My first Movie

I would appreciate any feedback you would like to give on my first imovie attempt. This one is an overview of my art projects. I plan to make more that document specific projects and will also incorporate video. Thanks for your feedback here.

Lost and Found?

Right after September 11, 2001 I wrote a short creed of what I believed in most. It was my best effort to pull myself out of feeling of despair and depression over a world gone mad. I tacked it to my office door and went on with life. I lost it after several years and recently found it again. I share it on this anniversary of 9/11 with a question or two weighing heavily on my mind; have we as a nation declared what we most believe in, or have we lost something?

My Creed

To always live a life full of love,
wonder and enthusiasm.

To listen for God's voice within me and
follow in Christ's example.

To be thankful.

To nurture others.

To create art that speaks to truth and beauty.

To be a faithful husband and parent,
inspiring teacher,
and lasting friend.

To be the best at what I do
and to learn from life.

To live my life without regret, fear, or malice
and to always remember
that love alone will carry me
across The Great River.

Fresh, Wild Eyes

Catherine Chalmers creates fresh, insightful, sometimes disturbing and always beautiful images of animal life. I saw her installation Safari at a recent show title "In and Around the Garden" at the Ackland Art Museum in Chapel Hill, NC. This video enraptured myself and those around me as we traveled along at a bug's eye level with creatures like salamanders, spiders, roaches, flies, and frogs. Better than any National Geographic Special from my childhood, I was transported into a wild world so foreign yet filled with such "familiar" characters. Reading the documentation on the exhibit I discovered that all the scenes were shot in her New York City loft; what a conceptually cool addition to a visually well made work of art. Check out her Website for more.

Update: Catherine has informed me that she has a larger show titled the entire American Cockroach project, of which Safari is a part, showing at the Boise Art Museum. You can see Safari in context with the rest of her workby taking a look at http://gallery.me.com/catherinechalmers

Meeting Ourselves in Meeting David Wilson

Searching the dial, I heard the familiar Tarheel accent come across the radio speaking of slavery. My back tightened uncontrollably. "Great." I thought "another argument on how the Civil War wasn't about slavery." Quickly, another voice entered the discussion, an African-American voice. Soon I learned both men had the same name, David Wilson, and were related historically as the relatives of an enslaved family and the family of their owners. What followed was a considered and balanced discussion on our heavy heritage we all carry in South.

Both David Wilsons had participated in creating a unique documentary titled "Meeting David Wilson" on the still lingering effects of slavery. The black David Wilson had uncovered his roots to slavery in Rokingham and Wilkes Counties, North Carolina and had the courage to come back and confront that heritage. What he found was a man that contradicted his own stereotypes. The White David Wilson is a thoughtful, kind, and carefully considering participant in this rediscovery. His qualified love of his family and his hope for a better world come across in this video. The Black David Wilson is equally intelligent and searching as he experiences unfamiliar territory and crosses lines drawn by race all too old and ready for erasing.

This is a ice breaking documentary worth buying, seeing, and sharing. That it happened in my own back yard makes it intriguing without lessening its universal importance. Its bravery and obvious longing for a better world make it eternally appealing.

Happy Birthday - What's Your Favorite?

This blog is one year old this month. I started it as a way to reach out and decrease my own sense of insulation I often feel as an activist artist. Searching for other artists making art with a social or ecological focus became a hobby. Soon I found other many wonderful things going on, some in my own back yard. Today, I have friends and contacts all over the world and do not feel so alone.

That community has resulted in good things;I am currently working with a group from across the state of North Carolina to pull of a conference of Human Rights and the Arts. Called an Anti-conference on Visualizing Human Rights it will be held on November 22nd, 2008, in the Global Education Center at UNC Chapel Hill. Artists from a wide range of mediums will share their activist art and working processes; students will share their own efforts, and face to face networking will abound. We hope to make this an annual event and move it to a national scale next year. I will provide links to the conference here as soon as they are created.

So what is your favorite entry on this blog from the past year? Mine is the kindergarten class dreaming for a better world.

I look forward to taking this blog into its "terrible twos", a year energized by new beginnings (only four more months!) and new focus on making the world a better place. Thanks for fulfilling the important role of reader.

Unconditional Love.....

"On September 11th, 2006, I packed my bags and headed to New York City for the 5th Anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center. Knowing that emotions would be running high on all sides of the political spectrum, I took a sign that encompassed the only thing I knew to be true: Unconditional Love is Global Security." - Bri Olson

Octavio Jones Photo Story on NC Migrant Conditions

Octavio Jones is a student at Randolph Community College and has taken some moving photos of migrant workers living conditions in North Carolina. Great job Octavio of showing the side on North Carolina that most of us never see. Click here and then press the play triangle to see and hear his photo essay.

287g: 1900 style

Watch this sad excerpt from Marko William's Documentary "Banished" on You Tube.

