Mentoring COMMUNITies to engage in meaningfuL, COLLABORATIVE change

 
 

Milenko Matanovic, founding Director of the Pomegranate Center in Seattle, WA, is a Slovenian-born artist and community activator. He helps parties arrive at shared goals using an art-centric facilitation process.

Milenko’s ability to drive collaborative decision-making across a wide spectrum of participants is the result of over 35 years of working with communities to create and own their visions for a sustainable way forward. His decades of work have been dedicated to improving livability, sustainability, environmental health and social vibrancy.

As citizens look for solutions to address climate change, housing shortages and changing economies, cities and towns will become the front line in implementing these changes quickly and efficiently. The time to promote courageous alternate visions on societal priorities and interactions is more urgent than ever, and it will require healthy collaboration in communities between governments, businesses, non-profits and citizens.

Milenko can help your community today.

 

Areas of Practice

Advising, Mentoring and Consulting

 

Milenko is available to consult, train and mentor governments, organizations, corporations, and community leaders and members.

He focuses on participatory planning, design workshops and creative placemaking, guiding leaders to collaborate in meaningful community engagement and rebuilding trust between groups.

Facilitation Training

 

The Pomegranate Method is a training program for facilitators based on decades of experience planning, convening and advising community collaboration projects.

The method was developed to quickly and efficiently tap into the collective wisdom of the diverse populations.

Speaking Engagements and Presentations

 

In demand as a key-note speaker and panel member, Milenko’s speaking engagements take him across continents where he invigorates audiences with stories and wisdom from his decades of on-the-ground experience.

Featured previous talks include: the Aspen Ideas Festival, Tedx, Poptech, Seattle Town Hall, Auckland and Christchurch Councils in New Zealand, Alaska Arts & Culture Conference.

learn more about Milenko

milenko is also an artist. learn more at:

  • “When beauty is baked into the design, more people use our malls, streets, bridges, and town squares and they do it with more enthusiasm, civility, and respect.”

    milenko

  • “I believe that every community now needs to invest in having courageous, fierce conveners who know how to connect the dots rather than promote their own ideas.”

    milenko

  • “I have a vision for our future, where we reclaim our time, our health, our creative energies, our community, our character and uniqueness, our air, water, soil. And we reclaim the spirit of democracy.”

    milenko

  • “Collaboration thrives in the process of gradual discovery in which ideas from multiple sources join to create a solution more potent than any single point of view.”

    milenko

  • "I enjoy pushing my artistic identity to the side to help others, encouraging scenarios where people can create something together, thinking and working as artists. Our collective works go not into museums or galleries but rather to specific sites in towns and villages. "

    milenko

Partners

Organizations Milenko has worked with include

  • “Milenko does a superb job leading an eclectic group of leaders from many different fields and perspectives in acts of collective, emergent imagining. He has an unerring ability to make a combined whole greater than the sum of its parts.”

    — Andrew Zolli, former curator, PopTech conferences

  • “He always appeals to the better angels of our nature. He gives everyone a voice and an opportunity to dream—to aspire and be something greater than what we are.”

    -Jock Edwards, Former Executive Director, Sherwood Trust

  • “I’ve heard many fine keynote speeches, but none better than Milenko’s. His combination of thoughtfulness, experience, wit and grace captivated his audience, and kept them coming back throughout the conference. He took time to get to know his audience, so he could meet us on our ground, and then help us view that ground in a new light.”

    — Daniel Kemmis, former Mayor of Missoula, MT and author of 'Community and the Politics of Place' and 'The Good City and the Good Life’

  • “AS A LIFELONG COMMUNITY ACTIVIST, I HAVE SAT THROUGH HUNDREDS OF CIVIC AND VOLUNTEER MEETINGS - MANY SUCCESSFUL, MANY NOT - AND ALL WOULD HAVE BENEFITED FROM MILENKO’S “GROUND RULES FOR COLLABORATION.”

    Deborah Szekely, U.S. Diplomat, Co-Founder of Rancho La Puerta and Founder of the Golden Door

  • “When we look at the fifty years of Milenko Matanovic’s art, two equally prominent aspects stand out: work within an (art) collective and the artist’s prevalent creative approach. In both, a harmonious relationship with the environment and the concept of the community as the fundamental node of spiritual dimensions play a crucial role.”

    Igor Spanjol, art curator and historian

  • "I have been both a student in Milenko’s trainings and a public sector partner on several projects. In fact, I found Milenko’s methodology around community engagement so compelling, I contracted him to provide his training to my agency, King County Parks, where more than 30 staff members were trained in his methodology. "

    Frana Milan, King County Parks

Get in touch

Interested in booking Milenko for a speaking engagement, advisory role or facilitation training? Or just looking to get in touch? Use this form or contact directly:

info[at]milenkom[dot]com

 

WHen To CONTACT MILENKO: