Keeping tango alive

If the city of Buenos Aires had a soundtrack, it would no doubt be filled with tango music. The emotionally-charged music and dance style, which emerged from a mixing of European, African, and indigenous cultures in the 19th century, has become the Buenos Aires’ trademark (at least for outsiders like me), lending form to a sense of nostalgia often associated with porteño culture. When I had the opportunity to spend a few months working in Buenos Aires in 2007, I made a point of visiting a few of the city’s established milongas and even took a few dance lessons. Yet, in my conversations with young artists, writers, and musicians, most expressed little interest in the tango tradition—that was their grandparents’ music.

In 2009, the cities of Buenos Aires and Montevideo joined forces to nominate the tradition of tango to the UNESCO Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The list comes out of the 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Heritage, a UNESCO instrument designed to protect and revitalize culture traditions or living cultural expressions such as oral traditions, performing arts, and festive events. As signatories to the 2003 Convention, States Parties are committed to safeguarding and revitalizing identified intangible heritage in their territories.

So, how does one safeguard and promote the intangible cultural heritage? The Convention itself does not provide specifics, but does state that Parties should report on legislative, regulatory and other measures taken every six years. Last week, at an event hosted by the Americas Society, I had the opportunity to ask Buenos Aires’ Minister of Culture, Hernán Lombardi, what steps Argentina was taking to promote the tango.  He outlined a four-pronged strategy: ensure the existence the traditional tango ensemble, the Orquesta Típica, through festivals and competitions; preserve and disseminate tango scores; promote the production of the bandoneón, the instrument that lends the tango its signature sound; and spark young people’s interest in tango by integrating tango music and dance into school curricula. He added that the best way to interest young people in tango was to link it to the possibility of romance. Lombardi’s office also supports a major annual festival dedicated to tango in both its traditional and contemporary expressions, Tango Buenos Aires.

Have these policy efforts paid off in breathing new life into the tango tradition? I couldn’t find any details of the the Ministry's strategy online, or how much it costs to implement, but will be looking for Argentina’s UNESCO report in 2015.

Portugal and the creative economy

I wanted to share this article from Der Spiegel Online on the struggles of Portugal's contemporary artists. It was written by my friend, Caille Millner, and discusses Portugal's lacking public support for culture and the ways in which local artists are responding to this reality. In the article, Portugal's former Minister of Culture, Jorge Xavier Barreto, is quoted as saying that most governments regard culture as an expense instead of an investment. In many European nations, however, this is no longer the case.

The cultural policy discourse I picked up on this year in Europe was about the arts as an investment, and an economically viable one. This discussion falls under the rubric of the creative and cultural economy or the creative industries. Not only are the creative industries increasingly a priority for domestic cultural policy (in Germany, the Federal Initiative on the Cultural and Creative Economy) and EU-wide cultural initiatives (the European Commission's recently unveiled Creative Europe program), support for the creative industries is a focus of many European countries' foreign cultural policy and development assistance (see GIZ's Kultur und Entwicklung or the British Council's Creative and Cultural Economy program).

In a recent report from the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology, Cultural and Creative Industries in Germany 2009, which charts the economic impact of the creative industries, these are identified as a growth industry that out-weathered several other major sectors during the financial crisis.

Such is the excitement around the creative economy as the new frame for cultural policymaking that artists and policy experts are sounding the alarm over the over-economization or instrumentation of the arts. That said, by closing its Ministry and dismissing the arts as an expense, Portugal could be missing out on some real opportunities to invest in its creative sector and even benefit from new EU funding programs.

Thanks, Caille, for bringing us the story from Portugal.

Re-thinking ‘World Music’

Singer Mariana Sadovka Photo by Kluczenko

Last Friday I was in Cologne to hear a panel discussion on the topic of world music sponsored by the regional public radio station WDR 3. The speakers, key players in Cologne’s performing arts and cultural policy scene, traded comments about the changes taking place in the field of contemporary music and the need to provide training and exposure to young musicians that would build their global music sensitivity and fluency. At the forefront of the discussion was a proposed Center for World Music envisioned for Cologne. The initiative is being spearheaded by Alba Kultur, a Cologne-based nonprofit devoted to promoting global music productions whose founder spoke passionately about the project. Though some questions were raised about the feasibility of such a center, there was a general consensus among the panelists that the project was a worthy one.


