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DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090410T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090410T210000
DTSTAMP:20230705T173341Z
CREATED:20090410T202500Z
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SUMMARY:The Autobiography of a Black Panther with Robert Hillary King
DESCRIPTION:Robert Hillary King became a member of the Black Panther Party while in prison for a crime he did not commit\, where he remained in solitary confinement for 29 years as one of the Angola 3. He wrote From the Bottom of the Heap: The Autobiography of Black Panther: Robert Hillary King (2008) after the state admitted his innocence and set him free.  \n\n\n\nCo-sponsored by the Albany Political Prisoner Support Coalition. \n\n\n\nPress Release\n\n\n\nIn 1970\, a jury convicted Robert Hillary King of a crime he did not commit and sentenced him to 35 years in prison. He became a member of the Black Panther Party while in Angola State Penitentiary\, successfully organizing prisoners to improve conditions. In return\, prison authorities beat him\, starved him\, and gave him life without parole after framing him for a second crime. He was thrown into solitary confinement\, where he remained in a six by nine foot cell for 29 years as one of the Angola 3. In 2001\, the state grudgingly acknowledged his innocence and set him free. This is his story. \n\n\n\nIn his recently published autobiography\, “From the Bottom of the Heap: The Autobiography of Black Panther Robert Hillary King\,” King begins his story at the beginning:  born black\, born poor\, born in Louisiana in 1942\, King journeyed to Chicago as a hobo at the age of 15. He married and had a child\, and briefly pursued a semi-pro boxing career to help provide for his family. Just a teenager when he entered the Louisiana penal system for the first time\, King tells of his attempts to break out of this system\, and his persistent pursuit of justice where there is none. \n\n\n\nYet this remains a story of inspiration and courage\, and the triumph of the human spirit. The conditions in Angola almost defy description\, yet King never gave up his humanity\, or the work towards justice for all prisoners that he continues to do today. “From the Bottom of the Heap\,” so simply and humbly told\, strips bare the economic and social injustices inherent in our society\, while continuing to be a powerful literary testimony to our own strength and capacity to overcome. \n\n\n\nReviews: \n\n\n\n“For a person to go through 29 years in one of the most brutal prisons in America and still maintain his sanity and humanity\, that’s what makes people want to listen to Robert.”–Malik Rahim Co-Founder of Common Ground Collective \n\n\n\n“As a brush with death sharpens life\, a lifetime of confinement can broaden the vision…”–Austin American Statesman \n\n\n\n“The case of the Angola Three has the potential of laying bare\, exposing the shortcomings\, in the entire US system.”– Kgalema Motlante\, a leader of the African National Congress in South Africa \n\n\n\n“Friendships are forged in strange places. My friendship with Robert King and the other two Angola 3 men Herman Wallace and  Albert Woodfox is based on respect. These men\, as Robert reveals in this stunning account of his life\, have fought tirelessly to redress injustice\, not only for themselves\, but for others. This is a battle Robert is determined to win and we are determined to help him.”–Gordon Roddick\,  Co-founder of The Body Shop and activist \n\n\n\n“When there is a train wreck\, there is a public inquiry\, to try to avoid it recurring. Robert King’s conviction was a train wreck\, and this book is perhaps the only way the world will get to understand why. There are more than 3\,000 people serving life without the possibility of parole in Angola today\, some as young as 14 when they were sent there\, and many of them innocent but without the lawyer to prove it. We owe it to them\, and others in a similar plight around the world\, to read this book.”–Clive Stafford Smith\, Director\, Reprieve
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/the-autobiography-of-a-black-panther-with-robert-hillary-king/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Speaker
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090403T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090403T210000
DTSTAMP:20230705T172811Z
CREATED:20090403T203900Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T172811Z
UID:10000920-1238785200-1238792400@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:"Shoot an Iraqi: Life\, Art and Resistance Under the Gun" with Artist Wafaa Bilal
DESCRIPTION:“Virtual Jihadi” artist returns to Capital Region with new book. Wafaa Bilal braves fear of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Troy censorship to speak again! Iraqi-American digital artist Bilal’s new book Shoot an Iraqi: Life\, Art and Resistance Under the Gun tells the story of the Domestic Tension project that placed him 24/7 on the receiving end of a paintball gun accessible online to a global audience – and what really happened on his infamous visit to Troy last spring.  \n\n\n\nThis presentation is co-sponsored by Women Against War. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPress Release:\n\n\n\nWafaa Bilal has exhibited his art world wide\, and traveled and lectured extensively to inform audiences of the situation of the Iraqi people\, and the importance of peaceful conflict resolution. \n\n\n\nHe will be speaking about\, and signing copies of\, his new book “Shoot an Iraqi: Life\, Art and Resistance Under the Gun” (City Lights)\, about his experiences as an Iraqi-American living in the United States. \n\n\n\nAccording to a review in Publisher’s Weekly\, “Weaving together accounts of Iraq and America\, art and violence\, performance and reality\, past and present\, this gripping account all but shakes the reader by the lapels.” \n\n\n\nBilal’s 2007 dynamic installation “Domestic Tension” placed him on the receiving end of a paintball gun that was accessible online to a worldwide audience\, 24 hours a day. Newsweek called the project “breathtaking” and the Chicago Tribune called the month-long piece “one of the sharpest works of political art to be seen in a long time\,” and named Bilal its 2007 Artist of the Year. \n\n\n\nBilal has exhibited worldwide including in Baghdad\, the Netherlands\, Thailand and Croatia; as well as at the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago\, the Milwaukee Art Museum and various other US galleries. His residencies have included Montalvo Arts Center in Saratoga\, California; Catwalk in New York; and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. \n\n\n\nIn March 2008\, his installation at RPI called “The Night of Bush Capturing: A Virtual Jihadi” drew controversy when a few Campus Republicans demanded its closure.  RPI President Shirley Jackson responded by ordering the art work removed from campus\, leading to accusations of politically-motivated censorship and widespread condemnation. \n\n\n\nThe exhibit was offered sanctuary off-campus at The Sanctuary for Independent Media\, a community-based media center in north Troy. \n\n\n\nRensselaer County Republican Majority Leader Bob Mirch\, who was at the time employed by former State Senate Republican Majority Leader Joseph Bruno\, led a protest against the exhibit surrounded by his employees from the City of Troy’s Department of Public Works.  The next day\, City of Troy code enforcement officials under his supervision ordered the building closed. \n\n\n\nThe resulting public outcry\, which included an angry protest outside Troy City Hall\, resulted in donations of tens of thousands of dollars to support The Sanctuary for Independent Media and an outpouring of volunteers. \n\n\n\nThe Sanctuary for Independent Media–whose programming was hosted in exile by supportive local churches\, small businesses and other organizations–re-opened a month later\, in April 2008. \n\n\n\nThe Capital Region branch of the New York Civil Liberties Union has filed a notice of claim against the City of Troy in preparation for a possible lawsuit. \n\n\n\nIn “The Night of Bush Capturing: A Virtual Jihadi\,” Bilal casts himself as a suicide-bomber in the game.  