the ancestors

I was directing a play a fantastic work by a very talented actor writer, Cassandre mentor.  it was called "Blue colored girl" ( yes we know in Canada and other British places we spell it coloUred )  in it she mentions being called by the ancestors, even though she cannot identify them, she knows they are constantly in her consciousness.  There are many similarities between  her play and the one i wrote a decade and a half ago. and i was and have been for the past two years constructing these ancestor pieces, they have gone from one large piece of wood to three  imagine if you will the painting is the "house" i'm going to have to reconstruct the pieces as one in another crazy assembly, i will meanwhile here is the new ancestors of montreal.

this time i spread them out. harder to destroy.

very late

NEW LIGHT

Whats good about blogs and journals,or any writing of a personal nature? Realizing when I'm stuck in a loop. Is creativity linked to a Mania ? Because every so often I find I'm going back to the same point starting over again. relearning, being scared,getting over fear, creating then falling back into the process. That's it! It's my process. it too damn  tiring. Time to ( yes, i'm gonna say it) start again, with a new light. Audre Lorde said (I'm paraphrasing) the difference between pain and suffering ; Pain is going through trauma and unsing the experience to change, knowing that you have been through the experience. Suffering is not using the experience for change,but repeating the trauma over again and again.

Thanks to; the nice poster folks who glued my work up rather than tear it down(which happened to the other work i put up if you go to grumpy's on Mckay in Montreal.
and big big thanks to Cassandre Mentor and Rabbit, who are performing "short and sweet" at the end of the month. Cassandre is a great actor  Rabbit is a wonderful writer with a fantastic reading voice.

moving and moving on.

It occurs to me the more i think i know the less i most likely do. this doesn't even stop me from thinking i do know more. Its age or something , the idea that i lived this long it has to be skill and not just by the grace of god, luck or other unquantifiable experiences. I have a new collection of work. some of it a repeat. like for instance back in the day in ottawa i set up some work in the parks and on the street one group that i was really happy with was called the "ancestors" large pieces,  four sculptural bits which called me to daughters of the dust and  recollection of seeing African scultpures( thank you Althea knight, who always is an inspiration and motivator) so once again i set them out on the lawn so to speak this time in montreal along the lachine canal. and paintings on St. Antoine,( they were quickly removed by poster people,, damn you ! don't you know art man!

i still am figuring the documentation bit. theses are the inside versions.

collective reason

Collective creation blog #2

As we move through this creative space, I realize not only are we talking in terms of space we share publicly, we have to think in terms of space in time in space and time. We are a group of people who span many years and have lived in different countries, because of this we see space and time differently. Even on a simple level, in Montreal there is an Anglo space and a French space, As gender we occupy space differently ( take a look at how much space  some men occupy on a bus compared to some women) go to a public event and see the lines of women wanting to utilize the washroom, while  men, So, who is afforded space?  think of People with disabilities who cannot participate in activities because of accessibility. I started thinking of this while listening to CBC this morning, they were talked about the segregated Canada, there were Indian hospitals, towns like Dresden Ontario which would not allow black people to eat in restaurants or use  bowling lanes etc. and who could forget viola Desmond being removed from the cinema in Nova Scotia. I think how older folk look at and use public space, I certainly do look at it differently from the younger participants.  In Quebec  women could not even acquire a bank account, lease a house or get hydro  hook up without the signature of a male.. so an exercise, as marginalized folk, either by gender, race, sexuality,  religion,disability etc;

 Could you jump in a time travel machine and go randomly to anywhere in the past? As for that matter we can never tell what the future has for us. As for the other space, cyberspace, I have to look to the young, I have to look for them because they are too busy texting or tweeting or face booking to look up. In many ways they share public space in a greater way over continents, time zones, semi publicly in places and in languages I can’t even begin to comprehend.  In that sense we have to talk about what is private in cyberspace?  and how can they be so private in public?

I am cheating I think because this will be posted on our collective  site which I urge you to go to

It seems as though every so often, I find myself sitting wondering about value. The word these days seems to be about getting what you're worth. I find the whole thing sad. The market place has now successfully turned us all into commodities. with the commodities in the west actually believing we are of more value, and we who have a degree are more valuable. We are drowning in our self importance. these days its impossible to take a shit without tweeting,fb-ing or blogging about it, to get feedback, affirmation. why? because we think everything we do is important. listen up! its not. there are many things we do that are quotidian at best. but i understand the logic- I just don't want to get into the idea that what I do is easily measured by $$$$'s. How much is your parents love worth? how much is the smile of a child eating an ice cream or singing a song worth? I love making  Art. I love all aspects of it. I love making stories, I love making things, but it pisses me off to no end when someone thinks it needs to be priced. i don't believe "if you don't value your work no one else will." I think seeing mediocre folks making large  coin sets us off, soon we are part of the inflation problem, asking for large sums to do nothing important. yeah why should someone who slaps together shoddy housing get paid large while people who feed and clothe and teach our future generations get comparatively nothing. I do blah alot... anyhooooo. the pictures are some of my newer things set out on the streets of Montreal. theses are free to look at, and if  you really like them you can take them home (be careful of the staples)  they are worth??????

sculpture, 2001, OTTAWA.  I was bleeding the other day about Culture. i keep hearing all  over the place, particularly from some community newspapers. The lack of culture, upbringing existing in the youth of today.

at the same time we have people telling their kids not to go into the arts. So the big question. Where does this culture come from?

 Ideas such as what we as a group of people find aesthetically pleasing. what stories  about our past do we want to bring forward. what is our ideas of morality, ethics. all these things are transported through our art. think of art as culture making,culture providing.  of course there are several levels, the commercial level is mainly concerned with maintaining the status quo and entertaining folks. but it is still an extremely effective cultural marker. its just not a great cultural critic, or a champion of progress

New Directions.

I was sitting in the funk, as My inspiration Cornel West says. my problem? Figuring what to do what to do how to make work that is exciting for me and at the same time does something other than occupy space as Art. Its not enough for me to be an artist a theatre maker although all good but these are not just jobs i like. and it is one of the most annoying things. have artist also fallen into the Marxist alienation trap, creating for the sake of creating. and not having any connection with the process or understanding of the commodification of it.

If i have a artist statement it would be ( and i thank you, Ms. Lacharite. I will explain in her new post after this one.) I want to visually occupy space with African images, which is difficult to find these days. images that are non commodified. in Canada There is anon presence of black artists and black images. So I continue with the my old way but I have narrowed down the scope of my work.

This turn is trying to paint tight extreme closeups of black gestures, arms, hands doing mundane things. close. trying to take away generalizations of race and bring it to close action of individuals who are racialized.