The panel was made up of senior-level professionals presenting expert opinions framed within the context of their respective institutions (UNESCO National Commission, contemporary music and dance schools, nonprofit organization, radio station). Though interesting, the discussion lacked the voice of a professional musician, particularly one that plays the non-western music in question. This shortcoming was somewhat remedied by a lively Q&A session during which several musicians spoke up about their personal experiences. One musician insisted that cross-cultural and international music was happening on its own, without the help of formal institutions and cited his experience getting involved in klezmer music. Another musician, from Argentina but having lived and worked in Germany for much of his career, made a similar point, stressing the need for spaces to perform and reach audiences over the need for research, theories and institutions dedicated to world music.

Exploring art’s radius

“The participation in an act of creativity enables people to think and feel outside of their realities.” These words from Basma El Husseiny, an arts manager and cultural activist in Egypt, set the tone for the Radius of Art conference hosted by the Heinrich Böll Foundation in Berlin in February.

Participants at the Radius of Art conference in Berlin

Attended by over 250 artists, policy makers, researchers, educators and funders from around the world, the conference sought to open an international dialogue on the effects of art and culture on social transformation. Panel discussions, workshops, and artist presentations addressed four themes—Art for Social Transformation, Public Art, Art toward Cultures of Sustainability, and Cultural Policy Strategies and Funding Structures.

I was fortunate to be able to attend with my colleagues from the German Commission for UNESCO and to present on a panel on artists at risk with my former colleague from freeDimensional, Todd Lester.

Several key questions emerged over the course of the two-day conference: What power relationships precondition the funding and support of socially-engaged art, particularly when dealing with North to South development and cooperation policy? How can we talk about arts in the public and political sphere in a language that is understandable by all its agents and stakeholders? In a time of urgent ecological and social problems, what role does creativity play? How can policies and funding structures be supportive without risking limiting art’s existence to a prescribed set of functions? At times, the questions in the air and the diversity of both perspectives and positions of the attendees, resulted in (for me) disorienting cacophony. 

A Talk on Cultural Corporate Sponsorship at the Times Center

Corporate sponsorship and branding were the topics of a panel discussion held yesterday at the Times Center. Organized by the Alliance for the Arts and hosted by The New York Times, the event brought together three experts on corporate philanthropy: Arthur Cohen (LaPlaca Cohen consulting), Glyn Northington (Target), and Andrew Hamingson (The Public Theater), and was moderated by Times’ culture reporter Patricia Cohen. While each speaker brought a unique perspective to the table – that of corporate community relations, nonprofit performing arts organizations, and nonprofit marketing – they seemed generally to share a common stance with regard to the panel’s theme. That stance was that corporate sponsorship, when done right, works great, so get on board. The consonance of their opinions and experience made for a coherent and informative panel, if not a particularly challenging one.

All three presenters emphasized that corporate sponsorship and philanthropy (terms they used more or less interchangeably) was about building a mutually beneficial partnership. Cohen used the metaphor of finding the right dance partner, showing a clip of Fred and Ginger and sharing Katharine Hepburn’s (in)famous quote: “He gave her class, and she gave him sex.” In the nonprofit-corporate relationship, typically the nonprofit provides visibility and the corporation supplies money. (I recommend taking a look at Cohen’s very accessible power point, "Corporate Sponsorship Now", available here.)

Northington spoke frankly about Target’s priorities in partnering with arts organizations—they want to reach a wide audience and build the Target brand through affiliations with education and family programming. Target, which commits a noteworthy 5% of its income to corporate social responsibility, tries to coordinate its branding across the organizations it supports, for example, through supporting nationwide family days and making publicity materials visually consistent.