After learning of the real-life death of his brother in the war\, he is recruited by Al Qaeda to join the hunt for Bush. \n\n\n\n“Virtual Jihadi” is meant to bring attention to the vulnerability of Iraqi civilians to the travesties of the current war and racist generalizations and stereotypes as exhibited in games such as “Quest for Saddam” along with vulnerability to recruitment by violent groups like Al Qaeda because of the U.S.’s failed strategy in securing Iraq. The work also aims to shed light on groups that traffic in crass and hateful stereotypes of Arab culture with games like Quest for Saddam and other media. \n\n\n\nAccording to Bilal\, “In these difficult times\, when we are at war with another nation\, it is our duty as artists and citizens to improvise strategies of engagement for dialogue. This platform is a piece of fiction that uses the video game format to create alternative narratives and perspectives.” \n\n\n\n“Because we inhabit a comfort zone far from the trauma of conflict zone\, we Americans have become desensitized to the violence of war. We are disconnected\, disengaged while many others do the suffering. The game holds up a mirror that reveals our own propensities for violence\, racism and propaganda. We can close our eyes\, our ears and deny that it exists\, but the issue won’t go away.” \n\n\n\nWafaa Bilal was born in Iraq on June 10\, 1966. Because a member of his family had been accused of disloyalty to his country\, Wafaa was denied the opportunity to pursue his dream of being an artist. Instead\, he was to attend college to major in geography. While in college\, he continued to pursue his art and was arrested and tortured for his political art work against Sadaam Hussein. \n\n\n\nShortly after the Gulf War\, Wafaa was inspired by President Bush’s message to the Iraqi citizens that if they attempted to overthrow Sadaam\, the U.S. would stand behind them. He became involved in organizing opposition to the government and was scheduled for arrest and execution when he escaped into Kuwait. There he was accused of being a spy and was close to being shot when his student ID convinced them he told the truth. \n\n\n\nWafaa was sent to a refugee camp on the Kuwaiti border. In the camp\, people laughed when rather than accept life in a tent he began forming brick that he dried in the sun and fashioned into a home. The adobe served a practical purpose\, for it provided relative safety from abduction by Kuwaiti soldiers who sneaked into tents in the middle of the night to kidnap young people for sale to Iraqi soldiers who tortured\, raped and executed them or the Turkish soldiers themselves would rape and kill them. \n\n\n\nFor two years\, Wafaa lived in limbo not knowing if each day would be his last. Still Wafaa worked to improve his art\, cleaning toilets in the camp to earn the money for art supplies\, buying supplies for children for art therapy to help them to work through the horrors witnessed. His experiences developed within him an abhorrence of violence and oppression and strengthened his inner resolve. \n\n\n\nIn 1992\, Wafaa came to the United States and took classes to learn English. Then\, he began art studies at the University of New Mexico where he excelled. His art is of a political nature that speaks to oppression of the human spirit\, including that of women who are bound by the rules of culture. He has won many awards for his art as well as a scholarship to the Chicago Institute of Art for post graduate study. He is now teaching at New York University in New York City.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/shoot-an-iraqi-life-art-and-resistance-under-the-gun-with-author-wafaa-bilal/
CATEGORIES:Speaker
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090402T120000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090402T160000
DTSTAMP:20230705T171853Z
CREATED:20090402T205200Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T171853Z
UID:10001548-1238673600-1238688000@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:"Upstate Girls\," A Conversation
DESCRIPTION:Teenage girls from throughout the Capital Region share stories about the challenges in their lives\, gathering with representatives of the institutions with which they are entwined – including the legal\, educational\, healthcare\, and penal systems- in response to award winning photojournalist Brenda Ann Kenneally’s compelling work.  \n\n\n\nThe Sanctuary will host a one day workshop to facilitate a dialogue between girls from the Upstate Girls exhibition\, other young women growing up in the Capital Region\, and the many agencies that can influence their efforts to break the cycle of post-industrial marginalization.  \n\n\n\nThe day will begin with a tour of Brenda Ann Kenneally’s award wining photographs and responses to the work. We will continue with a scrapbook workshop facilitated by young women from the neighborhood\, presentations by local change makers and breakout stations. The day will conclude with a final discussion with all participants. \n\n\n\nThis free workshop has been partially funded\, in part\, by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts and the Media Justice Fund of the Funding Exchange. \n\n\n\nAPRIL 2nd SCHEDULE: “Upstate Girls’ Conversation”\n\n\n\n12:00- 12:30 Brenda Ann Kenneally and the Upstate Girls: Exhibition Tour \n\n\n\n12:30 Dr. NetterHolistic Doctor\, Nutritional Consultant\, Reiki Master Healer and Teacher\, Certified Professional Life Coach\, presentation: Nutrition\, how to make easy healthy meals and home healing ideas. \n\n\n\n12:50 Jenn ThompsonNon-traditional education at HVCC\, Power and orgasm (SUNY Albany PHD) \n\n\n\n1:10 Mari Shopsis\, Education Director\, Rensselaer County Historical Society: Historical Scrapbooks. *The Upstate Girls Scrapbooks will be entered into the Rensselaer County Historical Society archive! \n\n\n\n1:30 Stations and Informal Conversations \n\n\n\nSmoothies and Trail Mix Stations: Karissa Centanni: Education Coordinator\, Honest Weight Food Coop: Nutrition and Low-budget Tips \n\n\n\nScrapbook Station:                                                                                                                       Dana Aftab and the Upstate Girls \n\n\n\nPress interviews \n\n\n\n2:10 Blue Carreker\, VP of Public Affairs and Marketing\, and Megan Carol\, Sexual Health Educator\, Upper Hudson Planned Parenthood: Reproductive health information \n\n\n\n2:30 Q Diamond\, Program DirectorCapital District Gay and Lesbian Community Council \n\n\n\n2:50 Lisa Frisch\, Executive Director\, The Legal Project: Free and low cost legal services  \n\n\n\n3:10  Alysa Cole\, Family Health Advocates: AdvocacyWhy Upstate Girls voices are important; how they can be heard \n\n\n\n3:30 Wrap up conversation\, Upstate Girls: Moving Forward
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/upstate-girls-a-conversation/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Gallery Show,Panel Discussion,Workshop
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090328T000000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090329T235959
DTSTAMP:20230705T172306Z
CREATED:20090328T211000Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T172306Z
UID:10001551-1238198400-1238371199@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Iraqi/American Youth Mural Workshop: “How Will They Know Us? Building a Culture of Peace”
DESCRIPTION:A two-day art workshop will bring together a group of local Iraqi and American youth to collaborate on a mural painting project. These youth share visions of a peaceful\, just coexistence in the workshop\, “How Will They Know Us? Building a Culture of Peace.” Guided by Claudia Lefko\, director of the Iraqi Children’s Art Exchange\, among others\, these murals will be exhibited in Egypt next year for the “UNESCO Decade of Peace and Non-Violence Among Children of the World.”  \n\n\n\nThe workshop is being co-sponsored by the Sanctuary for Independent Media\, the Iraqi Children’s Art Exchange\, and the Iraqi Refugee Project. The Iraqi Children’s Art Exchange in Northampton\, MA invites Iraqi and American children and youth to participate in art-inspired project to foster communication\, and promote peace and nonviolence. The Iraqi Refugee Project is a coalition of Women Against War\, Bethlehem Neighbors for Peace\, Women’s Association for Family Affairs whose goal is to support the needs of Iraqi refugees locally and internationally through direct assistance\, advocacy and education about the issue. \n\n\n\nPress Release\n\n\n\nGuided by Claudia Lefko\, director of the Iraqi Children’s Art Exchange\, Branda Miller\, Rensselaer professor of media arts\, and mural artists\, Linda Iannacone and Lauren Jacobs\, the American and Iraqi youth ages 8 to 18 will work together to shed light on the Iraqi refugee experiences and to share visions of a peaceful and just coexistence through artistic expression. \n\n\n\nProfessor Branda Miller’s students from her “Art\, Community\, Technology Class” at RPI and artist Linda Iannacone\, an experienced muralist\, will also help facilitate the workshop. Branda Miller is a media artist and educator and co-founder of The Sanctuary for Independent Media. \n\n\n\nThe ultimate destination of the mural is Egypt\, where in September\, 2010\, the end of the UNESCO Decade of Peace and Non-violence Among Children will be celebrated with a giant\, gala exhibition of thousands of murals created by children and youth from around the world. Claudia Lefko’s organization the Iraqi Children’s Art Exchange is coordinating The Iraq Art Mile as part of The Art Miles Murals\, an international project that emerged in support of the UNESCO Decade of Peace. The Iraqi Art Mile will be a series of murals painted in the Middle East and in the US with the theme: Building a Culture of Peace: Who Are We/Who Are They.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/iraqi-american-youth-mural-workshop-how-will-they-know-us-building-a-culture-of-peace-3-28-09-and-3-29-09/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Community Event,Workshop
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090323T170000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090323T180000
DTSTAMP:20230705T171516Z
CREATED:20090323T211900Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T171516Z
