Redefining Art

Unit 3 has been examining the power of underrepresented stakeholders, considering how we can better recognise and amplify the agency of marginalised actors. Art is a common tool in that work...and so your next major Climates of Resistance assignment is to tap into that tradition, producing your own piece of Agency Artwork as a Radical Recognition Report.

This session will help you prepare for the assignment by exploring various mediums for art and some of the ways that non-traditional actors are given a platform through music, poetry, painting, and more. You will also prepare for our interactive musical workshop this Wednesday.

Terisa Siagatonu is an award-winning poet, teaching artist, mental health educator, and community leader born and rooted in the Bay Area. Her presence in the poetry world as a queer Samoan woman and activist has granted her opportunities to perform and speak in places ranging from The White House to the UN Conference on Climate Change in Paris. She campaigns for youth advocacy, educational attainment, Pacific Islander/Indigenous rights, action on climate change, LGBTQQIA rights, and an end to gender-based violence.

Terisa holds a Bachelors degree in Community Studies and minor in Education from the University of California-Santa Cruz and a Masters Degree in Marriage/Family Therapy from the University of Southern California, aiming to use her background as a mental health clinician and poet to bridge the gaps in our quest for collective healing and liberation.

chapter house ['chap-tәr 'haūs] noun

1. On the Navajo Nation, a municipality’s seat of government.

2. A community center where chapter residents of all ages meet, discuss community issues, attend classes, participate in walks and runs, and receive assistance like food, water, or medical and veterinary services.

While we can’t physically come together during this pandemic, we at The Chapter House are providing a virtual space for Indigenous Peoples and allies to appreciate art, convene and collaborate, celebrate individual and shared Indigenous cultures, and explore the complexities of the 21st Century Indigenous experience.

This is a space for Indigenous empowerment and community, but all who share a desire for universal empowerment are welcome here.

Deshawn McKinney is a writer proudly reppin the northside of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Deshawn’s work focuses on the liberation of all intersections of Black people and their identities, and building coalition across peoples and movements to create sustainable, proactive, and effective bases of power. He utilises art, grounded in hip-hop, as a tool to invite folks into the conversation and disrupt the status quo.

Deshawn holds a Master in Social Policy from the London School of Economics and Political Science and a Master in Creative Writing – Poetry from the University of East Anglia. His chapbook, father forgive me, was published in 2021 by Black Sunflowers Poetry Press.

Beibei Wang is an internationally acclaimed percussion virtuoso based in London. She has been heralded by the Wall Street Journal for her “high-energy virtuosity” and by The New York Times for her “flamboyant” performance style. She was listed in the top 50 Chinese musicians in the “Sound of East” project by the Chinese Ministry of Culture in 2014. In 2015, she was endorsed by Arts Council England, receiving an Exceptional Talent visa from the British Government. Since 2008, Beibei has been featured as a soloist in world-renowned composer Tan Dun’s Organic Music Trilogy, collaborating with orchestras worldwide, including the BBC Symphony Orchestra UK and the China Philharmonic. Recently, her music was broadcasted on BBC Radio 3 Late Junction. She currently leads a traditional Chinese percussion course at SOAS and University of Birmingham.

Micah Hendler

Micah Hendler is a musical changemaker working to harness the power in each of our voices to make a difference. After studying international relations at Yale, Micah blended his academic knowledge of conflict and mediation with his artistry to found the Jerusalem Youth Chorus, an Israeli-Palestinian music and dialogue project. The chorus empowers young singers from East and West Jerusalem to share their truths, become leaders in their communities, and inspire others to join their work for peace, justice, inclusion, and equality.

Micah recently moved back to the US to work with the Justice Choir, a grassroots movement using the collective power of music to promote social and environmental justice, and Braver Angels, a relationship-building initiative depolarising the Red-Blue divide through dialogue. Named as a Forbes 30 Under 30, Micah also writes for Forbes about music, resistance, and global affairs.

As co-founder of Raise Your Voice Labs, Micah will compose an original song inspired by our conversations in class, leveraging music as a tool for peacebuilding and environmental justice.

Asif Majid

Asif Majid is a scholar-artist-educator working at the intersection of racialized sociopolitical identities, multimedia, marginality, and new performance, particularly through devising community-based participatory theatre and creating improvisational music. Currently, he is Assistant Professor of Theatre and Human Rights at the University of Connecticut.

Asif served as a Mellon/ACLS Public Fellow with the San Francisco Arts Commission and completed his PhD (Anthropology, Media, and Performance) at The University of Manchester. Asif has published in multiple books, peer-reviewed academic journals, and popular media outlets. His performance credits include work with the Kennedy Center (US) and Royal Exchange Theatre (UK), among others.