TED honors artist that brings awareness to urban injustice

Some of JR's urban interventions 

I heard a lot of buzz about French artist JR when I was living in Brazil last year. The photo-graffiti artist, with the help of volunteers, had covered building façades in Rio's favelas with colossal portraits of favela residents--asserting a human face on some of the city's poorest neighborhood and forcing outsiders to actually take a look. It's nice to see that TED is recognizing the power of artistic practice -one that is grassroots, independent, and even, at times, illegal- to raise awareness of social justice issues. The award comes with $100,000 along with the opportunity for the winner to make a wish to change the world that the TED helps to support.

See JR's work on the TED website or read about the award in today's NY Times. JR's work calls to mind the more localized work of São Paulo graffiti artists and activists Jonato, Everaldo, and Paula whose work, Morro da Macumba, I featured on this blog. 

Make Music New York 2010

The Yale Percussion Group at the Naumburg Bandshell 

There were over 1,000 free musical happenings today in New York for the city’s fourth annual Make Music New York festival. I’m proud to say I made it to three. Make Music New York (MMNY) is a day-long music fest open to anyone that wants to make music or enjoy music being made in the city’s public spaces. New York is one of over 300 cities worldwide to hold free music festivals on the longest day of the year after France's Fête de la Musique. 

Though I’ve sung the praises of France’s Fête, I must admit to have being totally ignorant of Make Music New York’s existence until I was handed a program for it at last Sunday at Summer Stage. At first glimpse (1000 musical acts!!) I felt a bit overwhelmed.  A full day dedicated to music in the midst of the city’s abundant free summer concert series? It felt like second dessert. But when I read deeper into the program, I realized that this was different from those series curated for the large stages at Central or Prospect Parks—this was about making music, and you didn’t have to be a vetted act, or even a professional musician, to take part. The other main difference was that the shows were happening in community spaces--on sidewalks, in small parks, around the city’s monuments--and that I didn't have to leave my neighborhood to attend.

The first show I attended was the Yale Percussion Group playing a selection of three pieces by Iannis Xenakis at the Naumburg Bandshell in Central Park. I did have to leave my neighborhood to catch this one, but it was worth the 15 minute subway ride.

Creativity and policy reform

The fact that Arts+Culture is listed as one of the key initiatives of the The Opportunity Agenda, a New York-based organization committed to "building the national will to expand opportunity in America," is very exciting to me. This rights-based leadership, research, and advocacy organization has recognized the important role of arts and media to "create a window into the possible" when it comes to changing public opinion about immigration.

Favianna Rodriguez, David Henry Hwan, and Chung-Wha Hong
Photo courtesy of The Opportunity Agenda

It was this notion that framed last Wednesday's dialogue and multimedia presentation, Immigration: Arts, Culture & Media held at Florence Gould Hall in Manhattan. As I entered the theater, I was greeted by projected images of multimedia artist Kip Fulbeck, front-on portraits of multiethnic individuals holding white pages in front of them that listed their diverse cultural backgrounds. The images reminded me of happy mug shots, as though the artist was challenging the way American society has come to criminalize immigration.

The lights faded and we were shown clips from popular TV shows, movies, and stand up comedians that challenged negative assumptions about immigrants. Alan Jenkins, The Opportunity Agenda's co-founder and director introduced the even and the night's moderator, the dynamic Maria Hinojoso. Acclaimed filmmaker Mira Nair started the evening on a surprising note by indicating during her keynote address that she doesn't consider herself an immigrant per se but as someone who is strongly rooted in three places, on three continents (New York, Uganda, and India). She spoke about confronting ethnic stereotypes in her early work with humor and talent. For Nair, the artist's first responsibility is to her craft, and good work could take an important social justice stand. She also spoke about empowerment as the ability to tell one's own story, this the motto of her East African film training organization, Maisha.