UID:10001033-1237827600-1237831200@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Reception for Exhibit of Iraqi Refugee Children’s Murals at Albany Public Library
DESCRIPTION:Reception for Exhibit of Iraqi Refugee Children’s Murals at Albany Public Library. The murals painted by Iraqi children and teenagers are currently on exhibit on the second floor through March 27. In September 2008\, young Iraqi refugees recently arrived in the Capital District participated in a one-day mural painting workshop with American artist/teacher Claudia Lefko and Iraqi artist Thamir Dawood at the Sanctuary for Independent Media. They created five murals on canvas depicting their thoughts and feeling about having to leave their beloved home country in a time of war and upheaval.  \n\n\n\nThe exhibit if co-sponsored by the Albany Public Library\, the Sanctuary for Independent Media\, the Iraqi Children’s Art Exchange\, USCRI and the Iraqi Refugee Project.  \n\n\n\nThe Iraqi Refugee Project is a coalition of Women Against War\, Bethlehem Neighbors for Peace\, Women’s Association for Family Affairs whose goal is to support the needs of Iraqi refugees locally and internationally through direct assistance\, advocacy and education about the issue. \n\n\n\nClaudia Lefko is the director of the Iraqi Children’s Art Exchange in Northampton\, MA. In the last seven years\, she has made two trips to Baghdad and two to Amman\, Jordan where she and her Jordanian and Iraqi partners work on making art with Iraqi refugee children and their families. Each time\, she takes art supplies and pictures created by children especially for other children. Thamir Dawood has collaborated with Claudia on a number of projects. He was born and educated in Baghdad. He fled with his family from Iraq in 2004. His work has been exhibited throughout the Middle East\, in Japan and the USA.  \n\n\n\nThe young Iraqis who painted the murals are part of a community of about 75 Iraqi refugees who have been resettled in the Albany Capital District over the past two years. They come here mostly from Jordan\, Syria and Turkey\, where they fled to escape the violence of the war in Iraq. There are currently an estimated two million Iraqi refugees living in countries neighboring Iraq in the biggest refugee crisis in recent history. \n\n\n\nThe reception gives the Iraqi refugees and American participants a chance to prepare for a two-day painting workshop (March 27 and 28)\, which is the next stage of the art project. The final murals created from the Capital Region will be displayed in Egypt next year as part of United Nations Educational\, Scientific\, and Cultural Organization “Decade of Peace and Nonviolence Among Children” international exhibit\, The Miles Mural Project.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/reception-for-exhibit-of-iraqi-refugee-childrens-murals-at-albany-public-library/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Gallery Show
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090321T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090321T200000
DTSTAMP:20230705T172049Z
CREATED:20090321T212500Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T172049Z
UID:10001283-1237658400-1237665600@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Opening in the Underground Gallery: "Upstate Girls - What Became of Collar City"
DESCRIPTION:The photographs are on display in the Underground Gallery at The Sanctuary for Independent Media\, available for viewing an hour before\, during and an hour after events and by arrangement. Upstate Girls is a look at part of working class America\, that\, despite sweeping technological advances\, remains essentially unchanged since the heyday of the Industrial Revolution – an indictment of the by-products of globalization that shape the American social and visual landscape. The ongoing project aims deep into the emotional and psychological cycle of poverty from a women’s eye view.  \n\n\n\nAward-winning photographer Brenda Ann Kenneally is a mother and an independent journalist whose long-term projects are intimate portraits of social issues that intersect where the personal is political. She began reporting in 2004 on the lives of five teen girls from North Troy who would come of age in an industrial city in post-industrial America. She works to push the boundaries of the social document\, using the web as a tool to expand and contextualize her immersion style of reporting. Kenneally’s many awards include the W. Eugene Smith Award for Humanistic Photography\, a Soros Criminal Justice Fellowship\, the Mother Jones Documentary Photography Award\, the International Prize for Photojournalism\, a Nikon Sabbatical Grant\, the National Press Photographers Association best of Photojournalism award\, and the Cannon Female Photojournalism Grant. Born in Albany\, she now lives in Brooklyn.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/upstate-girls-what-became-of-collar-city/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Gallery Show
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090318T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090318T210000
DTSTAMP:20230705T170932Z
CREATED:20090318T213000Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T170932Z
UID:10001286-1237402800-1237410000@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:A Best of "Fence": The First Nine Years
DESCRIPTION:Readings from Capital Region writers Chase Twichell\, Sam Truitt\, Christian Peet\, Laura Didyk\, and others in celebration of Fence magazine’s brand new anthology of poetry\, creative nonfiction\, short fiction and more.  \n\n\n\nArea authors Christian Peet\, Sam Truitt\, Jibade-Khalil Huffman and Laura Didyk will read in celebration of the publication of A Best of Fence\, a new anthology of collected works from Fence magazine’s first nine years of publication. Refreshments will be served and copies of A Best of Fence will be available for purchase. \n\n\n\nFounded in 1998\, Fence is a biannual journal of poetry\, fiction\, art\, and criticism that has a mission to redefine the terms of accessibility by publishing challenging writing distinguished by idiosyncrasy and intelligence rather than by allegiance with camps\, schools\, or cliques. It is part of their mission to support writers who might otherwise have difficulty being recognized because their work doesn’t answer to either the mainstream or to recognizable modes of experimentation. \n\n\n\nEver idiosyncratic\, Fence evades the tedium of the decade with this anthology\, co-edited by eleven of Fence’s editors past and present\, including founding editor Rebecca Wolff; fiction editors Jonathan Lethem\, Ben Marcus\, and Lynne Tillman; poetry editors Caroline Crumpacker\, Katy Lederer\, Matthew Rohrer\, Christopher Stackhouse\, and Max Winter; and nonfiction editors Frances Richard and Jason Zuzga. In addition to presenting a stunningly eclectic compendium of poetry\, short fiction\, criticism\, and creative nonfiction\, much of it by younger writers who appeared in Fence at the beginning of careers that went on to be dazzling\, this volume includes reflective essays by editors on their experiences with selected texts\, with authors\, with the magazine as a collective\, and with their own editorial identities\, and serves as an indispensable record of the inception and continuation of one of the most influential literary journals of its time. \n\n\n\nRefreshments will be served and copies of A Best Fence will be available for purchase.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/a-best-of-fence-the-first-nine-years/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Speaker
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090314T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090314T210000
DTSTAMP:20230705T170520Z
CREATED:20090314T213500Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T170520Z
UID:10001287-1237057200-1237064400@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:"Little Caughnawaga: To Brooklyn and Back" with Filmmaker Reaghan Tarbell
