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Photo Credit: Toni Shapiro-Phim
An exploration of aspects of humanity’s relationship with particular bodies of water across the globe, this mural was created by students in the Fall 2023 Introduction to Creativity, the Arts and Social Transformation course, under the guidance of renowned Argentinian artist and human rights activist and scholar Claudia Bernardi. Students interviewed individuals in or from more than ten countries about their relationship with water, and about what’s at stake if we don’t address threats to water stemming from the climate crisis.
Read notes about interviewees' stories that inspired the creation of images that appear in the mural.

May 4, 2023
CAST celebrated its 2023 graduates: Nicholas Ong, Delaine Gneco De La Cruz, Erick Amezcua, Jacob Krah, Kobi Russell, Shawna-Gay Duncan, Hannah Taylor, Becky Goodfellow.CAST Affiliate David Sherman included a poem in his interactive speech to the graduates, and CAST Alum Rasheed Peters' 20 gave a keynote speech.

Lanterns created by the CAST students are displayed on campus within the Leonard Bernstein Festival of the Creative Arts in the spring 2022
In the spring CAST Project Practicum course, six students who had been part of the fall Design Lab: Emmanuel Hernandez Jacob Krah, Nicholas Ong, Fiona Ripp, Liz Sandoval, and Madison Sirois, chose to continue their collaboration with the Charles River Watershed Association and their explorations/interpretations of the oral history interviews they had conducted through a group public art project. (Two additional students joined them.) Guided by local artist Andy Li, and following extensive conversations with Watershed Association staff, the students decided to make individual lanterns, each amplifying messages from their individual oral history interviews – messages about the river and its future -- in a public art exhibition they called “Voices of a Resilient River” that premiered on campus during Brandeis’ Festival of Creative Arts. Each lantern, about three feet high, has four cloth panels, decorated (in images – using paint or yarn or found materials – and words). They light up from inside, powered by a solar panel that gathers energy by day. Together they are a statement about the precarity of the Charles River and people’s lives along it, given the climate crisis and lack of concrete action to combat it. Several of the interviewees showed up to view the lanterns at night on campus. And the Watershed Association, who will keep and use the lanterns, has already put them to work during an action related to advocating for dam removal in Watertown.

March 30, 2023
CAST Design Lab students received an Award for "those who have demonstrated meaningful environmental improvements at a young age, recognizing their contributions toward a more sustainable future."
December 10, 2022
Film festival featuring short films by the students of CAST 170A: Documenting Immigrants Experiences class. The films explored Muslim identity, community, and unity themes to promote further understanding, acceptance, and inclusion.
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