This Trains Gotta Stop!

The Quaker Service Committee's protest against the War, Eyes Wide Open, came to Greensboro several years ago. I along with my family visited the Old Downtown Depot ( recently remodeled ) to see this moving and sad installation. I just found a panorama online of this installation. The singing in the background makes it seem like a holy place. As each US death was marked with one pair of boots, today it could never fit within the depot. Along the outer edge children's and women's shoes were stacked in chaos to represent the civilian deaths. Today, they would need a mountain of shoes to do justice to their memory.

Be sure to direct your mouse upward to look upward at this amazing train station. I have been here to say goodbye to my son as he boarded the train to go to college. I cannot fathom the sadness of the parents who came here, to this memorial, to say goodbye once more to a loved one. This trains gotta stop, Mr. President.

Making Art, Not War, in Afghanistan

German artist Luis Berrios Negron traveled to Afghanistan in 2006 to hold a workshop with young artists and conduct an architectural performance in a notorious location, a Russian built, but never used, swimming pool and accompanying billboard. The location was used by the Taliban for executions including pushing victims to their death off the high diving boards. Check out this interview on Pigmag.jp to see what he and the students pulled off.

Liberty Wall? Eye Sore? Embarrassment?

Gaudencio Fernandez of Manassas, Virginia, has created a wall that expresses his frustration and anger over the treatment of undocumented immigrants in his community. Watch the below You Tube video to see the emotion and debate this wall has created. Here is what the wall , in its current state (it has been fire bombed and vandalized over the last year) says:

" PWC AND MANASSAS CITY THE NATIONAL CAPITAL OF INTOLERANCE European American(s) exterminated millions of Native Americans in order to steal America, they were the first illegal aliens. European Americans have a 500 year history of rape, theft, murder, slavery, articial borders, "Jim Crow" laws and deportations of Native Americans. Since 1866 THe KKK rode at night to torture, lych and kill blacks, native americans, and other people of color. Today the actions of PWC and Manassas city council, are similar to the colaboration between local governments and the KKK in the 1900's. On 2.25.08 Manassas city mayor Douglas S. Waldron said Iam proud that finally we came to an agreement with PWC to implement 287g because we care about our community. What community!? 287g is an agreement will immigration and customs enforcement to detain and question native americans by police officers at their discretion. PWC and Manassas city persecute us with our own tax dollars, because European Americans would rather hava ghost town than live among native americans. They ignore our voices, they ignore our civil and constitutional rights, there is no democracy.. stop the persecution, we demand equality, and justice for all. WE WILL NOT BE YOUR SLAVES OF THE 21st CENTURY. "

Our Time Has Arrived!

Art Activists! Our time has arrived. ArtVenture, in association with ARTICLE 19, has proudly launched the inaugural ArtVenture Freedom to Create Prize. The US$ 100,000 prize consists of three categories and is designed to recognise artists whose works promote human rights, free expression, empathy, equality and understanding.

"The winner of the main prize, open to artists in the visual, performing or literary arts, will receive $50,000, half to be donated to a group that furthers the artist’s cause. A $25,000 prize will be given to an artist younger than 18, with $10,000 for a scholarship and $15,000 to be donated to a cause. A final $25,000 will be awarded to an artist who is imprisoned for his or her work." - Sarah Lyall, New York Times Article

Submissions for the prize close on 31 October, 2008

Documentary Photographers at Their Best

Verve Photo's by line is "A new Breed of Documentary Photographer" and each entry has a freshness and strength that is refreshing. It has quickly become one of my must visit sites to regularly check out. Holly Wilmeth's kiss series is one of my favorite. Visit Verve to find your own.

Windpowered Dynamic Skyscrapers Oh My!

Architect David Fisher is building a moving skyscraper that generates its own electricity using built in wind turbines. It will be built in Duabi. This idea changes the whole paradym of building. Artists rock the world!!!!

Click on the title above to see another video on these new buildings.

Empire = Treasure

Empire Books is a treasure. This small, used book store in the shadows of Guilford College on W. Friendly Avenue is filled with beautiful art books, refreshingly uncensored and challenging texts, walls of paperbacks, and antique-cool books from the 20th Century. Owners Shane and Mark obviously love their collection. Many books that they take in are quickly covered in a protective clear covering. Like a Vet caring for sick kitten Shane commented "There, that's better" after covering one book I was buying today. The owners make selection like knowledgeable antique dealers cherry picking books that are small jewels whether for their content, imagery, or style. Each owner has their favorite topics. Their wall of art books is the best I have ever seen. I forever imagine that it is the complete collection of some blue chip artist or curator. Why Guilford students are not lined up to browse and buy from this treasure chest baffles me. Good for me and my semi-regular visit to look and leave with new treasures for my own collection.