Wanda's Picks Radio Show, Wednesday, November 27, 2019

This is a black arts and culture site. We will be exploring the African Diaspora via the writing, performance, both musical and theatrical (film and stage), as well as the visual arts of Africans in the Diaspora and those influenced by these aesthetic forms of expression. I am interested in the political and social ramifications of art on society, specifically movements supported by these artists and their forebearers. It is my claim that the artists are the true revolutionaries, their work honest and filled with raw unedited passion. They are our true heroes. Ashay! 

Slave Rebellion Reeenactment Choir at the Old Mint/Armory
Kelsey Robinson's camera, edited by Wanda Sabir

This is the third conversation in a series, begun Nov. 20, 2019, which looks at the historic Slave Rebellion Reenactment Nov. 8-9, 2019 in the places the German Coast Uprising January 1811 took place in Southeast Louisiana. The brainchild of artist provocateur Dread Scott, these conversations are an opportunity for the Army to reflect on the experience and where we go from here. 

We are joined by: Jardyn Lake, aka Sweetboi, is a black/queer cultural activist, youth worker, and artist living in New Orleans. Jardyn has been a member of Southerners on New Ground (SONG) since being affirmed, baptized and radicalized in the holy waters of Southern youth organizing and leadership at the Highlander Center in 2005. A graduate of Temple University [B.A. African-American Studies, Summa Cum Laude] and University of London’s SOAS [M.A. African Studies, with Distinction], Jardyn is interested in creating a queer Black and African transnational dialogue and cultural-historical exchange between artists, activists, scholars, and visionaries. Since moving to New Orleans, Jardyn joined the Afro-Brazilian company, Casa Samba as a percussionist, furthering their vision to engage in diasporic cultural education and organizing. Jardyn is an avid sweet tea drinker, lover of all things dapper and dandy, and a world traveler.

Kelsey (R) with other Freedom Choir Member on
the levee. Photo credit: Wanda Sabir

Kelsey Robinson is a Pittsburgh and Brooklyn-based actor-singer with an interest in global folk music and theater with a focus on racial/multiracial identity and empathy elevating immersion;

Carrie Hawks (they/them) is a Brooklyn-based filmmaker, animator, artist and performer who focuses on healing and queer narratives.

Victoria Netanus Grubbs, Ph.D.Candidate in the Dept. of Media, Culture and Communication at NYU. Her research interests include the political economy of cultural production, transnational/diasporic cultural networks, the semiotics of sound, and the aesthetics of the black Atlantic. Professionally, she is an arts educator with a commitment to developing and supporting radical leadership in underserved communities in the U.S. and abroad; Carrie Hawks’ art investigates gender, queer sexuality, and Blackness in order to promote healing. They work in a variety of medium including film, drawing, doll-making, animation, and performance. They hold a BA in Art History and Visual Arts from Barnard College and a BFA in Graphic Design from Georgia State University. They have shown nationally and internationally in the Brooklyn

Victoria Netanus Grubbs

Museum, The New Museum, the Nelson-Atkins Museum, The Kemper, The Kitchen (NYC), Atlanta, Cape Town, Toronto, and Tokyo. Their award-winning animated documentary black enuf* was funded in part by The Jerome Foundation and included in Black Public Media’s AfroPop series. They have performed with Black Women Artist for Black Lives Matter, and selected for the Set on Freedom Artist Residency (Queens Museum) and awarded the Jerome Camargo Residency in 2019. Reviews, mentions, and interviews about their work have appeared in The New York Times, Colorlines, HyperAllergic, The Kansas City Star;

Nicole Eugene is an Assistant Professor at the University of Houston-Victoria. She received her PhD from Ohio University in Communication Studies, her MA is from Bowling Green State University in American Cultural Studies and she studied Sociology and Art at Spelman College. She is an interdisciplinary scholar, a disability advocate, and a scholar-artist. She is the winner of numerous awards and her work has been supported by Ohio Humanities, a state affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Her research focuses on the particular ways hidden disabilities—especially neurological disabilities—are shaped by cultural dynamics. She uses cultural studies, qualitative, ethnographic, and autoethnographic methods to examine the experience of navigating a visual culture with a hidden disability. She has published research on a range of conditions that includes but is not limited to: Bipolar, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Parkinson’s Disease, and Narcolepsy. Nicole Eugene has published several articles, including peer-reviewed articles in Howard Journal of Communications, Kaleidoscope: A Graduate Journal of Qualitative Communication Research, and Callaloo: A Journal of African Diaspora Arts and Letters. Her research interest areas includes: health disclosures, hidden disabilities, sleep, race, cultural studies, performance studies, critical theory, health narratives, feminism, and technology;

Camellia Moses Okpodu (born January 24, 1964 in Portsmouth, Virginia), is Professor of Biology and Dean of Arts and Sciences at Xavier University of Louisiana (XULA), New Orleans, LA. She was Professor (2003-2018) and former Chair of Biology (2003–2008) at Norfolk State University (NSU) and the 2007–2008 American Council of Education Fellow. She was the second director of the DIA-designated Intelligence Community Center for Academic Excellence at Norfolk State University, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camellia_Okpodu


And Dread Scott, artavist (artist+activist), provocateur and visionary who pursued the Slave Rebellion Reenactment concept from idea to fruition Nov. 8-9, 2019 in Southeast Louisiana into New Orleans and beyond. Visit https://www.dreadscott.net/ and https://www.slave-revolt.com/

Show link: http://tobtr.com/s/11595363

Music: Zion Trinity, Billy Harper