DESCRIPTION:The Kahnawake Mohawk ironworkers who helped to build the famed bridges and skyscrapers of New York City lived with their families in 10 square blocks in Brooklyn – a neighborhood known as Little Caughnawaga. In Little Caughnawaga: To Brooklyn and Back (2008) Reaghan Tarbell traces her family roots to create a portrait of this vibrant community and the women who sustained it.  \n\n\n\nThis event is made possible by the Experimental Television Center’s Presentation Funds. The Experimental Television Center’s Presentation Funds program is supported by the New York State Council on the Arts. \n\n\n\nPress Release\n\n\n\nThe Kahnawake Mohawk ironworkers who helped to build the famed bridges and skyscrapers of New York City lived with their families in 10 square blocks in Brooklyn—a neighborhood known as Little Caughnawaga. Reaghan Tarbell traces her family roots to create a portrait of this vibrant community and the women who sustained it. \n\n\n\nSome notice has been given to the men of Little Caughnawaga: Mohawk steel workers\, whose work was exceptionally dangerous\, helped to build the city’s most famous bridges and skyscrapers.  But Tarbell\, who is from Kanhawake and whose grandmother migrated to Little Caughnawaga\, wanted to switch the focus and to tell the stories of the women. They held the little Brooklyn community together by taking in boarders\, running households during the Great Depression and caring for each other when one of their men fell to his death—which happened all too often. \n\n\n\nThe film touches on the tragic Quebec Bridge collapse in 1907. During this time\, the structure of the bridge fell into the St. Lawrence River. The tragedy killed 75 people\, those of which included 33 men from the Kahnawake community. A memorial was organized and served to remember and honor those who had perished on that day. \n\n\n\nIn making this interesting and beautifully-constructed documentary\, Tarbell discovered a lot about her own family’s history. She also provided a rare gift to her community\, which\, she recalls\, mobbed her with thanks after she premiered her film on the reservation. “But the greatest praise\,” Tarbell says\, “because it’s a very personal story\, was when I showed an early cut to my mother and she called me\, crying\, and thanked me for giving her mother a voice.” \n\n\n\n“Part of our desire to show this work was to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson’s ‘discovery’ of the Hudson River\,” says Penny Lane\, one of the programmers at the Sanctuary.  “We wanted to be sure that the statewide celebrations of this quadricentennial event include stories of the cultural and economic exchange between the white settlers and the Native people who met them here\, and how those interactions over the past 400 years affect us today.” \n\n\n\n“First and foremost\, I made this documentary for my community and for my family\,” Reaghan Tarbell.  “I never saw myself as a filmmaker\, still don’t… but regardless of how you see yourself… I think if you’re destined to tell a story it will find you somehow. Telling the story about my family and my community was at the same time the most challenging and most rewarding time of my life.” \n\n\n\nTarbell is a staff Program Assistant in the National Museum of the American Indian’s Film and Video Center and lives in Brooklyn\, not far from the neighborhood of Little Caughnawaga. \n\n\n\nThe Sanctuary for Independent Media is a telecommunications production facility dedicated to community media arts\, located in an historic former church at 3361 6th Avenue in north Troy\, NY.  The Sanctuary hosts screening\, production and performance facilities\, training in media production and a meeting space for artists\, activists and independent media makers of all kinds.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/little-caughnawaga-to-brooklyn-and-back-with-filmmaker-reaghan-tarbell/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Screening,Speaker
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090228T080000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090228T080000
DTSTAMP:20230310T165632Z
CREATED:20090228T204600Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230310T165632Z
UID:10001032-1235808000-1235808000@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Free Jazz at the Sanctuary Presents The Splatto Festival Chorus
DESCRIPTION:The Splatto Festival Chorus is a rare assembly that brings together Todd Reynolds (Bang on a Can\, Yo Yo Ma\, and Meredith Mond) on violins/laptop; Ed Mann (Zappa) on percussion/electronics; David Barrett (Banda Elastica\, Splatter Trio) on saxophones; Michael Bisio on bass.  \n\n\n\n \n\n\n\nOne of the 13-part “Free Jazz from the Sanctuary” series recorded live at The Sanctuary for Independent Media – a unique celebration of freedom through creative expression. Co-produced by NY Media Alliance\, the Arts Department at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute\, with support from the New York State Council on the Arts and the New York State Music Fund\, established by the New York State Attorney General at Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors..
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/the-splatto-festival-chorus/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Jazz Music,Performance
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090221T200000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090221T220000
DTSTAMP:20230310T165831Z
CREATED:20090221T214800Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230310T165831Z
UID:10001031-1235246400-1235253600@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Free Jazz from the Sanctuary Presents "Somebody Blew Up America" with Amiri Baraka & Rob Brown
DESCRIPTION:The poet icon and political activist Amiri Baraka (1934-2014) will perform with Rob Brown\, one of the New York City downtown music scene’s most in-demand saxophonists\, in a reading of his new book Somebody Blew Up America and Other Poems.  \n\n\n\nOne of the 13-part “Free Jazz from the Sanctuary” series recorded live at The Sanctuary for Independent Media – a unique celebration of freedom through creative expression. Co-produced by NY Media Alliance and the Arts Department at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute with support from the New York State Council on the Arts and the New York State Music Fund\, established by the New York State Attorney General at Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nAMIRI BARAKA\, born in 1934 in Newark\, New Jersey\, is the author of more than 40 books of essays\, poems\, drama\, and music history and criticism\, a poet icon and revolutionary political activist who has recited poetry and lectured on cultural and political issues extensively in the USA\, the Caribbean\, Africa\, and Europe. With influences on his work ranging from musical Orishas such as Ornette Coleman\, John Coltrane\, Thelonious Monk\, and Sun Ra to the Cuban Revolution\, Malcolm X and world revolutionary movements\, Baraka is renowned as the founder of the Black Arts Movement in Harlem in the 1960s that became\, though short-lived\, the virtual blueprint for a new American theater aesthetics. The movement and his published and performance work\, such as the signature study on African-American music\, Blues People (1963) and the play Dutchman (1963) practically seeded “the cultural corollary to black nationalism” of that revolutionary American milieu. Other titles range from Selected Poetry of Amiri Baraka/LeRoi Jones (1979)\, to The Music (1987)\, a fascinating collection of poems and monographs on Jazz and Blues authored by Baraka and his wife and poet Amina\, and his boldly sortied essays\, The Essence of Reparations (2003). \n\n\n\nThe Essence of Reparations is Baraka’s first published collection of essays in book form which radically explores what is sure to become a twenty-first century watershed movement of Black peoples to the interrelated issues of racism\, national oppression\, colonialism\, neo-colonialism\, self-determination and national and human liberation\, which he has long been addressing creatively and critically. It has been said that Amiri Baraka is committed to social justice like no other American writer. \n\n\n\nSomebody Blew Up America & Other Poems is Baraka’s first collection of poems published in the Caribbean and includes the title poem that has headlined him in the media in ways rare to poets and authors. The recital of the poem that mattered engaged the poet warrior in a battle royal with the very governor of New Jersey and with a legion of detractors demanding his resignation as the state’s Poet Laureate because of Somebody Blew Up America’s provocatively poetic inquiry (in a few lines of the poem) about who knew beforehand about the New York City World Trade Center bombings in 2001. The poem’s own detonation caused the author’s photo and words to be splashed across the pages of New York’s Amsterdam News and The New York Times and to be featured on CNN–to name a few US city\, state and national and international media. \n\n\n\nBaraka lives in Newark with his wife and author Amina Baraka; they have five children and head up the word-music ensemble\, Blue Ark: The Word Ship and have co-directed Kimako’s Blues People\, the “artspace\,” housed in their theater basement for some fifteen years. He has taught at Yale\, Columbia\, and the State University of New York at Stony Brook. His awards and honors include an Obie\, the American Academy of Arts & Letters award\, the James Weldon Johnson Medal for contributions to the arts\, Rockefeller Foundation and National Endowment for the Arts grants\, Professor Emeritus at the State university of New York at Stony Brook\, and the Poet Laureate of New Jersey. \n\n\n\nROB BROWN was born in Hampton\, VA in 1962. He has been playing the saxophone since the age of 11. He moved to New York City in 1984\, and since then has been actively leading groups or working as a sideman with Matthew Shipp\, William Parker\, Joe Morris\, Whit Dickey. Others that Rob has performed and/or recorded with are Cecil Taylor\, Anthony Braxton\, Denis Charles\, Bill Dixon\, Butch Morris\, Reggie Workman\, Henry Grimes\, Roy Campbell Jr.\, Hamid Drake and Fred Hopkins\, as well as various dance groups\, poets\, and performance artists. He has toured Europe extensively. He is a 2001 CalArts/Alpert/Ucross Residency Prize winner and has received many Meet The Composer Fund grants. In 2006 Rob was awarded a Chamber Music America New Works grant. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nThe Sanctuary for Independent Media is a telecommunications production facility dedicated to community media arts\, located in an historic former church at 3361 6th Avenue in North Troy\, NY. The Sanctuary hosts screening\, production and performance facilities\, training in media production and a meeting space for artists\, activists and independent media makers of all kinds.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/somebody-blew-up-america-with-amiri-baraka-rob-brown/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Jazz Music,Performance,Speaker
