First Person Arts

Family Recipe Contest!

kkacala — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 19:03:29 +0000

Everyone has at least one special family recipe, one that’s been passed down through the generations. The one that reminds you of supper at Grandmom’s or summer picnics with aunts and uncles. Or maybe you created it just this past Thanksgiving and your family went wild for it. It’s the one that comes out flawless each time or it’s the type of recipe that survives despite numerous kitchen catastrophes. Regardless, it’s a recipe that goes deeper than delicious; it contains a story.

For our next Edible World program, we are hosting a family recipe contest! We are very excited to be bringing author Suzan Colón to read from her memoir Cherries in Winter on Sunday, April 11th. Bridget Foy’s is creating a special three-course meal (menu details are here) for the event. Dinner guests can submit family recipes from now till March 26th. Three will be chosen to tell their family story along with Ms. Colón and they will be featured on her blog!

Your story should be a maximum of 250 words. Send recipes to me at kkacala@firstpersonarts.org by March 26th. Buy tickets for the event here.

Also, starting March 29th, look to the First Person blog for family recipes from some of Philly’s best foodies: Snackbar’s John Taus, Meal Ticket’s Felicia D’Ambrosio, Green Aisle’s Erace Brothers, and more!

-Karina

82Women

kkacala — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:10:34 +0000

Nick found this interesting compilation of interviews with 82 women working in film and tv about the type of movies they would make with an unlimited budget and the women who have inspired them.

The impetus for the project was Kathryn Bigelow’s Oscar nomination and the question, “Why haven’t more women been nominated for Best Director?”. The responses reveal the wide diversity of interests and experiences of these women working in the film and tv industry. I’m curious to see what the filmmakers behind 82Women do next with the project. Ten minutes offers you just a taste of what these 82 women have to say on the topic.

For more info on the project visit www.82women.tumblr.com.

Any female filmmakers out there want to join the discussion? Let us know what you think in the comments section.

- Karina

Donald is Fierce

kkacala — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:06:00 +0000

AND he was the Audience Favorite at Monday’s Slam at World Cafe Live. Congrats Donald!

P.S. Love the prop!

JJ’s Interview, Part 2

kkacala — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:51:11 +0000

First Personalities is a series on the First Person Arts Blog where we check up on and catch up with past Festival and Salon presenters and participants.

JJ & friends

We posted last week about JJ Tiziou’s phenomenal project, How Philly Moves, where dancers – of any style, level of training, age – dance for JJ at special photo shoots. These photos are going to become the basis for a 50,000 square foot mural at the Philadelphia International Airport. Read Part 1 of our interview here.

“Everyone is photogenic.”
Similar to the democratic dance philosophy behind HPM is JJ’s belief that “everyone is photogenic.” As a dance and theater photographer, his subjects often are the people in the spotlight, those who love having their photos taken, but he also shoots a lot of the people behind the scenes or just everyday people at a protest. He doesn’t need to manipulate the scene to make them look beautiful; he sees the beauty that is already there, and knows how to highlight it.

I’ve been photographed by JJ on a couple occasions and can attest, he makes you feel comfortable, even when you have to keep perfectly still while staring into a flashlight for seconds at a time in an otherwise unlit room. (Really. We did this. For a couple hours. For a light-painting series that he was working on.)

That comfort is the basis for our photogenic-ness, that everyone should feel good about being photographed. He writes in his online manifesto, “People are beautiful when they’re finding joy in life, being kind to others, and enjoying themselves. Of course the photo will be stronger if you’ve nailed the lighting, composition, focus etc… but people look beautiful in pictures if they are comfortable and happy, and if you’ve caught them at just the right moment. That’s all there is to it.”

“I know that everyone’s photogenic, but […] I need help in order to keep proving it.”
JJ wants to change the way people think about his work. He wants to grow a community supported model of photography, where friends, fans and colleagues can contribute financially to JJ Tiziou Photography. It’s a different way of thinking about photography, seeing it as a form of public art, art supported in part by everyone who enjoys it.

Financial support from his base will allow JJ to do more of the community-based photography he loves and for which he is known. According to JJ, “If I follow the standard commercial photography models, I end up photographing only the things that the broader market values, and that doesn’t match up with my values. One of my goals is to provide ammunition for positive social change, by creating compelling images of everyday people engaged in creating positive communities through their art and activism, and by sharing them broadly online, to allow them to share their mission.”

You can subscribe and donate monthly or contribute per photo download. It keeps us all involved in the process of JJ’s work and allows JJ to keep taking so many community photos. JJ’s been investing in his communities for years; this is a chance for his communities to invest in him.

