Shaken and stirred by recent news of refugees, and visiting family in England for a USA holiday of public gratitude, I did some historical research and wrote up this year's Thanksgiving grace to say before a meal:
we are by birth
luck
and timing
fortunate to be here
around this table
with food and family
not hiding
generally unafraid
we give thanks.
we celebrate this holiday together
two handfuls of Americans abroad
we bring with us
a 394 year old story
of pilgrims and natives
partying in peace!
foreigners and locals
reportedly celebrated
the harvest of 1621 together
with meat, sport
and few shared words
perhaps the pilgrims were toasting
the short lines at Wampanoag passport control
pre-Massachusetts:
where fugitives could disembark,
meet a friendly Samoset and Squanto,
be fed by strangers and be left in peace.
Thanksgiving is then a story of refugees well met -
Perhaps a useful modern parable
Whilst we manage the borders around our current prosperity
As others flee brutal darkness towards our glittering light
Today we dine where the pilgrim's exodus began:
They craved religion free from state control
So they fled the Church of England
They took a 66 day boat voyage
And they landed amidst the Wampanoag:
A tribe already decimated by diseases
newly imported by
Explorers, fugitives and refugees.
War and encroachment followed
with these visitors
until the original nations dissolved.
We here are children
more of the pilgrims than the natives.
we flew back to these shores,
maybe 7 to 10 hours.
we eat of the earth, sky and sea
our people have plenty to share
in our storehouses
and plenty to protect
So what loving Truth lies for us
In the "story of Thanksgiving"?
Perhaps that
It is good and rare
to be alive
With healthy family
And a laden table
And a pause long enough to recognize
what sobering riches
we have here today in our lives.
Who controls the media we see on the streets? Maybe advertisers, and maybe street artists. The graffiti scene is dominated by men, and many advertisers are targeting our insecurities. Not everyone can abide this arrangement.
Rachel Cassandra & Lauren Gucik were eager to see their voices appear on the street. They teamed up together and made street art in San Francisco. After discovering the power in their collaboration, they searched out other communities of women making street art. They found a vibrant female street artist scene active in Latin America, and they've chronicled the artists they met in their new book Women Street Artists of Latin America: Art Without Fear / Grafiteras y Muralistas en América Latina: Arte Sin Miedo.
In this interview, Justin Hall, a friend of Rachel & Lauren, learns from them about street art, respect for public space, and women speaking out with brilliant color in a macho culture.
Who controls the media we see on the streets? Maybe advertisers, and maybe street artists. The graffiti scene is dominated by men, and many advertisers are targeting our insecurities. Not everyone can abide this arrangement.Rachel Cassandra & Lauren Gucik were eager to see their voices appear on the street. They teamed up together and made street art in San Francisco. After discovering the power in their collaboration, they searched out other communities of women making street art. They found a vibrant female street artist scene active in Latin America, and they've chronicled the artists they met in their new book Women Street Artists of Latin America: Art Without Fear / Grafiteras y Muralistas en América Latina: Arte Sin Miedo. http://artesinmiedo.net or http://artwithoutfear.netIn this interview, Justin Hall, a friend of Rachel & Lauren, learns from them about street art, respect for public space, and women speaking out with brilliant color in a macho culture. You can find out more about this project on my web site at http://links.net/daze/15/11/21-women-street-artists-of-latin-america-an-interview-with-rachel-cassandra-lauren-gucik.html
Disclosure: these two people are close friends of mine & I contributed to their 2012 Kickstarter. I met Lauren and Rachel through my wife Ilyse, they are part of Revel art collective together. I have enjoyed many great life adventures with them since, and both were an intimate part of our wedding celebration. So I know about this project and the people behind it, and I am a backer.
The Justin Hall Show shifts between personal stories, performance and interviews. This is my first interview with two people, plus I shot with two video cameras and two mobile phones for four total angles. Three people, four angles each - there's a lot to play with.
Fortunately it turns out that street artists often have video cameras or timelapse filming during creation, and the web gave me reach to follow their Central and South American art trails through Vimeo or Facebook or Instagram or Flickr. So I had good visual source material to put behind our discussion about women and street art.
I enjoy street art but graffiti tags make me sad, most especially when people tag murals. Talking to these two deepened my understanding of the visual space of cities; I hope you find something worthwhile in what my two friends have made.
How about if I post a story here with names & specifics covered up for privacy's sake. There's a 150 year timer, after which time they are revealed. Hah!
The latest episode of the Justin Hall Show is live!
I've spent many hours happily hunched over the macabre city builder Rebuild on my iPad, rebuildgame.com, contributing just a few of the millions of games of Rebuild that have been played in the last few years. So I was eager to have a chance to learn from Rebuild's developer, Sarah Northway. Sarah herein describes Rebuild 3, her experience with open game development, her taste for the end of civilization, her voracious travel lifestyle, and the design of a game about wealth inequality. Please enjoy this latest episode of the Justin Hall Show! And consider supporting future episodes here: patreon.com/justin
I've spent many hours happily hunched over the macabre city builder Rebuild on my iPad, http://rebuildgame.com, contributing just a few of the millions of games of Rebuild that have been played in the last few years. So I was eager to have a chance to learn from Rebuild's developer, Sarah Northway. Sarah herein describes Rebuild 3, her experience with open game development, her taste for the end of civilization, her voracious travel lifestyle, and the design of a game about wealth inequality. Please enjoy this latest episode of the Justin Hall Show! And consider supporting future episodes here: http://patreon.com/justin
More episodes of the Justin Hall Show are coming, and I'm over $200 per episode on Patreon. I'm grateful for the folks who support me there, and the people who continue to watch these crazy irregularly scheduled productions. I'm having fun, I'm having good conversations, and I'm pushing my skills as a storyteller.
But I'm not making enough money to keep up with my expenses, so I'm hanging out my shingle as Transformative Communications Services - helping firms tell their story to recruit the right talent to help them grow.
In a few weeks, people will gather in a darkened room to watch overshare: the links.net story. I produced this documentary home video and released it free on the web so it might find its audience. I didn't expect that people would want to show it live so soon!
If you live in the San Francisco Bay Area, get thyself to Omni Commons this Tuesday 3 Nov, 5:30-8:00pm at 4799 Shattuck Ave, Oakland. I'll be there to help screen my film, and we'll enjoy a talk from Michelle Krasowski, experimental archivist from the Internet Archive.
Now I am wedded, to Ilyse Iris Magy. Our friends stepped forward into documentation roles that we had assigned to professionals, so our friends could just focus on their duties mingling with strangers. Fabrice Florin posted a photo gallery which links to our wedding web site - I hadn't thought about whether I would link it directly from my life here, and I still haven't, so for now it's just a hint in a Flickr photoset description.