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20090214T200000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20090214T220000
DTSTAMP:20230705T165748Z
CREATED:20090214T222500Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T165748Z
UID:10001030-1234641600-1234648800@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Free Jazz at the Sanctuary presents Percussionist William Hooker with Oscar Micheaux's "The Symbol of the Unconquered"
DESCRIPTION:Percussionist William Hooker\, the genre-bending Free Jazz legend\, will improvise a sound track to pioneering African-American filmmaker Oscar Micheaux’s 1920 silent film classic\, The Symbol of the Unconquered\, originally advertised as a chance to come see “the annihilation of the Ku Klux Klan.”  \n\n\n\nCo-sponsored by the Department of the Arts at RPI and the Albany Sonic Arts Collective\, with support from the Presenting program of the New York State Council on the Arts and the New York State Music Fund\, established by the New York State Attorney General at Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nAbout William Hooker:\n\n\n\nWilliam Hooker is an artistic whole\, a vast circle of vision and execution.  A body of uninterrupted work beginning in the mid-seventies defines him as one of the most important composers and players in jazz.  As bandleader\, Hooker has fielded ensembles in an incredibly diverse array of configurations.  Each collaboration has brought a serious investigation of his compositional agenda and the science of the modern drum kit.  As a player\, Hooker has long been known for the persuasive power of his relationship with his instrument.  His work is frequently grounded in a narrative context.  Whether set against a silent film or anchored by a poetic theme\, Hooker brings dramatic tension and human warmth to avant-garde jazz.  His ability to find fertile ground for moving music in a variety of settings that obliterate genre distinctions offers a much-needed statement of social optimism in the arts.  A disciplined\, adaptive\, and energetic approach to his medium insures that the oeuvre of William Hooker will continue to grow thicker and richer.  William Hooker has released more than 40 critically acclaimed CDs.  As a composer\, he has received commissions from Meet the Composer\, the NY State Council on the Arts\, Real Art Ways\, Walker Arts Center and others. \n\n\n\nDrummer William Hooker\, who moved to New York in 1974\, remained fundamentally faithful to the aesthetic of free-jazz (despite a passion for exoteric/spiritual themes)\, starting with the double-LP Is Eternal Life (May 1975)\, a set of collaborations with other improvisers (including tenor saxophonists David Murray and David Ware.  Rediscovered by Sonic Youth’s guitarist Thurston Moore for the rock audience\, Hooker returned to a more abstract and free-form kind of creative improvisation in the main works of his prolific middle age: Darkness (November 1992) and The Spirits Return (April 1994) on the live Radiation\, by Hooker’s band featuring Donald Miller (Borbetomagus)\, electronic musician Brian Doherty\, Compo\, Kono; a duet with Moore (Sirius) and an electro acoustic duet with guitarist Elliot Sharp (The Hat) on Shamballa (1993)\, and recordings with Zeena Parkins\, Billy Bang\, and Lee Renaldo (Sonic Youth)\, DJ Olive\, and Christian Marclay.  \n\n\n\nThe albums with Ranaldo were heavily influenced by his screeching sounds\, just like his turbulent wall of noise heavily influenced the albums with Donald Miller.  Armageddon (February 1995) marked a change in direction\, both because the improvisations turned towards a more sophisticated kind of sound painting and because the stylistic palette expanded dramatically\, ranging from a Dadaistic duet with turntabilist Gregor “DJ Olive” Asch to the 16-minute free jam State Secrets for drums and two guitars.  \n\n\n\nAbout the film:\n\n\n\nOscar Micheaux was an independent filmmaker and entrepreneur\, whose earliest and most significant films were responses to D.W. Griffith’s “Birth of a Nation\,” portraying the African-American struggle against white racism and the KKK. These films were “Within Our Gates” (1919) and “Symbol of the Unconquered” (1920)\, both lost for decades and restored in the 1990s.  In “Symbol of the Unconquered\,” the black hero holds his ground and chivalrously protects a lovely light-skinned mulatto neighbor (who is passing as white) as a local gang of thieves and hooded\, torch-carrying Klansmen plots to frighten him\, steal his land and finally\, to kill him.  Though how they do it remains unknown due to a key missing reel\, the amorous “black” couple emerges from the ordeal unscathed and thrilled to discover their shared racial identity.  Laced within these (and many other) Micheaux melodramas are themes of inter- and intra-racial tensions and hatred.  \n\n\n\nOur press release:\n\n\n\nPercussionist William Hooker—a genre-bending free jazz legend whose collaborations range from the Isley Brothers to Sonic Youth—will improvise a live soundtrack to this recently-rediscovered 1920 silent film by pioneering African-American filmmaker Oscar Micheaux\, originally advertised as a chance to come see “the annihilation of the Ku Klux Klan.”  \n\n\n\nWilliam Hooker biography: (by Nathan Bush\, from www.AllMusic.com) Working on the periphery of the jazz world since he moved to New York in 1974\, William Hooker’s kinetically charged\, free-time drumming style and spoken word poetry have been matched with some of the finest improvising talent across generations and stylistic boundaries. From solo explorations to collaborations with Billy Bang\, Lee Ranaldo\, and DJ Olive\, Hooker’s music has surfaced on a smattering of independently minded record labels aiming to document some of the most distinctive musicians working this indefinable terrain. Born in New Britain\, CT\, on June 18\, 1946\, William Hooker initially approached the drum kit with reluctance. Hesitancy was soon replaced by commitment\, however\, and at age 12\, he was getting his first taste of performing\, supporting the Isley Brothers\, Dionne Warwick\, and Gary “U.S.” Bonds as a member of the Flames.  \n\n\n\nIn college\, he enrolled in a course on 20th Century Composers\, writing a paper on the atonal music of Alban Berg. Combined with an independent study of the jazz albums on Blue Note Records\, the drummer was ensured a unique music education. Local musicians like the tenor saxophonist Al Pitts and bassist Bob Snell provided more practical tutelage.  \n\n\n\nHooker eventually made a trek out to the West Coast with his good friend Tyrone Lampkin (future drummer for Parliament/Funkadelic)\, an eye-opening experience for the young musician. While he was disappointed by the lack of ability on the jazz scene as a whole\, the radical consciousness of the period led to his initial attempts at “free” playing. Hooker moved back to Hartford\, CT\, where he lived briefly before heading to New York in 1974.  \n\n\n\nIn his new home\, the drummer quickly established himself amongst the city’s jazz\, loft scene. The new jazz of Delmark and Actuel BYG began replacing the Blue Note Records in his collection. Unable to find a label for himself\, Hooker established the non-profit Reality Unit Concepts to fund his debut\, 1978’s Is Eternal Life\, a collection of solo\, duo\, and trio performances with prominent tenor saxophonists David Murray and David S. Ware and altoist Jemeel Moondoc. Hooker spent much of the 1980s hard at work\, performing with a number of his own ensembles. Rather than establishing a regular unit\, the drummer drew from a community of musicians that included trumpeter Lewis Barnes\, saxophonists Blaise Siwula and Charles Compo\, pianist Mark Hennen\, and guitarist Jesse Henry. Sadly\, little of the music he made during the decade found its way onto records.  \n\n\n\nIt wasn’t until the early ’90s that more outlets became available. Hooker’s work emerged on independent labels like Knitting Factory\, Silkheart\, and Homestead. The drummer began receiving increasing attention from the underground rock sector. Fans and artists of post-punk and indie rock were turning their ear toward experimental and improvised music\, including the sort of free jazz Hooker performed. Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore\, a longtime admirer of the genre\, released the drummer’s Subconscious album (1994) on his Ecstatic Peace label.  \n\n\n\nHooker soon began performing with younger musicians beyond the immediate scope of jazz (oftentimes at Knitting Factory jams). Shamballa (1993) pits Hooker’s fiery drumming against the unkempt feedback bursts of Moore and the calculated guitar electronics of Elliot Sharp. Envisioning (1994) captures an improv date with Sonic Youth’s Lee Ranaldo that includes spoken word segments. The duo was joined by the ecstatic electric harp work of Zeena Parkins for the date that produced 1995’s the Gift of Tongues. Hooker also brought electronics into his music\, collaborating with Brian Doherty\, Doug Walker\, and Gert-Jan Prins\, and turntablists DJ Olive (on 1995’s Armageddon and 1997’s Mindfulness) and Christian Marclay (2000’s Bouquet).  \n\n\n\nOscar Micheaux biography: (by Joseph Worrell\, from www.SilentEra.com) Writer\, producer and director\, Oscar Micheaux is the father of Afro-American cinema. The most prolific Afro-American filmmaker of the silent era\, Micheaux produced more than 40 films between 1919 and 1940\, and was active as a novelist until his death. Quaintly referred to as the “Cecil B. De Mille of Race Movies\,” Micheaux was a controversial figure during his lifetime. Like today’s premier Afro-American director Spike Lee\, Micheaux and his films were publicly misunderstood.  \n\n\n\nThe grandson of a slave\, and the fifth of 11 children\, Micheaux was born in Metropolis\, Illinois on January 2\, 1884. He worked at various jobs\, a coal miner\, a stockyards worker and a Pullman porter\, before becoming a homesteader and novelist in Gregory\, South Dakota\, in the 1910s. Failing to get his novel\, The Homesteader\, made into a film through the Lincoln Motion Picture Company\, Micheaux established his own motion picture and book publishing company while studying the techniques of film production. The Micheaux Film and Book Publishing Corporation\, founded 1918 in Chicago\, would soon be the most prolific of all black-owned independent film companies.  \n\n\n\nThe Homesteader (1919) with Charles D. Lucas\, Evelyn Preer and Iris Hall was his first entry in the race-film industry. A fledging industry known as “race movies\,” existed in the United States from 1910 to the end of World War II. Made predominantly by Blacks (especially in the 1920s) for black audiences\, these independent films emerged from a direct response to Jim Crow theaters and an exclusionary Hollywood system. They were a part of the Afro-American community’s attempts in countering and providing alternative images to the stereotypes so prevalent in mainstream culture. The William D. Foster Film Company\, actor and cofounder Nobel Johnson’s Lincoln Motion Picture\, The Richard F. Norman Company of Florida (The Flying Ace\, 1926)\, and the Philadelphia-based Colored Players Film Corp. (The Scar of Shame\, 1929) were other important race-film producers.  \n\n\n\nProduced outside the Hollywood system\, Micheaux’s race cinema cannot be viewed as commercial entertainment. An appreciation of them must take Afro-American history and the prevailing ideology into context. Micheaux and other black filmmakers experienced manifold financial\, technical and systemic obstacles in producing and distributing their films. He produced his films on low ‘shoestring’ budgets and marketed them himself peddling and reediting a single print from city to city for exhibitors\, regional censorship boards and theatre owners. Always in search for new markets\, Micheaux traveled to Europe and South America. An enterprising showman\, Micheaux used this forte in persuading hesitant Southern theater owners to screen his films in segregated cinemas or at blacks-only “midnight ramble” showings. While on promotional tours\, he would procure financial backers for upcoming projects\, encourage black businessmen to invest in black theaters and scout for fresh screen talent. Micheaux Productions went bankrupt in 1928\, reincorporated in 1930\, going into final receivership in 1940.  \n\n\n\nLike D.W. Griffith\, Cecil B. DeMille and John Ford\, Micheaux also created his own star system/stock company of featured players. Evelyn Preer\, a talented dramatic actress with the Lafayette Theatre Players Company\, was his first leading lady. She starred in nine Micheaux features and was\, in addition\, a popular musical comedy and race recording artist. Lawrence Chenault\, Lorenzo Tucker (dubbed the “black Rudolph Valentino”)\, Clarence Brooks\, Ethel Moses\, Andrew Bishop (a regular villain)\, Shingzie Howard\, Alec Lovejoy\, Katherine Noisette\, Laura Bowman and his statuesque wife\, Alice B. Russell\, were other Micheaux regulars. Attractive and assertive personalities\, they were detached from the Afro-American menial stereotypes found in Hollywood films. Biographical details about Micheaux players remain obscure.  \n\n\n\nMicheaux\, a maverick and a social activist\, did not hesitate in confronting issues that agitated both black and white audiences. His films interrogated the value systems of both communities in a variety of controversial subjects\, causing problems with the press and state censors in the process. In essence\, Micheaux’s films represented the emergence of a radical black voice in the mass media. Tales of mixed-race relationships or miscegenation was his favorite theme in critiques of ‘passing\,’ assimilation and racial betrayal. His second feature\, Within Our Gates (1920)\, was a rebuttal to D.W. Griffith’s Ku Klux Klan propaganda of The Birth of a Nation (1915). Micheaux’s multiple subplots revolve around the travails of heroine Sylvia Landry (Evelyn Preer) and her attempt to raise money from a wealthy Boston patroness to save a Southern black school.  \n\n\n\nWithin Our Gates remains a poignant indictment of a Southern lynching and the attempted rape of the mixed race heroine by a white molester who turns out to be her father. Here\, Micheaux counters and exposes the trajectory contradictions of Klan vigilantism and White America’s fears of miscegenation. His films reflected his racial ‘uplift’ didacticism and were part of his attempts to raise social consciousness while probing the black community’s values in a realistic\, if not always ‘positive’ light.  \n\n\n\nBody and Soul (1925) featured Paul Robeson in his screen debut. Robeson plays a dual role of a ‘good’ twin brother and a bogus ‘preacher’ who preys on a small community’s religious fervor and then attempts to rape the heroine Julia Theresa Russell (Micheaux’s future sister-in-law). The Afro-American press\, sometimes misguided\, criticized him for representing corruption in the black clergy (a sensitive area) and ‘exploiting’ black urban life\, crime and sexuality in his films. The film ran into trouble with New York censors. The censored and truncated print of Body and Soul\, unfortunately\, is all that survives of Micheaux’s original intentions.  \n\n\n\nForgotten for many years\, most of Micheaux’s films were mislaid or destroyed. The Homesteader (1919)\, The Brute (1920)\, The Gunsaulus Mystery (1921)\, Birthright (1924)\, The House Behind the Cedars (1925)\, The Conjure Woman (1926)\, The Spider’s Web (1927)\, The Millionaire (1927)\, The Wages of Sin (1928) are among his presumed lost silent films. A Daughter of the Congo (1930)\, a part-talkie\, and Easy Street (1930) are also presumed lost. The Library of Congress holds a 16mm reduction print of The Exile (1931)\, his first full-length sound feature. Considered lost for decades\, Within Our Gates (La Negra) was discovered in Madrid’s Filmoteca Espanol in 1990.  \n\n\n\nThe Library of Congress later restored and retranslated its subtitles. Within Our Gates\, The Symbol of the Unconquered (1920) discovered in a Belgian archive\, and Body and Soul (restored by George Eastman House) are Micheaux’s earliest surviving features. Only Within Our Gates (1920) and Body and Soul (1925) are available on VHS and DVD home video. His equally rare sound films\, Veiled Aristocrats (1932)\, The Girl from Chicago (1932)\, Murder in Harlem (1935)\, God’s Stepchildren (1937)\, Swing! (1938) and Lying Lips (1939) are currently available.  \n\n\n\nDifficult to situate in history\, it was convenient to ignore race filmmaking as an aesthetic or political practice. Today\, Micheaux and his contemporaries (The R.F. Norman Company and The Colored Players Corporation) are experiencing a renaissance of critical study and appreciation. The recent efforts of archivists Pearl Bowser\, Jane Gaines and J. Ronald Green have ensured that their legacy is finally being recognized as a worthy contribution to American cinema. Micheaux died on March 25\, 1951 in Charlotte\, North Carolina\, of heart disease. In 1987\, he was honored with a star on Hollywood Boulevard. He remains a major film stylist and politico.  \n\n\n\nPlot summary for The Symbol of the Unconquered: (by Hans J. Wollstein\, from www.allmovie.com) This early-black cinema silent was produced and directed by the era’s most prolific African-American filmmaker Oscar Micheaux. Iris Hall played Evon Mason\, “a beautiful Negress” travelling West to inspect her inheritance\, a gold mine. She is thrown out of the area’s only hotel but is cared for by a black prospector (Lawrence Chenault)\, whose life she later saves. Racism rarely reared its ugly head in Micheaux’s films\, at least not directly. It is therefore noteworthy that Symbol of the Unconquered contains a scene wherein the protagonist is barred from an all-white hotel\, a situation all too familiar to the film’s African-American target audience. Symbol of the Unconquered also featured Walker Thompson\, E.G. Tatum\, Jim Burris\, Mattie Wilkes\, and Leigh Whipper. The latter\, the first black member of Actors Equity and the founder of the Negro Actors Guild\, was a highly regarded Broadway actor whose best remembered screen role was that of Crooks in Lewis Milestone’s film “Of Mice and Men.”
