Pollinator

The Pollinator Program is like a virtual residency of mutual support. Participants get matched with a small cohort of compatible peers, and work on your new website in good company.

How it Works

1. Get invited to join: All members are alumni from our network of vetted residencies, fellowships, and cultural institutions.
2. Match with an aligned peer circle: We place you in a dedicated cohort with five other members. These are your people. (One might even be your creative soulmate?)
3. Learn a new goal-setting method: Join video calls with your circle each week, guided by our curriculum.
4. Make real connections, and real progress: join the next Program cycle to continue cross-pollinating.

Network

Pollinator supports interdisciplinary practitioners across art, technology, ecology, and social impact. We are currently accepting alumni of over 50 institutions and programs. See https://pollinator.coop for the full list of institutions.

Team

We build collaborative technology for artists, by artists. We believe in the magic of human-to-human intelligence and see Pollinator as a way to strengthen cultural ecosystems through peer-to-peer connection.

Pollinator Co-Directors Caroline Woolard and Or Zubalsky are artists, educators, and technologists who have been collaborating for 15 years. From 2008-2018, they built and maintained TradeSchool.coop, an international peer-to-peer learning platform that was used in 30 cities internationally. Caroline Woolard is the co-founder of Art.coop, a national network of art and design cooperatives, and the co-author of Making and Being, a book about collaborative pedagogy. Zubalsky and Woolard have taught for over a decade at The New School, Rhode Island School of Design, Cooper Union, the School of Visual Arts, the University of New Mexico, Bennington College, George Washington University, and the University of Hartford. Learn more about Zubalsky here and Woolard here.

Zubalsky and Woolard got together to build Pollinator with a team of aligned engineers in 2024. The team at Minima has worked together since 2014 to deliver cutting-edge software-based solutions for corporate clients. Minima has built and managed widely used web, mobile, and server-side applications, including Apple's Music TV. Minima builds complex systems that scale, are maintainable, and cost effective. Minima prioritizes the end user across axes of accessibility, security, communication, and simplicity.

Praise

“We need more networks to connect us to share resources at this time.” —Wendy Woon Artist, former Edward John Noble Deputy Director for Education, MoMA

“Pollinator is something all artist-serving organizations want to offer but struggle to pull off alone. It's an investment in all the artists [and aligned peers] we're supporting across all 40+ organizations.” —Blair Benjamin, Assets For Artists

“We have been gathering artists and technologists across borders for over a decade. Finally, Pollinator can help us to connect people in small groups at scale on an international level.” —Mechu Rapela, Tenthaus Oslo

“Pollinator is a great idea because it takes existing networks of fellows and says: We’ve been missing an opportunity to interconnect Fellows. What if we did this in a meaningful way?” —Cate Fox, Center for Cultural Innovation

“The world doesn’t need another big tech platform; it needs pollinators— something fluid, alive, and relational. Circles foster interconnection, cross-pollination, and shared growth.” —Martin Pettis, YMCA

“Pollinator is another example of what the founder has been doing for the last fifteen years - finding ways to connect people in the arts so that they can support one another. She is persistent in her dedication and vision.” —Samuel Hoi, former president of Otis College of Art and Design and Maryland Institute College of Art