2019:Diversity/Creative Diversity

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Diversity/Creative Diversity

Title

The Rise of Creative Diversity

Description

How many of us find ourselves compartmentalizing our lives at work? Taught to package different versions of ourselves for home, work, and our extracurriculars? As an art director and hip-hop artist, Katrina Lenzly (also known as Cooley Savant) found herself doing just that. That is until she asked herself, "What would it look like to combine all of our passions into our creative careers?" In the Rise of Creative Diversity, Lenzly unpacks the pitfalls of workplace culture and how we can create our most authentic work when we approach work with our authentic selves.

Relationship to the theme

This session will address the conference theme — Wikimedia, Free Knowledge and the Sustainable Development Goals — in the following manner:

Our creative industries don't just need innovative leadership. We need leaders that empower innovators. We need to rethink workplace culture and allow each other to think and create uninhibited. In my presentation, "The Rise of Creative Diversity", Lenzly examine how multi-hyphenate creators like Jaden Smith and Elon Musk are defying creative limitations. Lenzly interviews local creatives like ballroom dancer/interactive designer, Akmyrat Tuylivev, and photographer/graphic designer, Temi Coker, who explain how combining seemingly unrelated skills has broadened their career opportunities. In addition, she shares the 3 keys to breaking out our own inner creative diversity and end with an acoustic performance of my most successful single "Climate Change". "The Rise of Creative Diversity" encourages us to blend our skills and present our authentic-selves in the workplace. With humor and engaging presentation design, this presentation affirms the unlimited possibilities of design when we bridge our skills to disrupt, create, connect, and engage.

Session outcomes

At the end of the session, the following will have been achieved: Like many of us, Katrina Lenzly was told that to be successful in her career she had to 1.) Pick one skill, 2.) Be marketable, and 3.) Make all other skills a hobby. By the end of this presentation, participants will learn how to grow

1.) Free from Self-subscription — by allowing personal experiences to influence our work, we create our best, most authentic work.

2.) Show and Tell — we risk our best work when we fail to share what we do outside of our respective "jobs".

3.) Vacate the Vacuum – our creative work is only as bold, authentic, and diverse as our lives are. Break out of the bubble.

Session leader(s)

• Katrina J. Lenzly

Usernames

Affiliation/country

• United States

E-mail contact

Session type

Each Space at Wikimania 2019 will have specific format requests. The program design prioritises submissions which are future-oriented and directly engage the audience. The format of this submission is a:

• Lecture

Length of session

30 minutes

Supporting work

Optional:

• My website: www.seecooleyplay.com
• Can provide a video of past lecture to Turner Broadcasting upon request

Requirements

The session will work best with these conditions:

• Room: Lecture hall with projector and screen

• Audience: This lecture is appropriate for a mid-sized audience of 30-40. They do not need prior knowledge of this subject

• Recording: Recording is appropriate with a single fixed-location camera, sharable on the internet, with a free-licence