Who Protects Antiquity? Three Models

Who protects antiquity? Apparently, highly-educated, middle-aged white men in dark suits, I couldn't help thinking as I entered the Proshansky Auditorium at the CUNY Graduate Center last Wednesday evening. The suits, James Cuno, Lawrence Rothfield, and Lawrence Coben, moderated by Joel Allen, were gathered on the stage to debate just who is responsible for protecting our ancient heritage and, an even more problematic question, how to go about doing so. As a newcomer to questions surrounding antiquity and its preservation, I learned a lot.

Each panelist had a different take on the crisis facing antiquity today and a different proposal to solve it. Cuno passionately decried the ascription of national boundaries to the archaeological remains of peoples or civilizations, which knew no state lines. The artificial nationalization of artifacts, he argued, keeps nation states from understanding their role as stewards of antiquity, with an obligation to act in their best interest, even when it means relinquishing objects and sites to foreign museums, universities or teams of archaeologists. For Cuno, something like the bygone practice of partage, whereby foreigners were allowed to excavate sites in return for sharing the spoils with the source country, would be a way to save and study the world's treasures.

Rothfield focused on the problem of looters who are pillaging important heritage sites. He led us through an economic analysis of the looting process, blaming the prevalence of looting on the incentives created by collectors (individual and institutional) who put a premium on particular objects. The result was a negative externality: the destruction of the sites of ancient heritage at the hands of profit-seeking thieves. Taking his economic logic one step forward, Rothfield proposed that the demand side should bare the cost of the externality in a tax that would feed into a global antiquity protection fund. This fund would then be used to cover the cost of securing sites in source countries with low capacity to do so on their own.

Legitimizing (and questioning) culture’s utility

Early last Thursday morning I joined other students of cultural policy and international relations to hear a panel discussion on the topic of cultural diplomacy. The panel, entitled “Culture as a tool: Diplomacy and International Exchange in the 21^st Century” was co-presented by NYU’s John Brademas Center for the Study of Congress and the Wagner School’s Student Network Exploring Arts and Culture (SNEAC). Moderated by Frank Hodsoll, CEO of the Resource Center for Cultural Engagement and former chairmen of the NEA, the panel brought together representatives from UNESCO, The Asia Society, and the Instituto Cervantes in New York. The result was a series of interesting presentations that addressed some of the ways in which culture is being understood and engaged as a vehicle for larger objectives: fighting terrorism worldwide, promoting the foreign policy agendas, building grassroots understanding and dialogue among different cultures; and strengthening cultural identities and social cohesion.

I learned a great deal about how culture is being framed and funded in service of diplomacy or cultural understanding in different settings. Hodsell reminded us of America’s dismal record of supporting cultural on any front. In terms of “cultural engagement” (this seems to be the new catchphrase for cultural diplomacy) in foreign policy, he said, the Department of State is doing very little and what it is doing relies mostly on projecting the American image outward. Interestingly (and frighteningly for some) the Department of Defense has invested heavily in public diplomacy and is using culture as a way to build a better understanding of “other” cultures’ views. Towards the end of his talk, Hodsell alluded to the important ways in which culture leads to social change, citing Hugh Masekela’s music in Apartheid South Africa. In my experience, however, government support when culture workers use creativity to challenge injustice, is insufficient.

Culture, Policy, and Social Change

Over the next two months, I am going to be blogging about some of the intersection of arts and culture and social change efforts, some grassroots and others top-down. These blog entries are part of some research on international cultural policy that I'm conducting with the guidance of Professor Ruth Ann Stewart at NYU's Wagner School of Public Service.

For the most part, I will commenting on panel discussions and lectures on this theme taking place here in New York City. If you want to check out any these events (the first has already passed), you can click on the links below to find out more information. And if you hear of other events I should attend, please let me know.

Culture as a Tool: Diplomacy and International Exchange in the 21st Century

Thursday, March 25

8:00 AM

The Puck Building

Who Protects Antiquity?

