Events, Updates, News and More
Through struggle we bring forth the ripened fruit of a changed tomorrow. We never stand still; motionless as life breezes by. We move in the wind. Sometimes with it, Sometimes against it. Ever changing, we remake our reality. This past week I have been changed by the fortitude, brilliance and endless capacity of Afghan artists.
It’s that time of the year again. Spring is creeping up on us, new shoots are poking up from the ground and festivals of regeneration and re-birth are taking place around the world. In my ancestral part of the world, South and West Asia, the festival of Holi, (celebrated in South Asia) and Norooz (celebrated in West Asia), are coming up this month. Holi is March 8, Norooz is March 20th. Both feature fire, a meditation on righteousness and lots of color.
(This was supposed to be a post about my upcoming events this month and next. Click here to see what’s happening. I hope I can see you before I’m back in Kabul in April.)
What does “artist as leader” mean? What does it look like in our world? So often there is so much confusion about the role (and significance) of artists in our society. I have been forced to think about this since the passing of Whitney Houston. I’ve been plagued with feeling stupid for crying over the death of “an entertainer”, a Hollywood persona. I’ve been embarrassed to speak with much feeling about her death, afraid to be perceived as being ridiculous and shallow.
Yes, really, I'm talking about Whitney.
But what I have come to understand is that I was both mourning the loss of a brilliant artist who’s voice moved millions, and the loss of an artist who was struggled with her own sense of self worth in this contradictory society.
Hello, we're really important. Illustration by Luba Lukova.
The oppressive elements in society needs us to suppress our creativity in order to maintain the status quo. To send this message, artists, those who have dedicated their lives to art and creativity, are targeted. A friend of mine said that artists need to live in water deep enough to drown them. And that is what society does. It submerges the creative in all of us.
The messages that are broadcast in our society about artists are that we are irresponsible, stupid, drug addicts, mentally ill, have questionable morals; and that art is frivolous, a diversion, not serious work, it’s only for some people, it’s stupid, and can’t pay the bills. In order to maintain the status quo, we need artists to remain on the fringes of society, barely visible, always teetering on the brink of poverty and irrelevance.
These messages get enforced from a very early age. Imagine an adult asking you, with pleasure, if you are going to be a lawyer or a dancer when you grow up; what about a firefighter or a painter? From a very young age, we are steered away from art-making as a life choice. The marginalization of the arts and of artists means that art-making as a life choice is extremely hard to accept. We all, at some point, have suppressed our own creativity and locked it away in order to live in the “real world”.
Illustration by Luba Lukova.
Artist’s being marginalized goes hand in hand with the suppression of creativity in society. Creativity is powerful. And that brings me to my main point: art and creativity are the most powerful forces we have for liberation.
Art can bring people together. We don’t even need tospeak the same language.
Art can make a way out of no way. When people are living in oppressive situations, artists can help imagine a way out. The fight for another world has to imagine that the impossible is possible.
Artists never stop questioning. Creativity means to use your senses to engage in a process of inquiry.
So let the artists lead us. Let us recognize that they already do!
(This was supposed to be a post about all my upcoming events … but please click here for that info. Hope you can make one or two events.)
Since returning from Kabul last month I’ve jumped back into NYC life with both feet! Now I find my schedule full of speaking events and workshops from February through March! If you will be in NYC on any of these dates, please come to one or more of these events. I’d love to see you. And as always, please forward this to anyone who you think would be interested.
I love this time of year since its often the only extended break I have to reflect on my life, gather with people I love and appreciate the small, simple moments of grace from the year gone by. The lights we burn on Yalda, Solstice, Hanukkah, Christmas and Kwanzaa are all rooted in primal symbolism and full of references to the light of human goodness triumphing over fear and confusion.
The burka. It is such an emotionally charged, unique piece of clothing. For me, focusing on a thing rather than the real issues of sexism and women’s oppression doesn’t make sense, and foreign obsession fn the burka often stinks of exoticism and othering. So I’ve never commented on it nor have I spent much attention on it … until my last night in Kabul.
