10/2/2021
Outpost update, Selby's "Fires," Hernandez and Balbas' "Meryenda," Native American hip-hop, Akimbola's durags, Lozano-Hemmer's border, Mason's video, Godin's border.
THANK YOU
First, I’d like to express my thanks to new subscribers, and also to those who have been with me since I started this newsletter. I really appreciate your presence, and enjoy receiving your comments and ideas!
OUTPOST UPDATE
The Monterey Poetry Festival reading last night was lovely and thought-provoking. It’s been awhile since I have done a poetry reading in a real bricks and mortar bookshop!
On impulse, and because I’ve found myself in more face-to-face social situations, recently, I visited the Virus Geeks tent at Hartnell College, and took the Covid-19 test. Incredibly fast and easy, and you can do the nose-swabbing routine yourself! Outcome: negative. Whew….
Remember the “White Rabbit” from the Rabbit Hole and Soundings sections of last week’s newsletter? That song is still running through my head! Clearly, I am haunted by my past, and possibly my future, too. Perhaps I should write more about this, but it will take some time to percolate.
Nonprofit work and the creation of a chapbook, The Epic of Waiting (to be published in 2022 by Old Capitol Books and Boukra Press) has been on my mind a lot during the last couple weeks. It seems to be all I can do to just continue with my bedtime drawings/doodles, which I now view as my nightly or early a.m. meditation practice. Larger, more thought-out works just aren’t happening right now. I assume that this is a phase, and I’ll get to it at some point.
ART
I don’t have any art that I particularly feel like posting here right now. So, that’s that.
(Well, you can always visit my website).
I do have a few links to some interesting sites (below) . . .
LINKS
Stacy Selby describes their substack newsletter, Fires, as being “specifically about wildland fires, colonization, ecology, culture, and current events, written by a former hotshot and wildland firefighter.” The fact that “colonization” is mentioned together with “wildland fires” by “a former hotshot and wildland firefighter” was enough to catch my attention. Check out “What Was California Like Before Fire Suppression, Part I” and read on…
Selby has another newsletter, Hermitage, that looks interesting, too.
Meryenda, is a newsletter by Jessica Hernandez and Cassandra Balbas (2nd gen. Filipino-/Americans). Meryenda explores “the complexities of Philippine food culture and diasporic food ways.” A glance through their titles (“What’s a Meal Without Rice?” “The Canned Food Conundrum,” and “Where Does Ube Really Come From?) tells you that they are not just writing nostalgic articles about Philippine style home cooking.
Native American hip-hop in Albuquerque (KQED): “Dancing an Indigenous Future: Native American Hip-Hop and Freestyle in Albuquerque.”
Anthony Akimbola wants his art to speak to people who are not necessarily fluent in the language of “fine arts,” so he uses everyday items to make art:
Artist and “nerd extraordinaire” Rafael Lozano-Hemmer uses technology to turn a critical eye on technology itself in “Borderlands – Extended Segment” (Art 21). In describing his project about the border between the U.S. and Mexico, he says: “You can’t – make an artwork about the Wall. People there are sick of the Wall. They want to talk about the ways in which the two societies interpenetrate. To create an artwork for listening is really what the project became.”
Isaac Fitzgerald goes on walks with interesting people, and publishes the interviews that go along with this activity in his newsletter, Walk It Off. Recently he went on A Walk Through Hell’s Kitchen with author Alexander Chee, and talked about things like the neighborhood itself, anti-Asian attacks (and processing rage), mentorship, writing novels, cooling off (literally), and much more.
SOUNDINGS
I always find great things in the Vancouver-based artists’ platform and community BOOOOOOOM! run by Jeff Hamada. For example, Sam Mason’s sweet and moving video animation for Mac Miller’s “Colors and Shapes,” about the childhood experience of growing up as an artist, with all its pitfalls, dangers, and beauty.
Nicholas Godin’s otherworldly “Border” (You may know Godin as a member of the duo “Air”:
Yikes, it’s midnight—the witching hour. Until next weekend, my friends . . .