Not long ago, Canada's Governor General Michaelle Jean, who was born in Haiti, spoke movingly about the connection between art and action.
This week, on the radio, we heard an old woman singing as she wandered, like so many others, through the devastated streets of Port-au-Prince. Other voices, shy at first, joined in the singing, growing louder and stronger. This song of hope rose from the wreckage and travelled over the airwaves to reach us. And I thought: even when we have nothing left, there is always music, words and dance steps to bring us back to life, to bring us together and to provide hope. Art has the power to inspire, to heal, to transform, to rehabilitate, to bear witness, and to make us believe that there are better days ahead. In times like these, that is what the young people of Jacmel, in Haiti, remind us, who were able to recover their audiovisual equipment from the rubble and have since used it to bear witness to the human tragedy and the efforts made to overcome it. Their testimony is living proof of what art can do, even in the direst circumstances. Art has the power to elicit compassion and generosity.
The Governor General (or GG for short) was addressing an Art Matters Forum in Calgary just days after the Haitian earthquake (a message even more poignant today, given news from Chile). The Art Matters Forums are something she and her husband, Jean-Daniel Lafond, introduced on taking office five years ago - a series of conversations between artists of all ages and people from all walks of life. They've done more than 45 forums across Canada and around the world.
Curious to know what happens? We can listen in to the conversations on the Art Matters website - there are videos and blog posts. Some extraordinary moments in the video clips I've seen - from the voice of experience of mature artists like author Michael Ondaatje to the astonishing contributions of audience members. When I first heard about the forums, I immediately imagined a bunch of elites talking to one another. How wrong I was... All kinds of people take part, from the homeless to men and women who say they've never been to a play or an art gallery or even read a book, to urban artists who say that getting into art literally saved their lives. Talk about a conversation!
The most recent Art Matters was in Montreal on February 23. By the time you read this, the site should be updated with the latest material. It was co-hosted by an organization called Culture For All (Culture Pour Tous), whose name pretty much says it.
Regular readers will know that we've explored the intersection of the arts and world-saving-work before -
Is Theater More Relevant Than Ever?
Yes, New Radicals welcome Governor General Michaelle Jean (a former journalist) and her husband, Jean-Daniel Lafond (a film-maker) to the ever-growing community of people who are finding ways to put the skills acquired in their careers to work on the world's greatest challenges. (For more, please see archived articles.)
The arts move us and stir our souls, that's for sure. But can they also make us agents of change in our communities? Can the arts help save the world? Please share your thoughts by commenting below. As always, I invite you to email me directly: Julia (that familiar symbol) wearethenewradicals (punctuation) (suffix).
Laura Linney fan?
"Time Stands Still," featuring Linney as a wounded photojournalist, is bringing the psychological impact of war reporting to life on Broadway. The Dart Center, a resource for journalists who cover violence, recently held an event at Columbia University with "Time Stands Still" playwright Donald Margulies. Read Geoff Buteau's account of the panel discussion featuring Margulies along with real-life journalist couple Santiago Lyon and Emma Daly. Listen to audio from the panel and watch a video of Lyon and Daly talking about how their lives mirror and differ from the play. The Dart Center has also announced the new Dart Center Academic Fellowship - three days of training to college-level journalism educators and advisers on how to teach effective trauma journalism.
The Purpose Prize - For Those Over 60
Know someone who's 60-plus and saving the world? Or maybe you're doing something good and would like to share your innovative idea? The Purpose Prize is a great way to honour men and women who are making a difference in communities across North America and around the world. Purpose Prize nominations close March 5th.
Julia Moulden is on tour, talking about the New Radicals.
Follow Julia Moulden on Twitter: www.twitter.com/juliamoulden
We contemplete, share & learn & act & make us feel the connection, that we are ONE mankind.
TO SAVE THE WORLD is just a brief way to say Could help to save !
Martin Heidegger interpreted art as "a means by which a community develops for itself a medium of self-expression and interpretation."
Who do we view as part of our community? Much neuroscience research is being done on our perceptions of "in-group" or "out-group." People tend to empathize with their "In-group" and objectify those in the "out-group." Can art help us expand our "in-group" to all people in the global community?
Even Darwin challenged all of us by saying, "As man advances in civilization, and small tribes are united into larger communities, the simpliest reason would tell each individual that he ought to extend his social instincts and sympathies to all of the members of the same nation, though personally unknown to him. This point being once reached, there is only an artificial barrier to prevent his sympathies extending to the men of all nations and races. If, indeed, such men are separated from him by great differences in appearance or habits, experience unfortunately shows us how long it is, before we look at them as our fellow creatures" (Decent of Man, 1998).#in
Participation in art can do many things. But art cannot save the world. Not even Art can do that.
We've had PLENTY of art already, and it doesn't seem to me that it has saved the world at all, any more than religion or philosophy or science has.
Perhaps the bald truth is that the world cannot be saved. That doesn't mean we shouldn't do what we can to make it a better, more tolerable, more enjoyable place. But mebbe we should lower (or at least re-adjust) our romantic expectations of what any human endeavor - including the making and enjoying of art - can actually do.
www.hiphophopedealers.com
their work to the Reich.
The earth does not need saving and we humans being the really very minor organism on earth do not have the knowledge for such if such were necessary.
Humans do have the potential if they have the will to continue to be one of the evolving specie within the global organism of diverse species.
In such a sense, humans can save themselves from extinction, for the earth will continue, with or without the human specie..
http://www.ratical.org/LifeWeb/
"I believe your film can give my students a reason to want to stay in the 'here and now' and for some, a reason to live."
A reason to live! It brought us to our knees in joy! After years of production, sacrificing time with our own children and some of us even putting our homes on the line, while our friends and families asked, "What the heck are you doing? How can you risk it all?", this one letter answered the questions, relieved the doubts and squelched our fears.
THIS is what the entertainment industry is capable of. Healing, life-affirming, mind-expanding films that give people a reason to live, a reason to be joyful, a reason to love and laugh. THIS is what artists (who care) are all about.
As I like to say, "If you want to see change, change what you see." It is the artists of the world that change what we see. Now, if we can just get mainstream media to jump on board and start broadcasting healing art and entertainnment around the world. Wow!