Jim Walker
CEO, Co-Founder & Lead Artist - Big Car Collaborative
Big Car Collaborative - http://www.bigcar.org
Tube Factory - http://www.bigcar.org/project/tubefactory/
Listen Hear - http://www.bigcar.org/project/listen/
Indy City Futbol - http://www.bigcar.org/project/indy-city-futbol/
**Big Car is involved in many projects throughout the city. Please visit http://www.bigcar.org/projects/ to learn more. More than likely you have seen one of these projects but didn't know it was Big Car.
Whats your story? Big Car Collaborative
Started as a gallery in Fountain Square in 2004 in the Murphy Arts Center.
Moved from Fountain Square when it became more of a commercial district and found themselves in the Lafayette Square area and Haughville area.
Mission Statement: "We bring art to people and people to art."
Woodshop available in the basement of the Tube Factory. Initiative: To be a part of a bigger effort to help our city and neighborhoods.
Spark - The program at Monument Circle and City Plaza to help people gather and get comfortable. Ping pong tables, chess sets, chairs, couches, etc.
What is Placemaking?
Placemaking refers to a collaborative process by which we can shape our public realm in order to maximize shared value. (https://www.pps.org/reference/what_is_placemaking/)
What is Tactical Urbanism?
All about action. Also known as DIY Urbanism, Planning-by-Doing, Urban Acupuncture, or Urban Prototyping, this approach refers to a city, organizational, and/or citizen-led approach to neighborhood building using short-term, low-cost, and scalable interventions to catalyze long-term change. (http://tacticalurbanismguide.com/about/)
Spark Placemaking - Big Car Collaborative
Spark Placemaking is a placemaking and tactical urbanism program of the nonprofit Big Car Collaborative, working across Indiana and beyond. In this program, our team collaborates with communities who invite us to work with them to test and implement lighter, quicker, cheaperapproaches for people-focused public places and streets. Our work focuses on programming public places, not expensive design or build of public spaces that often then sit unused.
We work to foster connectivity, community, culture, and creativity through engagement-based partnerships led by artists, planners, and active citizens. We work to support livable streets, blocks, and neighborhoods in ways that benefit everyone. In addition to our work in Indianapolis, we are teaming up with local leaders and artists in Lafayette/West Lafayette and Fort Wayne – and we have worked in Indiana communities like Shelbyville and Richmond in the past. We have found that artist-led and community-driven placemaking as we approach it – free, inclusive, flexible, adaptable, site-specific, empathetic, human-scale – is very effective in communities of all sizes and with people of all backgrounds. (http://www.bigcar.org/project/sparkplacemaking/)
How are you funded?
Grants - Jim is also a grant writer.
Companies - funding from a company who is interested in using a local artist.
Cities - funding from the city to pay for the local artist who design the projects.
Jim Walker - Website Bio
Jim Walker leads Big Car’s work as a social practice artist, placemaker, community builder, designer, teacher, and writer who believes everyone deserves open access to the joys of art, creativity, and great public places. Jim — who worked previously as a journalist (writer, photographer, editor, and designer) for 20 years — is a student of cities and enjoys walking, biking, travel, and baseball. He lives with his family in the Garfield Park neighborhood.
(borrowed from http://www.bigcar.org/who-are-we/)
Jim Walker works as a public and social practice artist, placemaker, photographer, video and sound artist, designer and writer. He’s founder and CEO of Big Car, a nonprofit arts organization based in Indianapolis, Indiana. Walker began working as a journalist at age 16, writing and taking photos for his hometown paper in Warsaw, Ind. He enjoyed 20 more years in newspapers as a reporter, editor and photographer, finishing as an arts reporter for The Indianapolis Star in 2007. Along the way, Walker completed an MFA at Warren Wilson College and began showing photos, video, installation, and performance work in various galleries and art spaces. He’s influenced by Surrealism, Fluxus, Magical Realism, Futurism— people and ideas pushing boundaries of time, space, and perception. (https://herehere.us/aboutjim/)
Residency Project
Big Car owns 6 houses on Cruft St. right across from Tube Factory where local artists are able to live affordably.
Tasting session: Light Beer
Triton- Hometown Hero: http://www.tritonbrewing.com/beers/hometown-hero-golden-ale/
Crooked Stave - St. Bretta: https://untappd.com/user/Grateful75/checkin/537440864
Evil Twin - Tropical Itch: https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/24300/278959/
Leave us a review - https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/drink-culture/id1257831825?mt=2
Links
Prometheus Radio Project - https://www.prometheusradio.org
WQRT-LP 99.1 FM - https://www.wqrt.org
Bottom Level Tool Shop - http://www.bigcar.org/project/blt/
Hoosier Beer Geek - http://hoosierbeergeek.blogspot.com
The Disaster Artist Movie Trailer: https://youtu.be/cMKX2tE5Luk
The Room: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0368226/