Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash I have intended to get back to posting here regularly for quite some time. I haven’t done that for myriad reasons but a lot of things have inspired me recently, and I’m finally motivated to get back to it. Tonight I am watching Digital Witness: Performance in the Era of Online-Only, a Zoom panel discussion hosted by SOMArts. It’s a smart, articulate, intriguing, edgy discussion about how performance artists are adapting to a digital forum in the era of COVID-19. Everyone Is Active On Screens Right Now It speaks to something I have been thinking about a lot lately, which I haven’t quite really been…
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Flamenco Dance Interview: Sintonia Presents “Tattooed”
There’s about to be a flamenco performance at the newly-renovated Presidio Theatre here in San Francisco. The performance looks powerful. The group performing it looks fascinating. And I’m excited to be able to share a dance interview with you below so you can learn more about all of it. But first, let’s discuss the performance and the group behind it … The Performance: Tattooed Tattooed is “an experimental flamenco dance performance about survivors’ strength and resilience.” Tattooed is a flamenco dance performance by Sintonia. The performance consists of “theatrical vignettes that utilize each dancer and musician as a player in the narrative.” It is about trauma and abuse. It explores how…
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Inspiration: Before the Writing, Between the Writing, Comes the Inspiration
Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash My favorite feeling in the entire world is inspiration. I love to be in love. I’m thrilled during days when I feel excitement. And I’ve even been known to thoroughly indulge in immersing myself in red-hot moments of anger … But if I could only feel one feeling for the rest of my life, I would choose inspiration every single time. Inspiration is that hard-to-capture feeling of being simultaneously aware of your complete interconnectedness with the world around you and yet sure that your voice matters in the big scheme of things. It’s that feeling that you have been so touched by something in…
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Creative Duo Interview: Orange Barrel Industries
A portion of the interview about this creative duo was originally published in Happily Hooked digital magazine. Orange Barrel Industries is the collaborative art business of creative duo husband-and-wife printmaking team Hannah and Blake. They are a witty pair who got married in a series of art events. They share on their website, “At first, Blake thought Hannah was some kind of itchy, excitable midget and Hannah found Blake to be an uppity ascetic. It turns out, they were both right, but they learned to love each other, anyway. They bonded over their shared passions of printmaking, drawing, cooking and hard work.“ I had the opportunity awhile back to interview…
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Interview with Thread Artist Ellen Schinderman
Ellen Schinderman is a self-taught thread artist based in Hollywood, California. She doesn’t focus on the labels of being a “feminist artist” or a “fiber artist”, preferring to just be an artist, working with thread as her medium. Nevertheless, her work offers powerful messages to and about women. Her work recontextualizes images of women, including images that may be considered pornographic. She works to remind us that women are not objects. Instead, we are thinking, feeling, amazing beings. She wants us to love who we are the way we are. Furthermore, she wants to support other women in doing the same. Those are messages she shares in her work as…
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Interview with Needle Felting Artist Weijue Wang
Needle felting artist Weijue Wang is an emerging Chinese feminist artist. She was born an only female child to a family in China. Now she lives in San Francisco. Weijue is navigating different identities and bringing her personal experience into her work. She works to approach difficult topics through humor and cuteness. Her art is in done in several mediums, particularly incorporating needle felting. This choice is a direct result of her own personal experience with cosmetic surgery, a practice her work regularly comments upon. We learn more from this interview. What are your earliest memories of becoming an artist? Before I was born, my dad’s best friend bought a…
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Interview with Director, Photographer and Activist Danielle da Silva
Photographer Danielle da Silva is a multi-lingual, multi-disciplinary artist and activist. Her art includes writing, photography, and filmmaking. Moreover, she is a public speaker, the Founder and CEO of Photographers Without Borders (PWB), and Co-Founder of the Sumatran Wildlife Sanctuary. Furthermore, Danielle also serves on the board of the Dandelion Initiative, a grassroots organization run for and by trauma survivors. Although she tackles many different projects from many different angles, a single thread runs through all of her work: “communicating the extraordinary efforts of people around the world working to solve the most challenging problems.” She took some time out of her busy schedule to inspire us with this interview: The artist…
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Interview with Mixed Media Artist Whitney Turetzky
Whitney Turetzky is a self-taught visual artist whose mixed media work combines vintage photography, textiles and other ephemera with color block painting. Her pieces evoke powerful emotional responses while honoring common women of past and present. In this interview, she shares what makes this feminist work as well as how her art helps her pass on strong views of womanhood to her young daughter. Journey of a Mixed Media Artist Can you tell us a little bit about your journey to becoming an artist (and claiming that title, which can often be hard for people)? I have always been a maker, but I didn’t always call myself an artist. About…
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Interview with Sumi Ink and Honey Watercolor Artist Ms. Muse
Ms. Muse is a San Francisco artist who works in the unique mediums of Japanese Sumi ink and honey-based watercolor. She uses these mediums to paint “unapologetically girly” women who are “both attractive and thought-provoking”, using a “style reminiscent of twenty-first century French comic book illustration” and inspired by Modern Impressionism to “capture the free spirit and rainbow palette of San Francisco”. This interview shares more about her magical work with the female form. When did you become an artist? Art is something that has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. As a child, I had notebooks filled with drawings of different faces.…
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Interview With Crochet Artists Alyssa and Liz of Threadwinners
This interview was first published by Fempotential in early 2017. Since then I’ve had the opportunity to work with these great women in a number of ways. I’m thrilled to re-share this original article here. Threadwinners is a collaborative crochet art team based in Southern California. It’s made up of two awesome women: Alyssa Arney and Liz Flynn. They each took their own journeys to identifying as artists. They found their way to fiber art on their own. However, their visions really came to life when they joined up as a team. Together they: work to fight against patriarchy and the status quo by using art forms traditionally considered “interior /…