Wednesday, April 7

6:30 PM

Proshansky Auditorium

Romanticide: Love, Art and Codependency in Art and Cultural Politics

Wednesday, April 7

6:30 PM

19 Washington Square North

Immigration: Arts, Culture and Media 2010

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Florence Gould Hall

The Role of Art and Culture in Bridging the Divide Between the United States and the Muslim World

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

6:00-8:30 PM

[I still have so much to share with you from my time in Uganda, but it will unfortunately have to wait until after graduation in May. Below is a Uganda teaser: a troop of young performers from two orphanages who have mastered Uganda's diverse forms of music and dance and were in residence at Uganda's National Theatre the weeks I was working there. I got to sneak into a rehearsal and was blown away by their talent and professionalism. The youths below are playing traditional cowhide drums called ngoma that wobbled and spun around as they were energetically pounded.]

Reporting from Kampala

After two blog-less months I am back to share my experiences in Kampala, Uganda where I will be spending the next two weeks to carry out a program evaluation for Maisha Film Lab. (The evaluation project is part of my Master's degree program and takes the place of a thesis.) Maisha is a training institute for East African filmmakers and has been running month-long screenwriting and technical labs since 2005.

During the next two weeks myself and my partner will be interviewing over a hundred past Maisha lab participants to get an idea of the impact the labs are having on thesefilmmakers' careers and on the East African film industry more broadly.

When I'm not working, I'm hoping to get a taste of Kampala cultural life. Stay tuned...

Writers and artists bear witness to torture victims

Last Tuesday I attended “Reckoning with Torture: Memos and Testimonies from the War on Terror,” co-presented by PEN American Center and the ACLU. The event brought together 17 well-known writers and human rights workers to read from the War on Terror’s chilling record.

I attended this event not long after screening Steve York’s Confronting the Truth, a documentary about the use of truth commissions to respond to the needs of victims of mass atrocities. The film focused on examples from South Africa, Peru, Morocco, and Indonesia, which, while varying in methodology, all aimed to create a space for victims’ voices to be heard and become part of the public record. This documentary helped me frame “Reckoning with Torture” as an attempt at public truth telling.

When I walked into Cooper Union’s Great Hall I was greeted by two floor-to-ceiling screens showing images of Iraqi detainee's handprints taken while in U.S. custody. The images had been manipulated by artist Jenny Holzer who had carefully scribbled out or outlined with black permanent marker as though censoring the unique trace of each detainee's identity. On the armrests of our seats were sheets of paper marked with the handprints of those who had died in U.S.-run prisons. All of the images, which also included censored memoranda and reports, had been made available by way of the Freedom of Information Act, used since 2003 by NGOs and others to petition for these prisoners' release.

With these images as backdrop, I listened as participating authors read testimonies from the War on Terror. Some segments were outrageous, like a statement by GW Bush reaffirming the United States’ adherence to the Geneva Convention in the aftermath of the Abu Graib scandal. Other parts were devastating, like watching video footage of Guantánamo detainees divulging the treatment they received in detention. Particularly poignant was hearing a very visceral account of one detainee's experience being water boarded interspersed with a reading of the Department of Defense's praise of the brutal technique.

The readers of these testimonies (which included the likes of Art Spiegelman, Eve Ensler, and Paul Auster) were themselves moved and hence left a powerful impression on me. It also wasn’t about them. They were there to draw an audience to bear witness to and create a public record of the atrocities committed during the War on Terror, whose victims are dispersed around the world, some still in prison. The likelihood that a formal truth commission will emerge to recognize and record these stories is slim. I therefore urge you to take the time to see and hear what took place last week in the Great Hall. Seeing and hearing, as truth commissioners will tell you, are qualitatively different from simply reading, and chances are you will learn of some new, atrocious, truth.

The full hour and a half-long event is available to watch PEN’s website here. For the ACLU's critique of the Obama administration's handling of our torture legacy, go here.

PHOTOS: Far above, Holzer's version of a hand print of Iraqi accused of crimes by the U.S. military. Above, Ismael Beah reads from a sworn statement of Lt. Col. Darrel Vandeveld, former lead prosecuter in the military commission case of detainee Mohammed Jawad. (Both images) Copyright © Beowulf Sheehan/PEN American Center for non-profit editorial use only.

