Here you can find out about Daniel’s work as a consultant for a wide range of organizations across the United States focused on programming, communications, evaluation and the cultivation of group learning.
About Daniel
For nearly twenty years Daniel Tucker has been working at the intersection of art, education and activism in a wide range of community and institutional settings. His work in Chicago as founder of the magazine and event series AREA and as co-organizer of the oral history and archive project Never The Same demonstrate his strong commitment to working deeply in a place. As the founding Director and Assistant Professor of a Masters degree program in socially-engaged art at Moore College of Art & Design, he created a curriculum training the next generation of socially engaged artists. In this role he co-organized the In/Out Summer Symposium with Mural Arts Philadelphia and convened Conversations@Moore a regular lecture series featuring national and local presenters. In 2018 he completed the “Art of Leadership” program with the Rockwood Leadership Institute.
He works as an artist, writer and organizer developing documentaries, publications, exhibitions and events inspired by his interest in social movements and the people and places from which they emerge. His writings and lectures on the intersections of art and politics and his collaborative art projects have been published and presented widely and can be seen here on the portfolio miscprojects.com. Today he is based in Philadelphia with his wife Emily in addition to his work at Moore he is working as a consulting curator/advisor on a significant number of local and national projects.
Daniel’s Past Clients & Partners
In recent years his services have been sought out as a consultant for organizations including A Blade of Grass (New York City), Alliance of Media Arts and Culture (San Francisco), Block Museum at Northwestern University (Evanston), Center for Urban Economic Development at UIC (Chicago), Creative Time (New York City), Futurefarmers (San Francisco), Kansas City Art Institute’s Social Practice Certificate Program (Kansas City), Metropolitan Tenants Organization (Chicago), Mural Arts (Philadelphia), Pew Center for Arts & Heritage (Philadelphia), RAE Consulting (Philadelphia), School of the Art Institute of Chicago’s Department of Exhibitions (Chicago), and the University of California Institute for Research in the Arts (statewide),
As an external advisor he has supported the work of Threewalls, Art & The Public Sphere, Journal of Aesthetics & Protest (Los Angeles), Taller Puertorriqueño (Philadelphia), Temple Contemporary (Philadelphia), Leeway Foundation (Philadelphia), Chicago Torture Justice Memorials (Chicago), and he has served on the selection committee for Open Engagement’s conference (National), A Blade of Grass fellowship (National), ACRE Residency (Wisconsin), and numerous projects initiated by Mural Arts and Mural Arts Institute (Philadelphia). He is frequently sought out as an informal advisor to discuss community engagement strategies in the arts.
His curatorial projects have been presented at Kentucky Museum of Art & Craft, Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, Rowan University Art Gallery, Mess Hall, Gray Center for Arts & Inquiry at University of Chicago, University of Pennsylvania Kelly Writers House (Philadelphia), Columbia College’s Averill and Bernard Leviton Gallery (Chicago), Augustana Teaching Museum of Art at Augustana College (Quad Cities), Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts (Grand Rapids), Cuesta College’s Harold J Miossi Art Gallery (San Luis Obisbo), Texas State Galleries (San Marcos), Kalamazoo College Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership (Kalamazoo), PNCA Center for Contemporary Art & Culture (Portland), and the University of Louisville Hite Art Institute (Louisville).
Daniel’s work in Teaching, Public Speaking & Writing
As an educator he has taught and designed courses for Moore College of Art & Design, Ox-Bow School of Art, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, University of Illinois at Chicago, and served as an artist-teacher at Vermont College of Fine Art. He has given guest lectures in classes at over 30 colleges and universities across the United States.
He is frequently sought out as a public speaker for conferences including Imagining America and the Creative Time Summit, and both nationally and internationally at exhibition venues ranging from the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia to Centro José Guerrero in Granada (Spain). He has also been a keynote lecture on his research dealing with mapping and community art for the Art and Design faculty retreat by Columbia College (Chicago) (with Rebecca Zorach) and for the North American Students of Cooperation annual institute (Ann Arbor).
His writings have appeared in numerous publications and books. In 2014 he edited the book Immersive Life Practices (SAIC for Chicago Social Practice History Series) and his book “Organize Your Own” is entering its third printing this year. Tucker has a forthcoming interview in the Creative Placemaking Handbook (Routledge, 2020) and is under contract for a book about art and urban life with Onomatopee press in 2021. A major part of his practice has been interviewing others – 75 such interviews can be seen here https://miscprojects.com/writing/interviewing/
Tucker’s collaborative art work has been exhibited/screened at over 100 organizations, institutions and work has been funded by numerous foundations and he has completed numerous residency programs. You can read more about that work at miscprojects.com
In addition to his work in the arts he is known for his work in food activism following the release of “Farm Together Now: A Portrait of People, Places and Ideas for a New Food Movement” (with co-author Amy Franceschini and photographer Anne Hamersky) which was published by Chronicle Books in late 2010 and was picked by Michael Pollan as the best food book of that year in Grist and received extensive media praise (see farmtogethernow.org). He has also been featured as a keynote for this work at the 15th Annual Healthy Foods Local Farms Conference (Louisville) and the Connecting Community Gardens (Chicago).
Daniel Tucker 