A Toolkit for Gathering

Every profession gathers. From conferences to convenings, residencies to retreats, we each have discipline-driven concepts of what it means to get together. These default formats (conferences, retreats, meetings, critiques, residencies)—often shaped by habit more than intention—can limit what’s possible.

Defaults might seem efficient, but they rarely take full advantage of the value of getting together. There are simple ways to make professional gatherings more meaningful, productive, and joyful. This book presents a kit of tools on a spectrum from practical to poetic, alongside concrete, replicable tactics and provocations for new tools.

Originally conceived as the authors planned and participated in a two-day gathering at the residency program This Will Take Time in Point Arena, California in summer 2019, this book was written and designed over the subsequent year of COVID—a year of deferrals and uncertainty and impossible working conditions.