As part of the community music video project, Asif will help students reflect on their understandings of global justice through artistic expression.

Emma Morgan-Bennett

Emma is a visual media artist and activist-scholar particularly drawn to questions surrounding race, reproduction, and the body. Committed to Black Radical Joy, Emma sees liberation within the creative celebration and engagement of those who have survived and thrived in spite of the odds.

A born and bred New Yorker from Washington Heights, Emma is currently studying filmmaking at Goldsmiths, University of London as a Marshall Scholar. She graduated from Swarthmore College in 2020 with High Honors having written her Medical Anthropology thesis on Radical Doulas and the Black Maternal Mortality Crisis in Austin, Texas.

Outside of the classroom, Emma spends her time working as a full-spectrum doula (physically and emotionally supporting pregnant people through their reproductive journeys), working on her creative projects, and writing. She will be working with us on the visual aspects of our music video, brainstorming ways to “raise our voices” through film footage, photography, signage, and more.

Garrett Turner

A native of Florence, Alabama, Garrett Turner is a proud member of Actors’ Equity. Garrett majored in music and creative writing at Emory, where he recently served as an Arts and Social Justice Fellow using theatre to honour known victims of the 1906 Atlanta race massacre.

Garrett has studied at the University of St. Andrews as a Bobby Jones Scholar and holds masters degrees from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama and Queen Mary. He is currently writing Eleanor: A Church Story, a musical about a young Black woman from Tennessee who stages a mini revolution in her church when she is banned from preaching because she’s a girl.

In 2019, Garrett worked alongside Syracuse drama students while premiering Thoughts of a Colored Man with Syracuse Stage. He will continue that collaboration as part of the “Climates of Resistance Raise Your Voice” project, helping us consider how we can use music and art to advocate for sustainable justice.

Austin Willacy

For the past 23 years, Austin Willacy has directed Youth in Arts’ ‘Til Dawn, an award-winning teen a cappella group that empowers youth to find their voices in many ways. He is also a veteran member of The House Jacks, with whom he has produced 10 full-length albums and completed multiple world tours.

Austin has served on the boards of the Rainforest Action Network, a grassroots effort taking action against industries driving climate change, and Freight & Salvage, a nonprofit community arts organisation promoting public understanding of traditional music with a focus on racial and gender justice. As a facilitator for YES!, Austin has co-founded Arts for Social Change Jams in the US, Turkey, and India; the Black Diaspora Jam; and the Mens Jam.

Austin is the co-founder of Raise Your Voice Labs, where he uses music to facilitate dialogue about environmental activism, anti-racism, and global justice. Building on his political and community organising experience, Austin will showcase what effective public participation can look like in the midst of mass inequities.

Reylon Yount

As a biracial Chinese American growing up in San Francisco, Reylon began learning yangqin (the Chinese hammered dulcimer) as a way to stay connected to his heritage. They have since introduced the rare instrument to the world stage, featured alongside Rhiannon Giddens and Yo-Yo Ma on Silkroad’s GRAMMY Award-winning record “Sing Me Home”.

While completing undergraduate studies in Environmental Science and Public Policy at Harvard University, Reylon conducted research for environmental organisations in China, Australia, and the U.S. She then moved to the UK to complete two master’s degrees at SOAS University of London and Goldsmiths University of London. Reylon now co-directs Tangram, an artist collective envisioning a world beyond the China-West dichotomy.

Reylon serves as a Group Facilitator for the Community Audit, has taught a special session about environmental justice in East-West relations, and is a Teaching Artist for our community music video projects.

Jessica Zhu

​Jessica Zhu made her orchestral debut in 2006 as a student of Nancy Weems at the University of Houston, when she played Prokofiev Piano Concerto No. 3 with the Houston Symphony. She has since performed with many orchestras in America. In 2009, Jessica was awarded the highly coveted Marshall Scholarship, with which she completed a Masters programme with distinction at the Guildhall School of Music & Dramas.

The ‘outstanding young Chinese-American pianist’ Jessica Zhu (The Independent) received warm praise for her Wigmore Hall debut, given as part of the Park Lane Group’s Young Artists Series in December 2011. Jessica has also appeared at the Purcell Room in the Southbank Centre, St James’s Piccadilly, St Martin-in-the-Fields and the Manchester Bridgewater Hall, among others around the UK and in Europe.

Believing in using music to reach and educate audiences without easy access to the arts, Jessica is an alumna of the LiveMusicNow young artist scheme, which brought her to perform in hospitals, elderly homes, and special education schools throughout the UK.

Jessica joins this project with the goal of making music more accessible to everyone - including those of us who don’t identify as artists!