Today is the holy day of Ashura where, in Islam, believers mourn the death of Imam Hussein, the prophet Mohammed’s grandson. Imam Hussein was fighting a great oppressor and on this day he and his entire family and followers were massacred and left in the desert of Karbala. This story is most important to Shi’ia Muslims a they believe Imam Hussein to be the rightful successor to the prophet Mohammed. Sunnis also believe this day to be sacred and attribute other reasons to the observance like the day god forgave Adam.
Hello Kabul! Hello mountains. Hello kindness. Hello community. Hello learning. Hello growing. Hello change. I feel so full of joy and gratitude to be here and do what I love. It’s been such a busy week and I can’t believe that already I am half way done! I am finding out that being the sole facilitator and workshop coordinator is pretty time consuming but I promise to send more updates.
Art imitates life, life imitates art … but what’s the deal with pepper spray at WalMart? It’s the theater of the absurd in overdrive. I sit here next to the pot bellied stove in my guest house, calm and distant. I don’t mind the distance from this facet of life. Though I do remember when I was here in late September, I had such longing to be part of the Occupy movement in NYC. Funny how things change.
I’ve been back in NY for two weeks now and am so pleased that I got to see the last of the fall colors. When I arrived, reds, yellows, browns and greens were still bright and shocking. Now, many of the leaves have fallen – and the colors faded. When I left New York in October Zucotti park had just been occupied and the movement, which seemed to appear from nowhere, bloomed and blazed. In the two months between, something important has begun.
There’s no way around it. I can’t hide, pretend it’s not happening, close my eyes. I have to have to face it -the project has come to an end. Well, my part of it has come to an end and now the young students are tasked with carrying on the work and moving it forward. I have learned a great deal by spending these 6 weeks in Kabul, listening to people, observing life, understanding daily struggles, seeing entrenched attitudes and thinking about all of this in light of how art and culture can be used to educate, build community, and inspire change.
This last week has been filled with performances for NGOs and community spaces throughout Kabul. We often have 2-3 per day which makes for hectic and fun times. So far we’ve performed at schools, orphanages, for the National Police force, a community center for widows and orphans, the Kabul women’s prison, and in the garden of a women’s rights organization.
Sometimes a banana is just a banana … and sometimes it’s more! For the young men’s theater group, a banana represents the multiple problems in Afghan society. Dealing with the seemingly insignificant task of where to throw the peel leads the main character on a journey through the maze of maze of problems on all levels of Afghan society.
I’m writing two separate blog posts, one about the young men’s production and process and one about the young women’s. This one is all about the women. Despite being located in the cosmopolitan capital city, it seems that this theater group is the first all women’s group in Kabul. Many of these young women, even though they have studied theater at university, have not performed on the stage for audiences – not even in university productions. Well, here’s their chance! They are talented, smart, passionate, and ready to shout from the rooftops.
I’m tired. Tired, tired, tired. I work 6 days a week with the actors, then spend many more hours at the apartment revising agendas, planning, And trying to connect with local and international NGOs who would be interested in supporting this fledgling theater company when we leave. We go to meetings in the mornings and then go to the university in the afternoons until evening working hard and pushing the students harder. The sky is dark when we leave and Kabul is getting chilly, “sard-e-st” … “it is cold” in Dari.
Being raised in a South/West Asian home, in NYC, I have the privilege to be able to see things from different cultural perspectives and to carry with me the knowledges of many people. (I use the plural to reflect that there is no one “knowledge”.) I am blessed to have an extended family of second mothers, sisters and brothers who have shared with me some of Puerto Rican culture, African American culture, LGBTQ culture, Jewish culture and so on. I am grateful to have that information and perspective as a part of my being.
The last four days at the Kabul Theater Festival has been heady, thrilling, hopeful, and heartful. I was overjoyed to meet most of the theater artists that I worked with last year. They were presenting their work at the festival (one of them won best scenery and costumes!) and they all looked radiant and full of life. Moreover, I met so many new, creative people working in MANY different provinces of Afghanistan and in different forms of theater.