No monkey business

Yes, this is the first sports-related post on my culture blog. That's if you consider remote-controlled robot monkeys zooming after whiffle balls to "Chariots of Fire" to be athletic. It got my heart rate up!

Saturday night K. and I headed out to Greenpoint, Brooklyn to witness what is sure to go down as one of the best-fought "chimpionships" in the history of monkey sports.

Monkey robot sports tournaments are the brain-child of artist Dan Walker (the explosive lamp-sculpture below is his work. Dan's in the background, in character, donning Panama hat and pencil mustache as he arbitrates the game). We started hearing about the chimpionships last year and since then they have taken off, moving to larger venues (Saturday's game was held at Greenpoint's hip t.b.d. bar), crossing state lines (this summer Miami held its first chimpionship), and acquiring sponsors (like Amp energy drink).

So this is how it works: there are two, three-monkey teams, red and blue. There are three different sizes of monkey on each team, and each has different strengths (and weaknesses). The monkeys are controlled by humans, which is a big part of the fun. The teams are trying to score by corralling three balls (each a different size) into the opposite team's goal. Like soccer, though goal tending was against the rules.

I took a turn and, while I only scored once, and completely by accident, I had a lot of fun making my monkey disco dance in the center of the ring. The fans (hundreds of small plastic toys arranged on stadium seating around the field) loved it.

Another big part of the fun were the announcers, who called every play and made plenty of monkey wisecracks. In fact the theater of it all, the careful attention to each detail, was what made this event so much fun. That and the beer.

Everybody Loves Governors Island

It is rare in New York, where our endlessly diverse tastes are satisfied by a seemingly endless array of activities, to find so many people I know buzzing about the a single event. Yet since returning from Brazil, everyone I ask has either already ventured to Governors Island or really wants to go there. Apparently this quirky patch of land between Manhattan and Brooklyn is where it's at.

Right: A dragon sculpture made from found furniture by Benjamin Jones and Anna Hecker

A few weeks back, the New Yorker profiled this Island's storied history and uncertain future in comprehensive profile, details of which I won't repeat here (it would make a great urban policy case study). I will tell you that it was one of the cheapest and easiest city-exit-strategies I've found. Hop on a free ferry at South Ferry, watch as the island approaches for about 10 minutes, disembark, and wander.

It's a hard space to get a sense of and, were it not for the views of the financial district, Red Hook, and the Statue of Liberty as constant reminders of place, it could be quite disorienting. In one section I felt like I was on a New England college campus, complete with deans' houses, another section looked like abandoned housing projects, and one side of the island has a maritime feel with a series of decaying piers. Yet this spacial and temporal disjuncture lends the island a certain mystique while also leaving each visitor to discover the island as she wants, without a prescribed itinerary or agenda.

Part of the Wind Nomad exhibit of 400 "flapping" paintings set up all around the island.

We never figured out how they flapped

And this is just what we did. Our visit coincided with the New Island Festival (created by Dutch artists), so there was funky art around every corner and many performances including a jumping cow (we saw the cow twice, but never a jump). We wandered into a gallery space that had been created in one of the island's many empty buildings and enjoyed the pencil portraits of Flemish-New Yorkers by Ellen Depoorter. We took a ride to one tip of the island called picnic point and lunched in the shadow of our lady of liberty, watching families flying kites and throngs of bikers pedal by. We played mini golf on a course made entirely out of recycled materials. There was no one telling us where to go or what to see and therefore no pressure to do anything beyond what struck our fancy. In short, it was a beautiful way to spend an early fall day at no cost. If you haven't been to Governors Island already, you should go. But chances are you were already planning to!

This oversized table maze is actually a hole on the recycled mini golf course. It was really hard!