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/oscar-micheauxs-the-symbol-of-the-unconquered-with-percussionist-william-hooker/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Jazz Music,Performance,Screening
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20081219T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20081219T200000
DTSTAMP:20230705T163619Z
CREATED:20081219T164500Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T163619Z
UID:10000869-1229709600-1229716800@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:"Crime Against Humanity" with Poet and Activist Michael Anthony Reyes Benavides
DESCRIPTION:A play by poet and activist Michael Anthony Reyes Benavides and former Puerto Rican Political Prisoner Luis Rosa\, directed by Michael Anthony Reyes Benavides. Imagine 27 years of your life living in a space 6 feet by 9 feet. Imagine being confined in isolation with no human contact. Imagine the shakedowns\, the strip searches\, and the complete disregard for your humanity. Crime Against Humanity is a play based on the real-life experiences of fourteen Puerto Rican political prisoners who spent more than two decades in prisons for seditious conspiracy—two of whom are still incarcerated. Crime Against Humanity brings us into the U.S. prison system in a way no other play has\, focusing on the politically motivated use of isolation\, selective punishment\, sensory deprivation\, and disproportionate sentences. Crime Against Humanity is produced by the National Boricua Human Rights Network and Batey Urbano. These two organizations hope to use this performance piece to raise consciousness and gain support for the campaign to free the remaining Puerto Rican political prisoners. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nImagine 27 years of your life living in a space 6 feet by 9 feet. Imagine being confined in isolation with no human contact. Imagine the shakedowns\, the strip searches and the complete disregard for your humanity. Crime Against Humanity is a play based on the real life experiences of fourteen Puerto Rican political prisoners who spent more than two decades in prisons for seditious conspiracy—two of whom are still incarcerated. Crime Against Humanity brings us into the U.S. prison system in a way no other play has\, focusing on the politically motivated use of isolation\, selective punishment\, sensory deprivation and disproportionate sentences. \n\n\n\nWritten by poet and activist Michael Anthony Reyes Benavides and former Puerto Rican political prisoner Luis Rosa\, the play confronts the physical and mental torture these prisoners endured for more than 27 years. We gaze into their cell and experience the loss of parents\, the transition of children into adulthood and feel the physical brutality and torture of a government out to make an example of them. We see them as they refuse to be victimized and objectified\, confronting their hardships and adversities while maintaining their dignity\, and upholding their humanity. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nReyes Benavides spent hours interviewing the former Puerto Rican political prisoners\, and through extensive written correspondence\, the two remaining political prisoners Oscar López Rivera and Carlos Alberto Torres. Through the play\, we hear from their own mouths\, their own words\, exactly what it means to be a political prisoner in the United States. \n\n\n\nCrime Against Humanity is produced by the National Boricua Human Rights Network and Batey Urbano. These two organizations hope to use this performance piece to raise consciousness and gain support for the campaign to free the remaining Puerto Rican political prisoners. \n\n\n\n“By using theater as a tool of resistance\, we hope to reach out to those sectors that are often ignored by traditional activist outreach. We want our families\, our brothers and sisters and our community to come out and see what these prisoners endured\, many of them for almost 20 years\, two of them for more than 27″ (author and director Reyes Benavides). \n\n\n\nCrime Against Humanity will make stops in numerous other U.S. cities\, including New York\, Philadelphia\, Cleveland\, Hartford\, Washington D.C.\, Boston\, San Francisco\, and Los Angeles. The production has plans to tour throughout Puerto Rico in the future as well.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/crime-against-humanity-with-poet-and-activist-michael-anthony-reyes-benavides/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Performance
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20081214T120000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20081214T160000
DTSTAMP:20230705T162736Z
CREATED:20081214T164000Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T162736Z
UID:10000866-1229256000-1229270400@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Be The Media! Workshop: Holiday Animation
DESCRIPTION:The Sanctuary Youth Media Team hosts yet another animation whirlwind! Geared specifically for youth (18 & under)\, this workshop teaches the skills and techniques behind stop motion animation while encouraging spontaneous creativity and fun. Participants will work in groups to brainstorm and create short animated pieces that will be uploaded to the web for the world to see. Led by the Sanctuary Youth Media Team.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/be-the-media-workshop-holiday-animation/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Workshop
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20081213T200000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20081213T220000
DTSTAMP:20230705T161952Z
CREATED:20081213T163600Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T161952Z
UID:10000865-1229198400-1229205600@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Ted Daniel’s International Brass & Membrane Corps
DESCRIPTION:The International Brass & Membrane Corps features Newman Taylor-Baker on drums\, Charles Burham on violin\, Joe Daly on tuba\, and Ted Daniel on assorted brass. Ted began his professional career playing local gigs with his childhood friend\, the legendary guitarist Sonny Sharrock. Since then he has played and recorded with Archie Shepp\, Dewey Redman\, Andrew Cyrille\, Sam Rivers\, Billy Bang\, Henry Threadgill\, and many other jazz greats.  His latest recording\, “Golden Atoms\,” has just been released on Soul Note.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/ted-daniels-international-brass-membrane-corps/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Jazz Music,Performance
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20081207T120000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20081207T160000
DTSTAMP:20230705T161552Z
CREATED:20081207T163100Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T161552Z
UID:10000862-1228651200-1228665600@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Be The Media! Workshop with Andrew Lynn and Special Guests: Digital Media Labs
DESCRIPTION:Digital Media Labs (DML) are all ages (14+) monthly workshops introduced by popular demand. Whether you are working on a documentary\, making a music video\, or learning to blog and post videos on the Internet\, these sessions will benefit you. Bring your own digital media projects and ideas\, or just commune and share skills with other makers. DML will focus on media production\, web publishing (HTML & blogging)\, digital imaging\, and video editing. Each session will highlight certain skills\, but will not be limited by any specific assignments or software applications. Participants will have access to Sanctuary computers and camcorders during lab hours.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/be-the-media-workshop-with-andrew-lynn-and-special-guests-digital-media-labs-3/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Workshop
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20081206T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20081206T200000
DTSTAMP:20230705T161324Z
CREATED:20081206T162800Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T161324Z
UID:10000861-1228586400-1228593600@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:"I Need That Record" with Filmmaker Brendan Toller
