Look Past The Eyes

Shirin Neshat is a Iranian expatriate who has been making video art for years on the experience of being a women in Persia. In September, she won the Silver Lion Award for best director at the 66th Venice Film Festival for her first feature film, Women Without Men. Here is an interview of her I found on YouTube. A trailer for her movie is on YouTube but you must sign in to view it- apparently something in it requires you to be a mature viewer. In Women Without Men, Shirin shows us the lives of four women seeking freedom against the backdrop of 1953 Military Coup that installed the Shah. Like many good artists, her work was one step ahead of the world and although she began work on it 6 years ago it speaks to the current Green Movement's struggles in Iran.

Take time to sign into You Tube and look up "Women without Men" it is worth seeing and will be worth watching in its entirety when it comes to the states.

Dan adds new meaning to "My house is your house."

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Dan Phillips is showing the rest of us how to really recycle! Time to check out Hunstville!

Whose gonna whipe your baby's face.....who's gonna build your wall?

These images are in black and white but Tom Russell's questions are relevant and of the moment. When we finally settle health care reform are we gonna be brave enough to tackle immigration reform? If not, why? Time to ask these hard questions. Thanks Tom for using the art of your song writing to look at this issue straight on- I'm afraid of the golf shirt crowd too.

My Own Four Walls Project

Diane Nilan is trying to open all our eyes. Wake up America.

Leap Before You Look

by Linda Faltin


Look before you leap, the old adage tells us.
Play it safe.
Better safe than sorry.
Never talk to strangers.
A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
Birds of a feather flock together.

But what kind of life portrait
would we paint if these words
formed our only palette? if
coloring inside the lines in
black and white and shades
of gray were preferable to
living life in the rainbow hues
of daring and delight?

Sometimes the only way to
grow is to make a leap of faith.
unsure of where or how you'll land
but certain that the landscape
of your life will change...
and how, pray, tell, will you ever
make new friends if strangers
are off-limits? out-of-bounds?

So- we need new adages, it seems to me:
Leap before you look.
Play it daring.
Better sorry than always risk-free.
Smile at strangers...dare to engage.
Those birds in the bush have a song worth hearing.
and with arms open wide, welcome every "kind"
into your flock.

Now, that's a life in living color!




(Linda dedicated this poem to me. Thanks Linda, you have no idea how much this means to me.)

Krystle Warren

Found this on a perfect autumn day. She's from Kansas City and has become a big deal in Europe.

Blu and David Ellis prove all it takes is imagination (and hard work)

COMBO a collaborative animation by Blu and David Ellis (2 times loop) from blu on Vimeo.

This installation painting project's site struck me as the perfect symbol for the Great Recession we are in. These artists take what looks like an abandoned Italian apartment courtyard and give it new life. I hope this video is going viral. Now, if we could make their creativity infectious we might just all survive.

Make Art Not War- Art Therapy for Terrorists

This is for real. Amazing.

Maya Lin's Last Monument

credit


What is Missing is Maya Lin's self proclaimed last monument. If you have walked the slight grade of the Vietnam Memorial and felt the slow rise of the names in black stone, then you know the feeling she is after with this monument. In this instance, it is the slow disappearance of species after species, habitat after habitat, that our mindless human activities is erasing from the planet. The non-traditional memorial take form in many ways, including digitally. Check out Lin's website on the project. Haunting.

Saving Eden

Sitting in the audience last night at the 1st annual Land Jam I was touched to hear this song about the very place where I work; Rockingham County and Eden, NC. Laurelyn Dossett's song Leaving Eden sums up the struggles in that community, the plant closings, and the death of so many opportunities. I and my colleges are working to give them another option; education and in my case, creativity.

Gary Gresco Doesn't take it sitting down

THe City of Greensboro blew it when they listened to the trite complaints of a few community members and removed a wonderful sculpture from the new greenway in Greensboro. Gary speaks the truth in this News and Record article. Sorry Gary. Your benches were awesome. I apologize that my community cannot elect smarter officials. It's a direct result of our less than acceptable public education where art and art appreciation have gone the way of dial phones and typewriters. I hope the publicity from this gets you 15 more grants. I guess all those "no-good bumbs and prostitutes" are gone now from the streets of Greensboro. What a shame that your art attracted them.


Removal of public art was a desecration

BY GARY GRESCO

When I first poured my heart and soul into the Warnersville bench installation, I had no idea this art project would have such a profound impact.

How could steel and stone be responsible for the ills of this community? Especially when there are so many other benches throughout Greensboro. This question was a major topic of conversation at the Tri-State Sculptors' annual conference at Elon University last weekend.

I have reached some conclusions. The Warnersville bench was removed to thwart the very words inscribed on each segment. They are:

-- Remove Endurance and replace it with surrender.

-- Remove Triumph and replace it with failure.

-- Remove Faith and replace it with apathy.

-- Remove Strength and replace it with weakness.

-- Remove Hope and replace it with despair.

Read rest of article


AMAZING Comment by Zhak on News and Record Comment Board:


"One summer evening a couple spotted five freshly varnished chairs glowing in the moonlight in the Warnersville neighborhood. He wished to sit on the chair marked 'endurance.' She had only ten minutes to spare so vetoed the idea. She wished to sit on the chair marked 'faith' since she had not yet seen his wallet. He suggested 'triumph' as he looked forward to having his way without the benefit of responsibility or character. She preferred 'strength' as would she have the strength to make it through one more shift. Neither considered 'hope' as this seat was taken by the community that hoped by some miracle someone would make this whole situation go away."

Moore, Sandburg, Woodie

I watched Moore's newest movie "Capitalism-A Love Story" this weekend and realized that he is the living voice of straight talkers like Carl Sandburg and Woodie Guthrie - survivors from our last economic disaster. They saw the plight of the common man and recognized that it was piss not rain falling on their heads from those "above" them. I've posted some of my favorite Guthrie songs here. Also, here is one of my favorite Sandburg poems- worth following the link and reading it all.



TO A CONTEMPORARY BUNKSHOOTER

by Carl Sandburg

You come along. . . tearing your shirt. . . yelling about
Jesus.
Where do you get that stuff?
What do you know about Jesus?
Jesus had a way of talking soft and outside of a few
bankers and higher-ups among the con men of Jerusalem
everybody liked to have this Jesus around because
he never made any fake passes and everything
he said went and he helped the sick and gave the
people hope.

Rest of Poem

Ahhh...Thank You Creative Muses!

Houx knows how to hoe a truthful tune

Long Train Home

More on Chris Smither.

Every generation lets something slip away. Sometimes it's a good thing- like Racism or Homophobia. Sometimes it's not so good. I wonder if we have let the feeling of the sacred slip away. Maybe it slid out between the teeth and gins of hypocritical preachers or between the shouts of Christians who want the Lord to be a Warrior rather than a Shepherd. Maybe it slipped away because we were too self conscious to teach our children to pray. Or maybe pop culture stole it when they made Christ into a bobble headed dash board toy. I don't know.

I find the sacred still. In nature, in art. In pastors like my friends Linda and Brady who speak the truth even when the truth is not popular. And in songs like this one.