Carnaval, West Indian-American Style

Two weekends ago I attended what I'm told is the largest parade in the U.S., and yes, we're too early for Thanksgiving. This parade was in Brooklyn and featured no inflated cartoon characters, though I did see a devil, a snake man, butterflies, and many other fantastic creatures. I also saw a lot of bodies, barely dressed in the most ornately decorated bikinis, and a lot of sensual dancing. This was the West Indian-American Day Parade (also known as West Indian Carnaval), held every year on Labor Day Monday in the neighborhood of Crown Heights, Brooklyn. It draws somewhere between 1 and 3 million spectators. On this balmy early September day, my boyfriend and I took the subway down to Brooklyn and met up with a high school friend, Will (also the creator of sublime sculptures), who was in town for a visit.

We wandered around for a while along the parade route as the opening acts filed past--political candidates, unions, and professional associations (our favorite were the New York City corrections officers which rolled by in two nearly empty school buses). Eventually we swam upstream and found a spot that offered good views as the different Masses (as the parade troops are called, like in New Orleans Mardi Gras I'm told) prepared to pass the judges booth. Each Mas had a semi truck filled with speakers and a crew of organizers, DJs, and dancers perched atop a wooden frame dancing, sunning, and yelling to the crowd and their throngs of dancers below.

Though I was a shade disappointed that none of the Masses we saw had any live musicians, the costumes made up for it. Bright plumage, bejeweled bodices, glittering leggings, headresses--we were all mesmerized (especially my male companions). Personally, I most enjoyed the dancers' footware, from sneakers to slouchy boots, that each dancer had decorated with spray paint, glitter, jewels, or dye. I also enjoyed the inventive larger than life puppets, mounted on rolling frames pulled by key paraders and representing that Mas's theme.

Snake/scorpion man in frame costume

Unfortunately we didn't get to see any of the Masses in formation, catching them right before they were to head past the judges. We did get to see hundreds of young people, who, though restless and overheated, were clearly excited and proud of their elaborate costumes and having a lot of fun. Still, after nearly two hours of watching all that flesh shake and gyrate down Eastern Parkway to the pulse of highly amplified soca music on a sea of fuschia and gold features, I had had enough. For this year.

Last minute bead attachment en route to judges booth

[Since you've probably noticed that food is a big part of how I experience the world, I won't leave you hanging: I ate well at the West Indies Day Parade. Surprisingly, though, it wasn't the pricey styrofoam dish of spicy jerk chicken, dirty rice, and fried plantains that most tantalized my palette but instead the $2 plastic sack of small fruits that looked like key limes but behaved like lychees. Parade spectators in the know (those sporting flags of West Indian nations) were snacking on them, so I followed suit, buying mine from an older man who had dozens of bags hanging off his fingers. I thank my friend E. for later revealing the identity of my mystery fruit. She told me: "It sounds like you had what is the genipa, quenepa, quenette, genip, mamoncillo, or Spanish lime, depending upon which tropical land you're in. It is in the same family as lychee, that is the Sapindaceae. And yes, it is a pain to eat." Try one. You'll see why.]

Tagging through the grime

I understand that some graffiti is about adding (applying paint, paper, light, knitting to surfaces) and some about taking it away (scraping into subway windows, etching into paint, peeling a message into paper).

Today I saw a very satisfying example of the latter variety: Someone had tagged the 7th Avenue subway stop walls by cleaning their name into the grime. The New York City subway is notoriously filthy--most every visitor I've spoken to concurs. So seeing how the signature layer of sooty grease had been cleaned away to reveal, in the bright white tile, someone's stylized signature, struck me as genius, not to mention free. And, at the rate those walls get cleaned, this "wash me" approach is probably more permanent than many spray-painted tags in public places. Go Semz.

La Reunion, TX

I've decided to continue my blog stateside, where there is no shortage of interesting cultural happenings to write about. First stop: Texas.

Today I had the opportunity to take a tour of an emerging artist residency in Dallas. La Reunion, TX (LRTX) was founded three years ago with the support of an active community of artists and architects in the Dallas area who wanted "to create an arts residency that inspires, sustains, and renews artists and community through education and outreach."