DESCRIPTION:I Need that Record (2008)  is a documentary feature examining why more than 3\,000 independent record stores have closed across the U.S. in the past decade. Greedy record labels\, media consolidation\, homogenized radio\, big box stores\, e-commerce\, shoddy “stars” pushed by big money\, and the digital revolution all pose threats to the very well-being of our favorite record stores. Will these stores die? Will they survive? The filmmaker will lead a discussion following the screening. \n\n\n\nToller\, who researched the film for two years and traveled all over the U.S. talking to record store owners\, musicians and music lovers\, comments that “[r]ecord stores serve as important community spaces providing foundations for new musical and artistic scenes and movements\,” noting also the role of record stores as seedbeds for independent thought and meeting places for people of all kinds. I Need That Record! is a compelling tribute to this endangered phenomenon. \n\n\n\nI Need That Record! features interviews with Thurston Moore (Sonic Youth)\, Ian Mackaye (Dischord Records Fugazi/Minor Threat). activist/author Noam Chomsky\, Mike Watt (The Minutemen)\, Lenny Kaye (the Patti Smith Group)\, Chris Frantz (Talking Heads/Tom Tom Club)\, guitar composer Glenn Branca\, Patterson Hood (Drive-By Truckers)\, Pat Carney (Black Keys)\, punk author Legs McNeil\, rock photographer Bob Gruen\, BP Helium (Of Montreal)\, and the owners and employees of record stores in NYC\, Boston\, DC\, Cleveland\, Detroit\, Ann Arbor\, Chicago\, Minneapolis\, Memphis\, Nashville\, and Los Angeles. \n\n\n\nGreedy record labels\, media consolidation\, homogenized radio\, big box stores\, e-commerce\, shoddy “stars” pushed by big money\, and the digital revolution are all real challenges to independent record stores. I Need That Record! asks: Will these stores die? Will they survive? \n\n\n\nThe film has attracted buzz on Pitchfork\, The Onion A/V Club\, PunkNews\, Wiretap Magazine\, Brooklyn Vegan\, The Stranger and more.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/i-need-that-record-with-filmmaker-brendan-toller/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Panel Discussion,Screening
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20081203T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20081203T200000
DTSTAMP:20230705T161046Z
CREATED:20081203T162300Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T161046Z
UID:10000859-1228327200-1228334400@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Frank Lopez Presents Submedia and Lost Film Festival: Guerilla Media Screening with "Ground Noise and Static"
DESCRIPTION:Video and web artist and all-around culture jammer Frank Lopez of subMedia.TV visits us from Vancouver\, BC!  His work includes the post- Katrina music video George Bush Don’t Like Black People (downloaded over one million times and counting) and the vlog It’s the End of the World as We Know It and I Feel Fine (which highlighted the Wafaa Bilal incident last spring).  He’ll be presenting Ground Noise & Static\, a powerful documentary filmed in the midst of the protests at last summer’s 2008 political conventions.  \n\n\n\nGround Noise & Static is a joint effort of Franklin López of subMedia.TV andPepperSpray Productions. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nAbout Ground Noise & Static \n\n\n\nIn November\, one or the other of the corporate candidates willwin\, and then\, as always\, it will be what the people do\, not thepoliticians\, that counts. \n\n\n\nGround Noise & Static is a video report on the protests that occurred in connection with the Democrat and Republican National Conventions\, Ground Noise & Static is a manifesto. We went to Denver and St. Paul to take the pulse of the movement. Corporate media would cover the platitudes and posturing of the politicians\, we were interested in something else\, a story hidden in plain sight\, captured in the now-classic street chant\, “This is what democracy looks like.”
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/frank-lopez-presents-submedia-and-lost-film-festival-guerilla-media-screening-with-ground-noise-and-static/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Panel Discussion,Workshop
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20081130T120000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20081130T160000
DTSTAMP:20230705T160418Z
CREATED:20081130T155100Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T160418Z
UID:10000858-1228046400-1228060800@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Be The Media! Workshop with Jim de Seve: Digital Media Labs- Beyond the Talking Head
DESCRIPTION:Digital Media Labs (DML) are all ages (14+) monthly workshops introduced by popular demand. Whether you are working on a documentary\, making a music video\, or learning to blog and post video to the Internet\, these sessions will benefit you. Bring your own digital media projects and ideas\, or just commune and share skills with other makers. DML will focus on media production\, web publishing (html & blogging)\, digital imaging\, and video editing. Each session will highlight certain skills\, but will not be limited by any specific assignments or software applications. Participants will have access to Sanctuary computers and camcorders during lab hours.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/be-the-media-workshop-with-jim-de-seve-digital-media-labs-beyond-the-talking-head/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Workshop
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20081123T120000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20081123T160000
DTSTAMP:20230705T160241Z
CREATED:20081123T154900Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T160241Z
UID:10000857-1227441600-1227456000@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Be The Media! Workshop: Beyond the Talking Head
DESCRIPTION:For this workshop\, the Sanctuary teams up with SACC TV Channel 16 – Schenectady’s public access television stations. Learn the skills and tricks of creating dynamic video pieces for television that go beyond “talking head” interviews. Learn about collecting b-roll\, covering edits\, and adding meaning and illustration to your interviews and documentary works. Get in touch with your creative side\, as the instructor helps you explore other genres and techniques to drive your message home. \n\n\n\nInstructor: Jim De SeveJim De Seve is a local documentary maker and media producer. In addition to his own acclaimed documentary work\, he has shot and produced videos for Nickelodeon\, MTV\, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden and the American Museum of Natural History. Jim currently teaches documentary production at Union College.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/be-the-media-workshop-beyond-the-talking-head/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Workshop
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20081122T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20081122T210000
DTSTAMP:20230705T160010Z
CREATED:20081122T154400Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230705T160010Z
UID:10001028-1227380400-1227387600@archive.mediasanctuary.org
SUMMARY:Free Jazz from the Sanctuary presents   The Ras Ensemble
DESCRIPTION:Ras Moshe has been playing in various groups throughout New York City for almost 20 years\, with William Hooker\, Sabir Mateen\, Steve Swell\, Marc Edwards and others. His style has been compared to post-1965 John Coltrane and Frank Wright\, among others. Born and raised in New York\, and with a family history rich in the jazz tradition\, Ras has uniquely positioned himself to bring the lineage of free jazz into the present day.  \n\n\n\nLocal presentation of Ras Moshe is co-sponsored by the Arts Department at RPI and supported by the New York State Council on the Arts and the New York State Music Fund. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPress Release\n\n\n\nSaxophonist Ras Moshe is on the forefront of musicians keeping avant garde jazz urgent and vital. Moshe comes blessed with a jazz pedigree: his grandfather played with Lucky Millinder\, Earl Bostic\, Ella Fitzgerald\, and many others\, and his father worked with Carlos Garnett\, Stanley Cowell\, and other musicians in the new music scene in Brooklyn. As a result Moshe is well versed in jazz’s past\, but he uses his knowledge to envision the future. And he’s bringing as many musicians with him as he can: Moshe is founder of Music Now!\, a roving festival that regularly produces some of New York City’s most exciting concerts. \n\n\n\nRas Moshe has been playing in various groups throughout New York City for almost twenty years. He is a veteran of the groups of such leaders as William Hooker\, Sabir Mateen\, Steve Swell and Marc Edwards. His style has been compared to post-1965 John Coltrane and Frank Wright\, among others. Born and raised in New York\, and with a family history rich in the jazz tradition\, Moshe has uniquely positioned himself to bring the lineage of free jazz into the present day. \n\n\n\nRas has been writing and reciting poetry since childhood. He believes in the positive effect the new music will have on social and personal change. His new release is “Transcendence” on KMB Jazz.
URL:https://archive.mediasanctuary.org/event/ras-moshe/
LOCATION:The Sanctuary\, 3361 6th Ave\, Troy\, 12180\, United States
CATEGORIES:Jazz Music,Performance
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR