Shaping audiences with care

Socially engaged artistic explorations often involve changing tactics and pivoting quickly to achieve their goals and reach their intended audience. The artwork of Studio REV- takes the form of sculptures, film, videos, prints, installations, dance, interactive media and performance that address the challenges and opportunities impacting the lives of low-wage workers, immigrants, teens and women. One of Studio REV-’s largest projects is the CareForce, a transmedia public artwork and two mobile studios (NannyVan and the CareForce One) that amplifies the voices of America’s fastest growing workforce, caregivers – and the diverse people who are championing the growing national movement for domestic worker justice. With the CareForce as a case study, this conversation between writer Gretchen Coombs and artist Marisa Morán Jahn, founder of Studio REV- and lead artist of the CareForce, consider how formal and informal pedagogical strategies activate an audience. Audience in this context can be a public, a community, or something more narrowly defined – as in the case of the CareForce – as domestic workers and domestic employers. First, however, is a brief description.