Last year, we ran for President. (Kinda.) Now, Blights Out is running for Mayor! (Sort of!) While Blights Out isn’t planning a collective occupation of the Mayor’s office (yet), we are launching a year-long creative campaign called ‘Blights Out for Mayor’––a series of 12 billboards and 5 yard sign designs that call for and suggest entry points into a Truth and Reconciliation process that would redress the racist/classist/disaster capitalist policies and values imposed after Katrina. These messages seek to expand the horizon of our political imaginary, calling us to reevaluate our society’s relationship to property, land, and money. It is a call to action, a call to #PutHousingFirst.Click here to change this text
Archive for tag: storytelling matters
Photography Expanded at Magnum Foundation
By Hanul Bahm
On Thursday, June 8, Magnum Foundation presented Photography Expanded, a daylong presentation and panels on collaborative documentary practices.
The Advocate: Why Black Gay Filmmaker Marlon Riggs Matters Now
By Charles Stephens
During the 1992 presidential primaries, Pat Buchanan, seeking the Republican Party's nomination, used an unauthorized clip from Tongues Untied to blast the National Endowment for the Arts and attack George H. W. Bush.
This Fine Day We Wake With The Poets
By Wendy Levy
On Monday, January 30, award-winning poet Kaveh Akbar posted poems on his Twitter account by poets from nations banned by the immigration block. Libya, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen—incredible words of vision, hope, truth.
Corporation For Public Broadcasting: Reported Trump Privatization Plan Would Be “Devastating” To Public Media
By Matt Gertz
The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) is pushing back on reported efforts by the Trump administration to privatize it, saying the proposal would have a “devastating effect” and that “the entire public media service would be severely debilitated.”
‘What are our desired futures?’
By Jason Wyman
“What are our desired futures?” Now, more than ever, this question seems critical to our country and our democracy. This election has brought to the light the significant divides in this country across age, geography, economic class, race, gender, and political ideology.
Let Us Cover the World in Gold
By Myah Overstreet
When I first began working on this project, to curate an inspiring collection of media created by youth in 2016, I didn’t know where to start—I didn’t know who to contact, what artists to recruit, or what kind of media I was really going for. The only thought that truly gave me inspiration was the thought, the vision, of living in a world transformed by art that young minds created, and how much I yearned to create this world.
NAMAC Joins the Conversation at ArtChangeUS REMAP: Detroit
NAMAC Executive Director Wendy Levy participated in REMAP: Detroit and was inspired by the conviction of the communities in the rooms, the fearless examination of the challenges, and the celebration of the arts, in the broadest view, as an engine for transformation.
#DocsSoWhite: A Personal Reflection
By Renee Tajima-Peña
I once considered documentary to be a fallback for filmmakers of color who were shut out of the fiction universe. I was wrong. As it turns out, we may be more under-represented in nonfiction filmmaking. Sundance estimates the proportion of documentary directors of color screening at the festival to be around 15 percent. The Directors Guild of America estimates 82 percent of its narrative members are white males; it doesn't even bother to calculate documentarians.
A Journey Back…
By Yanqing Yang
Before joining NAMAC’s Creative Leadership Lab, I was building a cultural connection platform for young creative changemakers and thinking about how to build a system of collaboration.