About
What is it?
The Art of Mass Gatherings is an experiential learning symposium that uses festivals as classrooms to activate an arts-focused approach to community resilience and emergency preparedness. It invites artists, event producers, and emergency professionals to come together to share knowledge and strategies for enhancing the safety, accessibility, and sustainability of large gatherings. By bringing together a variety of professionals involved in producing mass gatherings, event producers and emergency responders alike will become more fluent in each other’s craft.
The core framework of the Art of Mass Gatherings is these four pillars:
Safety, Accessibility, Sustainability, and Community Engagement
The Four Pillars
THE ART OF MASS GATHERINGS
The focus on arts and cultural events is strategic. “Producing over 120 festivals over 12 years led to the realization that people who set up festivals are skilled at creating temporary cities with all of the necessary infrastructure such as water, waste, power, security, transportation, and structures,” explains Matthew Kowal, co-founder of Majestic Collaborations. Many of the same skills required to produce safe, accessible, sustainable live events are transferable to contexts requiring any combination of the development of temporary infrastructure, management of large groups of people, and support of community mental health and wellness.
By sharing their knowledge and building skills in these areas, artists and event workers create more inclusive events, expand the safety and resilience of their entire communities, and increase qualifications for a range of job opportunities both in and outside of the arts.
Working with locally-based host committees, Majestic Collaborations customizes each symposium to meet the specific needs of the areas in which they are held. Topics at past events have included mental and physical first aid, power systems, stages and structures, alternative energy design, and cultural asset mapping to identify unique regional capacities for creative resilience. Presenters include both local luminaries and special guest experts from around the nation. Attendees take turns as students and teachers, fostering learning and professional networking at the intersection of event production and emergency management.
See it in action
This short video shows footage from our Art of Mass Gatherings event in Greensboro, North Carolina at the North Carolina Folk Festival in September 2021.
Who's Involved?
What does it take to put on an Art of Mass Gatherings event, and who in the community is involved?
Host festival
An arts or cultural festival that serves as the host location of the Art of Mass Gatherings learning symposium.
Host committee
A group of local individuals who help ensure the local relevancy and success of the symposium. The host committee meets regularly online to plan the event. Members are invited based on availability to participate and sometimes subject matter expertise. Host committee members serve three primary roles:
Provide input related to programming
Identify and invite session presenters from within the community
Spread the word about this opportunity to their networks
Events tend to look like their organizers, so ideally the host committee comprises a diverse mix of arts and cultural organizations, emergency service agencies, and subject specialists that s inclusive of diverse demographics. We are grateful for the help of our local contacts and past presenters to help convene this committee.
Session presenters
A combination of local and national professionals who lead sessions at the symposium. Ideally some of the session presenters are festival staff who can give us an overview or tour of their event. Others will include safety, accessibility, and sustainability experts and advocates identified by the host committee in partnership with Majestic Collaborations. Majestic Collaborations will facilitate the involvement of nationally recognized presenters where appropriate in order to round out the content related to all four pillars.
Participants
Event producers, artists, emergency professionals, and activists: anyone who is involved in convening or stewarding large gatherings, and who would like to increase the safety, accessibility, and sustainability of their events. Students are also encouraged to attend!
Press
Spread the word! We rely largely on the festival producer and host committee to get local and regional media involved and help spread the word about the event to potential participants. A limited number of press passes are available for journalists to attend all or part of the event; request one by e-mailing us.
Sponsors (optional)
In-kind sponsors might include food/beverage providers, venues for event activities, photographers or videographers, advertising, or event equipment/services related to safety, accessibility, and sustainability. Paid sponsorships might come from local businesses, regional emergency services, venues, etc.
Advisory committee
Behind the scenes, we regularly convene national and international experts, advocates, and industry leaders who provide feedback and input about the relevancy of content, prioritization of specific kinds of learning outcomes, and program strategy for the Art of Mass Gatherings. Their input shapes the Art of Mass Gatherings program and curricula as a whole. Members of the advisory committee are not necessarily directly involved in the planning/management of any specific events.