The Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Center
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The Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center brings together diverse experts from around the world in a collaborative environment to address global challenges. It hosts small conferences on topics aligned with the Foundation's mission of promoting global well-being. The Center also offers writing and arts residencies to support focused work in a serene setting that fosters interaction with other innovators. Both the conferences and residencies have led to meaningful advances on issues like public health, agriculture, and the environment by convening diverse perspectives from different sectors and geographies.
The Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Center
- 2. International Conferences On Global Issues The Bellagio Conference Program provides space for exchanging ideas across disciplines and geographies, engaging in focused small group interactions, and pushing creative and innovative thinking to address global challenges. Conferences must be consistent with the Foundation’s mission to promote the well-being of humanity through- out the world. In particular, the selection committee looks for conferences that link to the Foundation’s dual goals: advancing inclusive economies that expand opportunities for more broadly shared prosperity, and building resilience by helping people, communities and institutions prepare for, withstand, and emerge stronger from acute shocks and chronic stresses. To achieve these goals, The Rockefeller Foundation works at the intersection of four focus areas – advance health, revalue ecosystems, secure livelihoods, and transform cities – to address the root causes of emerg- ing challenges and create systemic change. The Foundation seeks applications from conference orga- nizers who expect their conference to catalyze and scale transformative innovations, create unlikely partnerships that span sectors, take risks, and to generate innovative yet concrete outcomes. PARTICIPANTS: Bellagio conferences (and the Bellagio community as a whole) are designed on the principle that the best idea gen- eration is produced by groups with diverse perspectives. Conference organizers are encouraged to invite relevant key figures from multiple sectors (academic, public, private, not-for-profit, and multilateral organizations) and from diverse geographic areas. FACILITIES: The Center operates two buildings for meetings: one that can accommodate up to 19 participants, the other, up to 23. The small size of Bellagio Center meeting spaces has shaped a tradition of small, face-to-face participatory meetings. Conferences are generally scheduled for five days or fewer, including arrival and departure days. Room and board are provided to all conferences participants at no cost, and limited travel assistance is available. For details, visit www. rockefellerfoundation.org/bellagio-center. APPLICATIONS: Conference applications are accepted on a rolling basis, For details, visit www.rockefellerfoundation.org/bellagio-center. Writing & Arts Residencies The Bellagio Resident Fellows program offers a serene setting conducive to focused, goal-oriented work, and the unparalleled opportunity for interaction with fellow residents from a stimulating array of disciplines and geog- raphies. The combination of uninterrupted, individual time during the day and evenings spent with innovative leaders, writers, and artists from a wide array of fields advances fellows’ current projects and stimulates creative approaches to future work. The Center also offers collaborative residencies for two to four people working on the same project. LENGTH OF STAY: Residencies typically last four weeks, but applicants may request a shorter period. ACCOMMODATIONS AND TRAVEL ASSISTANCE: Residents are housed in two main buildings and each resident is given a private room with a bath and study/ studio. Internet access is available in all bedrooms and most studies. A small library includes basic reference books and online research tools. Spouses/partners may accom- pany the resident. Accommodations are not available for children, other family members, friends, or pets. Room and board are provided to all residents at no cost, but residents are responsible for airfare and local trans- portation to and from Bellagio. To help offset costs, the Foundation offers a limited travel assistance grant based on the income level of invited residents. APPLICATIONS: Deadlines vary for the residencies. For details, visit www. rockefellerfoundation. org/bellagio-center. “Comprised of experts in different fields from both developed and developing countries, the meetings were friendly and open… As a result of the Bellagio eHealth conferences, palpable action is taking place.” —Catherine Omaswa, Chair of National eHealth Steering Committee, Uganda, eHealth Conference, Bellagio Center Conference The Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center brings together people of diverse expertise and backgrounds in a thought-provoking, collaborative environment to generate knowledge and innovative solutions addressing a wide range of global issues. Since the Center’s establishment in 1959, we have seen the powerful results of investing in and unleashing human creativity. >> The Bellagio experience fosters a robust exchange of ideas between scientists and artists, theorists and practitioners, those who make policy and those who are affected by it. Located in northern Italy on Lake Como, the Center convenes diverse actors and perspectives to generate solutions to critical social, political, health, environmental and economic challenges. The Rockefeller Foundation’s history with the Bellagio Center began in 1959, when Ella Holbrook Walker offered her home “for purposes connected with the promotion of international understanding.” Dean Rusk, the Foundation’s president at the time, accepted her generous donation and embraced its enormous potential. >> For more than 50 years, the Bellagio Center has served as a place for meaningful advances throughout the world. It was a staging ground for efforts to mobilize an agricultural revolution that saved a billion lives in Latin America and Asia. It was the setting for negotiations and agreements that made it easier for people from around the world suffering from HIV/AIDS and other devastating afflictions gain better access to vaccines and medications. This legacy, the serene work environment on the shore of Lake Como in northern Italy, the diverse groups of people, and the promise of future achievements make Bellagio an inspiring and productive forum for fostering positive change. “My Bellagio residency convinced me that I wanted to devote the rest of my career to public-policy research… with a focus on energy, technology, and national security.” —John Deutch, Institute Professor at MIT, former Director of Central Intelligence, Bellagio Center Resident TheBellagioCenter TheHIstory
- 3. For more information, please visit www.rockfellerfoundation.org/bellagio-center or contact [email protected] or +1.212.852.8362 “Forsmallideas,youcangotoanyretreat,buttothinkexpansive, fearless ideas and then design something innovative and coura- geous to put them into practice, there is no place like Bellagio.” —Seth Berkley, President and CEO, International AIDS Vaccine Initiative, AIDS Vaccine Conference, Bellagio Center Confer- ences and Residencies art direction and Design: © Emerson, Wajdowicz Studios / www.DesignEWS.com