Billed as “a summer celebration of the Richmond Arts community,” the Institute for Contemporary Art at Virginia Commonwealth University will host a kind-of neighborhood potluck on Saturday.

In addition to showcasing the three newest exhibitions at the modern art museum, “ICA Full House” will offer up food, music, activities and fellowship with representatives from more than two dozen local arts groups in attendance. Most importantly, for artists, there will be panel discussions that discuss a creative future rendered uncertain by AI and recent cuts in federal arts funding.

“Even though we’ve historically received very little funding at the federal level, we have to be thinking about our future,” says Jessica Bell Brown, the ICA’s executive director. “If one cultural institution in our city is feeling it, that means we’re all feeling it.”

The event coincides with two newly-installed exhibitions at the modern art museum from artists Julien Creuzet and sculptor Lily Cox-Richard as well as a five-person group show that explores art from the Caribbean and its diaspora, “Ayida.” ICA Full House will also introduce Cambodian-infused dishes by the museum’s first-ever chef-in-residence, Santana Hem, and offer culinary fare from the museum’s Abby Moore cafe as well as local eateries such as Olive Major, VegTable and Ruby Scoops ice cream.

There will be plenty to do. In addition to recording sessions offered in the VPM + ICA Community Media Center, Studio Two Three will be on hand to create complimentary screen prints — visitors are free to bring blank T-shirts or bags. Elsewhere, Circle Thrift will hold a make-and-take crafting service to decorate everything from key chains to phone cases. There will be remarks from Brown, VCUarts Dean Carmenita Higginbotham, ICA curators Amber Esseiva and Egbert Vongmalaithong, and guest curator Serubiri Moses, and the afternoon’s soundtrack will be provided by DJs from WRIR 97.3 FM.

“We’ve always had celebrations to mark the opening of new exhibitions,” says Mimi Luse, the ICA’s head of program production. “But because of the current moment we’re in, a moment of big transition and change, we thought we should gather [the arts groups] together under one roof, meet each other and talk.”

The event will include panel discussions on how artist-run spaces can respond to shifts in public funding, and how algorithms and AI will impact creatives (and how best to respond). “Artists run spaces in 2025 are very different than they were in 2024, given all these funding cuts,” Luse says. “We wanted to sort of take a temperature check and see how everyone’s doing, give everyone an opportunity to make their voices heard.”

The discussion on algorithms promises to be lively, she adds. “We will look specifically at how different creators have reacted to the way that the algorithm is a machine that sort of monetizes your art, and everyone on the panel has really different takes on that. Do you avoid the algorithm? Do you embrace it? Do you try to jam it up? I mean, is there even a point in resisting at this point?”

The dialogue won’t end on Saturday, she says. In the coming months, the museum will offer special programs on topics important to working artists. “We’re going to be offering workshops on artist finances in the Fall, a two part workshop that will involve things like filing your taxes as an artist.”

It’s all part of a concerted effort on the part of the ICA leadership to be, as Brown puts it, “a soft landing for the local arts community.” Organizations slated to table and network at Saturday’s event include 1708 Gallery, The Anderson, ART 180, Black American Artists Alliance of Richmond, Black History Museum and Cultural Center of Virginia, The Branch Museum, Candela Books + Gallery, Circle Thrift, Creative Mornings Richmond, Downtown Neighborhood Association, Envelope, Exposure Cinema, Firehouse Theatre, Good for Her Films, Hand/Thrown, Hard Light Cinema, Main Projects, Milk River Arts, Mycelium Works Collective, Oakwood Arts, Richmond Public Library, Richmond Urban Dance / The House, Shockoe Records, Studio Two Three, Sultry Gallery, The Valentine, VCUarts, VCU Division of Community Engagement, Visual Arts Center of Richmond, VMFA and WRIR.

“The ICA is the largest contemporary art institution in the city,” Luse says. “We have a lot of space and we want to share that space with the arts community and be sort of like a big umbrella where folks can connect with one another. I think that it would be foolish of us as this big institution not to acknowledge what’s happening, and to bring people together to talk about it. It’s important for us to look honestly at what’s going on.”

ICA Full House will take place at the Institute For Contemporary Art at VCU on Saturday, Aug. 23 from 1-4 p.m. The event is free. https://icavcu.org

Correction: There was a typo in artist Julien Creuzet that was corrected.