Twin Cities Daily Planet (https://www.tcdailyplanet.net/category/arts/)
Rosy Simas of Rosy Simas Danse is Haudenosaunee, Seneca, Heron Clan. She brings a Native feminist lens to the contemporary dance world with her body of work, the latest of which is “Weave,” a collaborative dance project. “Weave” will make its debut on Jan. 12 at the Ordway Center for Performing Arts, a co-commissioner in collaboration with The O’Shaughnessy. Simas describes the upcoming performance as a glimpse into a much larger experience that extends before and after for those involved.
Community elders gave Resmaa Menakem his name approximately 20 years ago and merely a decade after he began his path as a mental health therapist. His name reflects his calling as a healer with Resmaa meaning “to cause to rise in the alignment of truth” and Menakem meaning “using the foundation of his people” in the Kemetic language. Menakem believes that he “came to this planet as a healer,” and remembers that his mother noted his affinity for helping people in his youth. After 30 years of working as a therapist with people with severe handicaps, abused children and others, he has now released another book to aid with healing and show the truth in his name. Menakem’s book, titled “My Grandmother’s Hands: Radicalized Trauma and the Pathways to Mending our Hearts and Bodies,” dropped in September 2017 with the audio version due out Dec. Continue Reading
On Nov. 2, a multiracial group of people gathered at Plaza Centenario on the corner of 12th Avenue and Lake Street in Minneapolis. Organized by the Immigrant Movement for Justice, Por Raza and Morena Minnesota, an ofrenda for Day of the Dead was built to honor family members and community leaders throughout the world who passed away due to injustice. The plaza was established by the tireless efforts of local community groups Cuernavaca-Cuernavaca-Axochiapan-Morelos (CCAM), Club Morelos (CM) and Latino artists. Towering above pedestrians stands a bronze statue of Mexican revolutionary leader Emiliano Zapata created by German Michel Leal, an artist from Morelos, Mexico, a sister city of Minneapolis. Continue Reading
For Keno Evol, Tupac – and by extension, hip hop – was his first gateway into art as activism. Continue Reading
Whether you work at an office job or on the field of the NFL, white supremacy dominates work culture in the United States. In May, Twin Cities Daily Planet Arts + Culture Editor Caroline Taiwo brought us this in-depth analysis on confronting white supremacy in the workplace. In partnership with Pollen Midwest, we followed that article up with an event series and syllabus for further reading. On June 15, Taiwo appeared on KMOJ 89.9’s radio show Urban Agenda with Lissa Jones to talk more about her workplace experiences as a Black woman. With excerpts from James Baldwin and live Q&A phone calls from Minnesota listeners, this episode works to help folks – and people of color especially – recognize and activate around the white supremacy they interact with on a daily basis. Continue Reading
May Lee-Yang along with Saymoukda Vongsay and Naomi Ko — founders of the Funny Asian Women’s Kollective (FAWK) — started building the idea for a series of workshops to help Asian women work on their comebacks. They titled the series, “Clapback.” Continue Reading
One of the first things you notice at Jim Denomie’s home and studio in Shafer, Minnesota, are the horses. I’m not talking about live horses. He collects spring horses, like the ones you used to ride outside of the hardware store as a kid. There are about ten of them all in various conditions facing a trail on Denomie’s vast Chisago County property. He says they’re for his grandkids, but really they might be for him to have another playful go at childhood. Continue Reading
Do interracial couples experience more push-back than same-race couples, and if so, how do they deal with it? How does colorism affect the lives and academic experiences of students? And what are some strategies for processing historical trauma that non-Black and non-white mixed folks can use to acknowledge and move through complex family histories? These are just some of the questions that the first ever Midwest Mixed Conference attempted to tackle, through panels, arts activities, workshops and discussions. Held Aug. Continue Reading
“Mother King” is a conceptual Black opera about the life of Alberta Williams King — slain activist and mother of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Continue Reading
“If you asked me what I was gonna be when I was like 20 [years old], photography was not something I would have said,” recalled artist Patience Zalanga. Continue Reading
After fights broke out in Chicago during the 2012 Pride Festival, Phillipe Cunningham approached a police officer to ask about a safe route to walk home. At the time, Cunningham had recently transitioned and noticed during this interaction a different type of aggression and animosity directed at him. “The more Black and masculine I began to look at first glance, that’s when the aggression had an uptick,” Cunningham said. “That was my first experience interacting with cops as a Black man. It shook me.”
Cunningham, a queer, transgender Black man running for Minneapolis City Council in Ward Four, said many queer and trans people of color and Indigenous folks (QTPOCI) have stories like this – times when they were trying to have fun, ask for directions or simply occupy public space – and a police officer responded with hostility. Continue Reading