Here is the 2 pac video, once again for people. What he is saying in the video gives me a different perspective with this new context that Obama is now the president -elect. I think, this video should be a requirement for every elementary school pupil.
Tv On The Radioというバンドの新しいアルバム「Dear Science」が素晴らしかったので、宣伝。ニューヨークのブルックリン発のバンドで、友達繋がりで知り合った人達ですが、今や凄いバンドになってきている。前回のアルバム「Return to Cookie Mountain」も素晴らしい出来やと思ったど、今回も更にパワーアップしている気がします。ファンクでヒップで、実験的、メランコリーで洗練されていて、あんまり音楽のセンスがない私でもその凄さが分かる。どの曲も好きだけど、6曲目「Family Tree」を大音量で聞くと鳥肌がでます!堀内君どうでしょう?日本に来て欲しいな。
Tonight was really fun nights. There were faces I haven't seen for a while as well as new faces, who brought lots of exciting ideas and proposals. Thank you all for coming by! Also last night, our member, Shika, brought the flyer for a lecture series organized by a Kyoto-based an indepedent alternative space, which I heard for the first time. I checked their website immidiately, and it seems that what they are doing is really close to what we want to do. Exciting and Encouraging.
Changing a subject, I have been cheking what kind of grants are available out there for the project my friends and I initiated in Italy, and gradually realized that most grants are either given to organizations or already established artists. Especially in Japan this tendecny is really strong: most of the art grants are directed to safe choices, public museums, mainly because many of them face the lack of national funding, thus relying on these grants. There is lack of interest and brave investment for young-adventerous projects to support a younger generation. But through this research, I found that, SF based artist/waiter (very common case in the US) offers the uniqe grant, Service-Works Grants, in which he dedicates one night of his tip to fund a small project every month. Of course an amount he is giving is small, but very encouraging and inspiring action for other fellow artists.
It's somebody else's election, and I feel that I should spend the time spent for the US election should be directed to elections in Japan. Nevertheless, it's got impact on our life all the way, so just in case if you have time to follow the result, here are the links I use.
This article is written by my favorite journalist at the Guardian, Gary Younge, about what symbolic meaning the Obama's candidecy has for especially African American populations. I tend to be a little suspicious about the excitement raised for his candidecy manily because his policies are not progressive enough, but Younge's point of view is important as well.
Thank you for coming by for the party last night. I hope you all enjoyed made in Italy salami. In the end, Italy is the country of meat and cheese, in my opinion. About the presentation, despite that I have many occations to speak in front of people, talking with a power point document does not happen so often. So I was a little bit nurveous. I hope people there understood my experiences at Cittadellarte, and its purpose as well as function. I wanted to tell that, from the program's participant's point of view, Cittadellarte, founded by a world-famous artist, Michelangelo Pistoletto, exists as a laboratory that examines and investigates the role of art and creativity in this society. Of course there are gaps between what it is trying to do and its practice, and I think, as the foundation has grown bigger, it has experienced problems as any organization goes through. Nevertheless, I am deeply inspired and moved by the foundation's attempt and commitment to the society because it's so easy to get away from it and remain inside a small art world. Having 15 people for the period of 4 month and offering us to discuss very fundamental questions we tend not to raise in our everyday life was an amazing experience for me. How we are going to use this experience, and how we are going to continue the project we initiated is a bigger challenge waiting for us in the future. I think, this excitement and energy will last for few more weeks(?), so anyone who needs enegy-charging, please come by hanare and talk to me!