The Talk Shop will be a temporary, experimental cultural center open in Midtown Kansas City for one year. It will be a vehicle for dialogue by hosting public events at which people will gather to discuss topics that matter in Kansas City, like education, transit or food issues.
We will have eight six-week programming themes. These themes will inform scheduled events as well as a certain number of programs that will be planned in response to ideas or issues that arise. The format of the events themselves will be varied, including exhibitions, hosted conversations, meals, or other types of gatherings that we come up with along the way. Overall, we hope to cultivate healthy conversation surrounding public issues in Kansas City by making them interesting, accessible, and enjoyable. The Talk Shop will involve individuals from the Kansas City community and beyond in an effort to both strengthen and diversify our own cultural landscape.
Our choice of venue informs the entire aesthetic of the project. We intend to design and implement an inviting, collaborative space for individuals from all walks of life. For this reason, we find it key to be located on Main Street; foot traffic, accessibility and centralization are all key to the format of the project. We want this project to create a participatory audience that is as diverse as possible.
We see this as an opportunity for cultural exploration. By choosing the main venue as a midtown storefront– a public, accessible, unintimidating environment (as opposed to an art space) –will be able to draw a more diverse crowd. They may not represent typical audiences at art events, and because of this they are valuable contributors and participants within the community.