How Do We Define Our Changing Communities? How Do We Serve Our Changing Communities?

Wednesday, October 21, 8:30 am – 10:00 am

Organized by Stuart Post, program officer, Independence Community Foundation.

Moderated by Marilyn Gelber, president, Brooklyn Community Foundation. Presented by Stuart Post; Arnold Lehman, director, Brooklyn Museum; Karen Brooks Hopkins, president, Brooklyn Academy of Music; Laurie Cumbo, executive director, MoCADA; Georgiana Pickett, executive producer and president, 651 Arts.

As in many American cities, Brooklyn’s demographics are in a constant state of flux. Neighborhoods change, but arts institutions remain rooted. Or do they? Four of the borough’s most dynamic cultural leaders—Laurie Cumbo, Director of the Museum of Contemporary African Diaspora Arts; Karen Brooks Hopkins, President of the Brooklyn Academy of Music; Arnold Lehman, Director of the Brooklyn Museum, and Georgiana Pickett , Director of 651 Arts—will discuss how they define and serve their changing pieces of Brooklyn. These four museums, presenters, and/or producers embody the best of Brooklyn’s cultural spectrum: they are large, small, and midsized; august, established, and emerging. Despite differences in size, age, or budget, they have grappled in creative, thoughtful, and complementary ways with that most basic but often elusive question: where is our community and how can it best be served? (And how has that ongoing search been impeded by the economic crisis?) This freeform roundtable will be moderated by Marilyn Gelber, President of the Brooklyn Community Foundation.