Next up for JJ… he’s heading down to North Carolina in April to teach a workshop on Visual Storytelling for Activists at The Stone House. He’s hoping to first head to Florida to document a march organized by the Coalition of Immokalee Workers - an organization fighting for human rights in the agricultural industry that JJ has been supporting with his work since 2003. (Maybe you can help him get there by chipping in at http://community.jjtiziou.org?)

The HPM shoots just happened this past weekend, and JJ says they were amazing - but people can still sign up to be involved with the future evolution of the project.

-Karina Kacala

Meet Josh Neufeld Tonight

kkacala — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 17:38:50 +0000

Josh Neufeld, comix artist extraordinaire, will be talking about the graphic memoir tonight at Warning: Graphic Content. I’m psyched I get to meet the author of A.D. New Orleans After the Deluge. I read the book prepping for tonight and fell in love with the real-life stories of Hurricane Katrina survivors. In 2008 I visited NOLA and was shocked at both how much the city was thriving but how much work still needed to be accomplished post-Katrina. To visit New Orleans is to love New Orleans and I’ve felt a kinship and empathy towards the city ever since.

Here are the things I might talk to Josh about tonight, if I get the chance.

1) His upcoming collaboration with NPR’s “On the Media” co-host Brooke Gladstone. (Their book is tentatively titled The Influencing Machine and it’ll be a comic book about the media.)
2) His trip down to Philly from Brooklyn, where he lives with his wife and daughter.
3) If he’s still in touch with the people featured in A.D. and what they are up to now.
4) How he thinks the situation in New Orleans has improved since the storm and flooding.
5) Did he feel totally cool when MTV’s “Splash Page” blog called A.D. the best nonfiction comic of 2009?

Ok, maybe I’ll save face and refrain from asking him that last one.

Meet Josh, Jamar and Daniel tonight and ask them your own questions at BMFI.

-Karina Kacala

Favorite Graphic Nonfiction

kkacala — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 17:43:37 +0000

In anticipation of tomorrow’s Salon on graphic nonfiction, I asked around the FPA office to see which graphic nonfiction works are most popular. I discovered that Alison Bechdel could start a fan club amongst our staff and even Kanye West has gotten into the graphic memoir field.

Vicki Solot, Artistic Director… Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home

Tiffany Thwaites, Marketing Intern… Through the Wire (illustrations by Bill Plympton based on the music and lyrics of Kanye West)

Sarah Crawford, Intern to the Artistic Director… Craig Thompson’s Blankets

Dan Gasiewski, Managing Director… Stitches by David Small tied with Bechdel’s Fun Home

Nick Forrest, Administrative Coordinator… Abandon the Old in Tokyo by Yoshihiro Tatsumi, with a caveat, “Although neither a memoir, nor nonfiction, per se, this graphic novel does an incredible job of capturing the feeling and politics of a particular time and place in history through small, personal stories that speak to much greater truths.”

As for me, my first foray into graphic nonfiction was Maus, so that will always hold a special place in my library. But I do think that Fun Home is my favorite. Bechdel created such sad intimacy in her work about her dysfunctional childhood; I can’t imagine reading it and not being affected.

Share YOUR favorite graphic nonfiction books in the comments section!

-Karina Kacala

Salon Sneak Peak: Jamar Nicholas

kkacala — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 18:11:55 +0000

Cover of Fist Stick Knife Gun

In preparation for his appearance at our upcoming event, Warning: Graphic Content, I interviewed comic book and graphic novel illustrator Jamar Nicholas. He is currently in the process of adapting Geoffrey Canada’s memoir Fist Stick Knife Gun into a graphic novel, which is scheduled for release this October. Speaking with an artist after seeing their work is an interesting experience; the viewer formulates an idea of who the artist is and speculates about what might motivate their work. Having never before interviewed an artist in any official capacity, it was satisfying to have the opportunity to test these speculations in regards to Mr. Nicholas.

Fist Stick Knife Gun is a unique project for Jamar in that the author of the memoir is alive and available to critique Jamar’s work. The relationship has been extremely collaborative and Canada has made himself very accessible to Jamar. Yet it does raise the stakes for presenting an authentic account of Canada’s experience. This pressure is compounded by Jamar’s admiration for Canada’s novel, and by his dedication to setting the same tone as the original work.

