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Designing for Dignity 03


On October 24 + 25, 2025, the MCA Chicago will host Deem Journal’s third annual symposium. Designing for Dignity 03: A Convening of Possibilities will carry forth the thematic discourse of the past two years’ gatherings with a day of hybrid in-person/online programming dedicated to expansive perspectives on liberatory design thinking.

Tickets available August 27


2024 Symposium
2024 Symposium
2024 Symposium
 Participants
Theaster Gates +
Duane Powell +
Edra Soto +
Ghian Foreman +
Andres L. Hernandez +
Katherine Darmstadt +
Radha Mistry +
Nadia Elokdah +
Cate Fox +
Struti Suryanarayanan +
Marz Lovejoy +
Mabel Wilson +
Nu Goteh +



ProgramFriday October 24, 2025
WELCOMEWelcome Pre-Partyhosted by Chicago Architecture BiennialOur partners at Chicago Architecture Biennial invite you to start the weekend with a pre-party at Rebuild Foundation's Stony Island Arts Bank. The space of this former savings and loan was restored by artist Theaster Gates and reopened in 2015 as a hybrid gallery, library, media archive, and community center aimed at preserving Black culture and artistic expression. This fall, it serves as a site of the Chicago Architecture Biennial, hosting five installations by architects and designers from around the world. 

Please note: The pre-party is free to attend and is only a 5 minute drive/15 minute walk from the St. Laurence Elementary School, where the Deem Symposium pre-programming will begin at 7PM.
EXPERIENCEMulti-Sensory Placemaking: A Social Practice Experience
Theaster Gates, Nu Goteh, and Duane Powell Deem’s third Symposium will open with an evening of conversation, music, and mingling in partnership with Rebuild Foundation and onsite at the St. Laurence Elementary School on the South Side. This celebratory kick off event brings full circle the cover story with Theaster Gates that grounded Deem’s fourth issue, and which took place here exactly three years ago when the building was still under construction. Friday’s program will offer a full-circle, embodied experience of the now-finished space, initiated by a continuation of Issue 04’s conversation between Gates and cofounder/creative director Nu Goteh (which will expand on the multi-sensory potentials of placemaking as a mode of social practice) and followed by a sound experience presented by seminal Chicago house DJ and cultural guardian Duane Powell.

Please note: The Friday, October 24 event does not take place at the MCA and is ticketed separately. Please RSVP through Eventbrite.


Saturday October 25, 2025
KEYNOTEThe Place of DwellingEdra SotoThe kindness and love for humanity that imbue the work of artist and educator Edra Soto have proven the transformative power of art to inspire positive change. Soto will speak on how she strives to empower unheard voices and celebrate fellow creatives in order to build spaces for reflection, convening, and collaboration.
DIALOGUEOn Our Terms: Imagination and Urban SpaceGhian Foreman, Andres L. Hernandez, and Katherine DarmstadtThis panel-style conversation, moderated by architect Katherine Darmstadt, considers possibilities for spatial futures in Chicago. The speakers, each of whom are deeply enmeshed in imaging placemaking in this city, will speak about designing equitable approaches to urban revitalization and regeneration that are, both conceptually and functionally, by and for the communities who hold this city dear.
PRACTICE ACTIVATIONMemories of Tomorrow: A Meditation on Futuring Practices & Possibilities
Radha Mistry In a not so distant future, a not so simple reality persists: ten billion people are poised to want the same thing that we all do. More. Amongst a backdrop of increasing turbulence—think climate change, the encroachment of fascism, and the perpetual imminence of war—perhaps there is another way? But real things take time to grow. Architect turned speculative designer, educator, and storyteller Radha Mistry asks—what else might we imagine into being if we embrace a practice of slowness? A meditation on what could be.
DIALOGUEResourcing and Regeneration: Solidarity Economies for the NowNadia Elokdah, Cate Fox, Sruti Suryanarayanan, and Marz LovejoyA panel-style conversation with several other practitioners around designing solidarity economies for the present, with special consideration paid to the artists and culture workers who are most affected by our current administration's policies.
ENDNOTEFutures of MemoryMabel Wilson Architect, designer, and scholar Mabel O. Wilson shares her explorations on the complexities of the architectures of commemoration. She reconsiders how marginalized histories challenge conventional uses of archives and the design of commemorative landscapes in ways that catalyze new modalities of remembering and imagining possible futures.




Designing for Dignity 3: A Convening of Possibilities is made possible with support from the Richard H. Driehaus Foundation, the Graham Foundation, and is presented as part of the sixth edition of the Chicago Architecture Biennial.
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