Established in 2010 with support from the Office of the Provost, UF College of the Arts Creative B is a thematic program designed to engage students in the Summer B term through diverse, creative, innovative, and imaginative activities, and to center the University of Florida as a national hub of innovation and emergent interdisciplinary creativity.
This year's series Creative B programming that took place during the Summer B term (July 3 through August 11, 2023) was designed and presented as a lead up to the production of a 2024 biennial summit around the two-year theme of Recovery Through the Arts at UF College of the Arts.
Click here to learn about the history of the UF College of the Arts Creative B program and view a full overview of Creative B 2023 projects.
Creative B Summer 2023 projects featured in this video:
The Walking Station
Led by the UF School of Architecture | College of Design, Construction, and Planning. Through the Summer B term, the Walking Station located in the Reitz Union dispensed short (10-15 minute) and long (15-30 minute) walking experiences, along with short literature on the topics of walking, the mind-body connection, and recovery. Walking Station activities and literature promote the active exploration of campus while fostering participants’ connections with the environment and each other. Each walking experience includes detailed instructions and a complementary creative exercise, including collage, photography, drawing, and more.
Creative Gator at the Harn Museum of Art
Led by the Harn Museum of Art. Open to all UF Students, the Creative Gator at the Harn Museum of Art facilitated an inclusive and welcoming space with artmaking activities, mindfulness activities, museum tours, and demonstrations and performances by local artists and performers.
NOMFUSI: A Conversation About Resilience and Compassion from South Africa Through Music
Led by UF Performing Arts. UFPA hosted South African musical artist NOMFUSI for a cultural exchange through music, dialogue and conversation on health, women’s rights, and global healthcare support. With a voice rich in emotional vulnerability and nimble power, Nomfusi writes and sings from her experience, as a woman and as a child of a South African township. Her music flows from her homeland, shimmering with maskandi guitar flourishes and soaring melodies, while hinting at everything from house to '70s jazz to funk.
CAME Creative Connector
Led by the UF Center for Arts, Migration, and Entrepreneurship at the Harn Museum of Art, in partnership with One Nation One Project and the City of Gainesville. The CAME Creative Connector was an evening of networking and workshops supporting youth engagement in arts and cultural programs and events, and introducing opportunities for the public to engage with the upcoming Phase 2 of One Nation One Project GNV project that aims to promote wellbeing and reduce youth gun violence in Gainesville.
Recovery in Community Workshop Series
Led by the UF Center for Arts in Medicine and the UF Center for Arts, Migration, and Entrepreneurship. This project centers the voices and experiences of historically marginalized communities, artists and creatives, and students in a way that speaks to the universality of the human experience. South Florida’s Art Prevails Project partnered with UF CAM and UF CAME to present workshops in storytelling, poetry, and spoken word; and engaging panels and talkback conversations open to campus and the community at large.
Response & Recovery: An Artists’ Talk
Sponsored by the Center for the Humanities and the Public Sphere with additional funding from the Center for Arts, Migration, and Entrepreneurship. This artist talk convened a group of dance and theatre makers participating in Creative B residencies from San Juan, New Orleans, South Florida, and Gainesville for a thoughtful panel discussion about their work as it connects to expansive ideas of response and recovery.
Y No Había Luz: La Mar
Led by the UF School of Theatre and Dance. UF SOTD hosted Puerto Rico-based theatre company Y No Había Luz, along with guest dance choreographers from New York Live Arts as residency artists to engage with students on the concept of 'Disaster and the Body.' Learn more about Disaster and the Body in this Fall 2023 UF COTA In the Loop feature story.
Memorial for a Disease - COVID: Dialogues, Drama & Documentaries
Led by by the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences. Memorial for a Disease focuses on the guiding question: How can academics react to a collective trauma which brought about a global tragedy of unparalleled proportion? One way is to engage in a series of reflections and contemplation. In Gainesville, Fla., we remember those who are gone and recall what is left to be done.
Summer Dance Intensive
Led by UF School of Theatre and Dance. This transformative three-week dance intensive combines a rigorous schedule of classes with rehearsals, works-in-progress showings, artists’ talks, and special projects, culminating in a performance of works created during the festival. Directed by dance faculty member Rachel Carrico, this summer's guest artists included Lacina Coulibaly, critically acclaimed dancer, teacher, choreographer and co-founder of Kongo Ba Teria and Jarrell Hamilton, writer, choreographer, educator and founder of TBean Productions. Jarrell Hamilton’s residency is sponsored by the ongoing ‘Disaster & the Body’ research project funded by the UF Office of Research.
Sound-Sites in the Age of Utopian Recoverism: Art, Technology and Exhibition Practices
UF University Galleries exhibited the work of Amor Múñoz and Thessia Machado, two of the artists that won the first CIFO-ArsElectronica Awards in 2022, in the exhibition Sound-Sites in the Age of Utopian Recoverism: Art, Technology and Exhibition Practices. The exhibition and accompanying series of Creative B artist conversations, master classes, and more explore how the connections between art and technology can lead to rethinking problems related to our ways of inhabiting the environment.
UF College of the Arts is proud to sponsor Creative B programming with support from the Office of the Provost.