La Reunion (located in present-day Oak Cliff) has a fascinating back story: it was founded as a utopian socialist community in the mid-19th century by Victor Considerant who traveled to Texas with a following of artisans, philosophers, musicians, and lots of good ideas. Unfortunately, ideas and art weren't enough to get the settlers through a drought and the colony was disbanded. Many of the Considerant's enlightened compatriots filtered into Dallas and infused this growing city with their ideals and talent.

On this surprisingly cool August day, I met with LRTX's founding director, Sarah Jane Semrad, for a tour of the site. In addition to some incredible tree sculptures (like this sweater-donning tree above), I got to see a beautiful coral snake, hand-sized yellow and black butterflies, and exuberant birds all making their ways through the dappled afternoon light. The 35-acre site has a huge amount of potential to support the creative process and engage the Dallas community. Already kids from the Student Conservation Association have worked on various restoration and clean up programs on the site. LRTX also engages local artists in diverse social change initiatives in the Dallas area. One such program is Art Chicas Unidas which pairs high school-aged girls from under-served communities with professional female artists, selected by jury, to work on a site-specific artwork.

Defunct train tressle on the LRTX site

As one of Dallas's first artist residencies, I was excited to see such innovative programming in action and its attention to the preservation of this gorgeous greenspace so close to the city center. It's not an easy moment to be launching an artist residency, but this is exactly the sort of community-minded artspace we need more of.

A saideira

Last night was my last in São Paulo so I rounded up my friends for a saideira (one for the road). It ended up being one of my best nights here. We met up at Drosophyla, a laid back bar near Consolação for caipirinhas. Drosophyla has perhaps the coolest light fixtures I've ever seen--made from large copper colanders that let pass just enough golden light to find the straw to your caipirinha. By midnight, most people had headed home to bed but a valiant three chose to stick it out and continue on to Bar do Cidão for some choro (a bit like samba de mesa but with a slightly different rhythm and more wind instruments).

Cidão is the owner of this Vila Madalena bar (and bartender and chef). He runs a unpretentious establishment known for its nightly live samba de mesa and chorinho. When we arrived the musicians were on break so we chatted with them outside and then found a table. Samba de mesa and choro are typically placed around a table or simply in a circle. This time, for the first time, I was invited to join the circle and try out some of my newly acquired percussion skills. The hour I sat in the roda playing pandeiro, tamborim, and even a cuica (or was that a tan-tan?) with this group of talented young musicians was one of my all-time musical highlights. Granted I faked some of the rhythms and most of the technique, but I managed to keep up.

That is totally me playing a pandeiro

We lost another two after Cidão, but luckily there were more friends waiting for us at a bar near Rua Augusta. I can't remember the name and wouldn't recommend it if I did, but it was the perfect last venue to listen to a DJ spin reggae and Brazilian soul before exhaustion overcame us. As we left the last balada (club), the first birds were beginning to sing and my stomach was starting to grumble. Our last destination was the famous Estadão, known for its delicious roasted pork sandwiches. Here it's not uncommon to see prostitutes eating next to taxi drivers next to journalists from the newspaper headquartered across the street. I devoured by pernil and washed it down with a suco de abacaxi e hortelã juice (pineapple juice with fresh mint) and was even feeling pretty awake as I said good-bye to the last friend standing and hailed a cab.

Lanche de pernil com suco de abacaxi com hortalã--the best way to end any night on the town

The day's produce lined up outside Estadão

The cabbie drove me through the Centro and down into Santa Cecilia and I watched the city stream by--people waking up and heading to work, stopping at the lanchonete for a morning coffee and coxinha, cuing up outside the public hospital, returning from a night out. Beneath the minhocão (meaning giant earthworm and SP's longest elevated highway) the endless graffiti and pichação was swathed in the morning light. Even at 6 am the traffic was thick as we turned onto Cardoso de Almeida and up to Turiassu. I got out on my corner, already bustling and entered Edificio Elza. On the stairs I said good morning to a neighbor who was starting her day just as I was ending mine. It was a good last night in Sao Paulo.

Some of my favorite under-minhocão wall art

The corner of Turiassu and Cardoso de Almeida--my home in São Paulo