This dedication seems to be one of the reasons Jamar was selected to adapt Fist Stick Knife Gun; another is the parallel between the backgrounds of Geoffrey and Jamar. When asking Nicholas how growing up in inner-city Philadelphia shaped his work, he said that Canada required the illustrator adapting his memoir to, like Canada himself, have grown up in inner-city New York. When Canada and Nicholas spoke for the first time, the similarities between the cultures of Philadelphia and New York became apparent. Jamar says that he sees himself in the memoir, and says that anyone who has grown up in the inner-city will be able to relate to it.

Jamar also made it clear that his work, and Fist Stick Knife Gun in particular, are not intended to be exclusively for an audience with this type of background. Jamar expressed that his work is not designed to alienate any audience. Any person who feels the need to see what growing up in an urban environment is like would be equally touched by this memoir as someone who is able to personally relate.

Nor is the appeal of the work strictly regional. Jamar said tightly packed communities across the world will likely share traits with the version of New York City depicted in Fist Stick Knife Gun. Most urban environments are subject to a hidden code that governs the actions of every member of the community- as children there are things you can and can’t do. Jamar said that even the nicest, most unassuming children are forced to become fighters and establish themselves in the neighborhood’s pecking order.

Jamar Nicholas, photo by Marc Manley

Another one of Jamar’s on-going projects relates to this urban environment in a manner completely different from Fist Stick Knife Gun. The web comic Detective Boogaloo is the story of an inner city b-boy cop with super powers, fighting to bring down his super-villain brother who has taken over the city. Jamar says that this seemingly simplistic comic can be read on multiple levels. It is in essence a Cain and Abel story reinterpreted to be fun and entertaining. Most importantly, Detective Boogaloo is intended to be a love letter to an era of hip-hop long past.

The nostalgia Jamar expressed for this vanishing era made it clear that the world depicted in Fist Stick Knife Gun is not wholly complete. Indeed it is vital to examine the reality of every era through the lens of multiple pieces of art. The fact that Jamar is presently doing so through different styles of work impresses on me his flexibility and vision as an artist. He is able to look at the urban environment of his past on multiple levels, and from varying viewpoints.

In the end, speculating on Jamar’s background and motivations seemed pointless when compared to the valuable insights I gained in speaking with him. Though our conversation satisfied my curiosity about his work, it will only lead me to further speculation in regards to the work of other artists. I eagerly anticipate seeing Jamar share his thoughts and work with a wider audience at the upcoming event, Warning: Graphic Content, and hope that this audience is able to benefit just as much from his unique insights and from his unique work.

-Sarah Crawford

First Personalities - Daniel Heyman

kkacala — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 18:23:00 +0000

First Personalities is a series on the First Person Arts Blog where we check up on and catch up with past Festival and Salon presenters and participants.

Perhaps you saw Daniel Heyman’s work last Fall during our Festival at the “Shelter” exhibit, or perhaps you’re planning on seeing him at our upcoming event with Philagrafika at the Bryn Mawr Film Institute, “Warning: Graphic Content.” If you have seen him around town, you’ve likely caught just a glimpse, a blur, a zooming in your peripheral vision because, like so many of our artists, Daniel is always on the move, making and showing his art. (For a quick rundown of where else you might mind him and/or his art in March and April, from The University of the Arts to the Pennsylvania Fine Art Academy and more, check out his upcoming exhibition schedule here.)

If this is your first introduction to Daniel’s work, then welcome. From gallery installations to watercolors to gouache on nishinoushi paper, he is bound to have a medium and a body of work that appeals to you. Don’t be surprised if you find yourself transfixed by them all like I was. Often adding whimsically arranged text to his captivating and engaging portraits, he uses them to tell stories set against the backdrop of controversial world events, like our war in Iraq. Heartbreaking and fascinating, one can’t turn away from the stories he conveys; stories that would otherwise go untold.

See him in person next Tuesday at the Bryn Mawr Film Institute. Get your tickets here.

First Personalities: Talking with JJ Tiziou

kkacala — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 03:55:51 +0000

First Personalities is a series on the First Person Arts Blog where we check up on and catch up with past Festival and Salon presenters and participants.

I think of JJ Tiziou as the unofficial photographer of Philadelphia. A well-known figure among Philly’s artistic and activist communities, JJ is getting some recognition from the big guns, thanks to How Philly Moves. His photographs of Philly dancers will be the basis for a large-scale mural on the parking decks facing I-95 at the Philadelphia International Airport.

I sat down with JJ on Saturday and got the scoop on his latest goings-on. Honestly, it was just an excuse to sit down with a friend whom I don’t see enough! We’ll be focusing on How Philly Moves in today’s post. Look for Part 2 on Friday when we talk about his community supported model of photography and the belief that everyone is photogenic.

“Philly is a city that dances.”
How Philly Moves (HPM) began as a candidate for a Septa-sponsored public art installation in 2008. Collaborating with sculptor James Peniston of Studio 34, JJ put out a call for dancers to join him for community photo shoots. They would dance; JJ would photograph. And the term “dancer” was by no means exclusive. Trained, amateur, professional, social dancing… it was all welcome. Two successful preliminary shoots led to more shoots held during the Philly Fringe in September 2008.

JJ and James’ project was one of five finalists for the Septa commission, but it wasn’t selected. But the excitement around the project - both the photo shoots and resulting exhibition in an empty storefront at 36th and Walnut - made it clear that they were on to something.

A bit later, Mural Arts was embarking on its project of “gateways into the city” and the Deputy Mayor of Transportation had already envisioned the parking decks along I-95 as an ideal canvas. From a national call for artists, four were selected, including JJ (the only Philadelphian in the bunch). In late August 2009, the committee made their selection.

The project is getting started now both on site and in the studio. Surveyors are looking at the surface of the parking garage and figuring out how the non-traditional surface - gaps, ridges, 45 degree angle drops - will translate to the flat fabric that will be painted off-site by the as-yet-to-be-announced mural artist. What will look perfectly in proportion and 2-D from the cars driving down the highway will actually be carefully distorted in 3D rendering software to account for the 3D aspects of the garage surface.

Meanwhile, this weekend brings the first official shoot for the latest iteration of HPM. Over 400 people signed up for the 60 slots at the shoot. The popularity isn’t surprising. As JJ notes, “By the definition of the project, every person [is] perfect for it.” However, choices had to be made. When choosing the dancers, the priority was on capturing a diversity of dancers based on style, age and neighborhood.

The photo shoots are like dance pieces themselves, as JJ moves with and around the photo subject. His volunteers have even gotten in the act, like when some of his assistants jumped in to make the subject – someone more comfortable among the crowd and chaos of the nightclub scene - feel at home.

It’s a different way of shooting, using slower shutter speeds to capture the energy of the movement and where the constant movement means fewer workable frames; you aren’t guaranteed to capture a sharp shot with each take. Sometimes the picture is too blurry, other times it’s too static and then there are the handful of shots when the blurring works for you.

When I asked JJ what his plan is for this weekend, his answer was simple. “Take a lot of pictures.”

JJ & friends

“It’s much more than my project…[there's] a big community behind me.”
While JJ is the lead name attached to the project, many people have made the project a success thus far. It goes beyond the big name sponsors, and they are indeed big - Mural Arts, Bank of America, US Airways, the airport, the parking authority, the city itself. It includes the many dancers and volunteers who have participated. When creating the original proposal for Septa, JJ made a call for volunteer help installing the project, expecting a handful of responses. Suddenly he had a forty-person crew pledging to give days of work for free. At the photo shoots, he’s had up to 15 volunteers setting up lights, checking in dancers, and uploading photo files.

And it’s not too late to become involved in HPM. Signing up on the website will keep you in the loop as the project moves forward. JJ definitely wants more photo shoots. An exhibition of photos will be concurrently on exhibit at the airport, offering a space for the images not able to make the mural. The potential exists for satellite murals and other partner projects. JJ sees HPM as constantly evolving, not finished when the mural goes up in late spring 2011. “If the dance community wants to build on this, get involved, tell the city.” HPM is bigger than even a 50,000 square foot mural can cover. It’s a city-wide audience engagement/empowerment project. It advertises the diverse, amazing dance scene in Philly, but it also says, in the words of JJ, “You dance too.” Anyone can participate. Anyone can move. Anyone can dance.

Even JJ. He was most recently a part of Anna Drozdowski’s dance piece at the CEC in the New Edge Mix Performance Series.

Check out Part 2 of our interview next week.

-Karina Kacala

Oooh… Nanaimo

kkacala — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 21:49:35 +0000

The Olympics are over but I just found a new reason to think about Vancouver, Canada… Nanaimo bars.

Inquirer writer Dianna Marder shared some with the First Person Arts family and I’ve been indulging all day. She came into a stash after writing about them for the Inky.

It’s a silky layer of cream sandwiched between a chocolate/graham cracker/coconut/nut base and a thin schmear of dark chocolate. Not good if you’re training for the Olympics. Good for Mondays in the office. If you want a local fix, maybe E will make some for you.

Thank you Dianna!