Brazilian rapper Brisa Flow made history as the first Indigenous artist on the lineup of Lollapalooza Brazil in 2023.

But she said that her success has come at a price.

“Being a pioneer brings wounds; there’s no way you can have a machete opening a path and not get some branches on your face,” she said, adding, “I got many, and I believe I learned a lot.”

Her music mixes hip-hop with ancestral singing, jazz, electronic and neo-soul. She’s also an activist and educator. Many of her songs are influenced by her own background — and the struggle of Indigenous people in Brazil, where less than 1% of the population is Indigenous.

Flow said that she and her partner experience a lot of racism on the street. It’s one reason that her Indigenous identity figures so prominently in her work — both as a way to channel her feelings and to educate people.    

Flow’s latest album, “Janequeo,” is about a tough Indigenous woman. 

“Janequeo was a female Mapuche warrior who had to negotiate several deals in the war to liberate her people,” she said. “I bring that to the contemporary, which is the reality of Indigenous brown women, mothers and independent artists in Brazil.”

“Brisa Flow is one of the biggest artists in Brazil,” said Bruno Barros, an independent culture producer who writes about music. 

Even though Flow’s Indigenous roots are key to her work and identity, he said, she achieved her place in music not because of her race.

“She is an artist who happens to be Indigenous and delivered one of the great albums of 2022,” he said.

The 37-year-old Flow, whose birth name is Brisa de la Cordillera Collio Inzunza, was born in Sabará, on the outskirts of Belo Horizonte, the capital of the state of Minas Gerais. Her parents are Indigenous artisans from Chile who moved to Brazil during Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship.

Flow said she got into hip-hop as a teenager and started to participate in rhyme battles when she was around 17 years old, often as the only female.

“I got into hip-hop especially because of its body movement, that idea of being at ease, being who you are,” she said.

It took her a long time to build a career as an artist. She lived in different cities in Brazil and worked odd jobs in telemarketing, and at a T-shirt factory before she moved to São Paulo. She said her song, “Fique Viva,” or “stay alive”, talks a bit about that journey.

“I had to learn to love myself and stand on my own two feet,” she said, paraphrasing the beginning of the song. “The opening is like, ‘boom, this girl has been through a lot, let’s see what she has to tell me.’”

She was influenced by a range of female artists, including Chilean composer Violeta Parra, who she names in the song, “Violeta Se Fué,” and Argentine singer Mercedes Sosa, American soul singer Erykah Badu and rapper Lauryn Hill.

Her partner, Ian Wapichana, a multi-instrumentalist and producer from an Indigenous community in Roraima, in the north of Brazil, often performs with Flow, and they wrote the song, “Etnocídio,” meaning “ethnocide” together.

Wapichana said he wrote his part and when they got to the studio; Flow confessed she had not written hers, so she did so on the spot, improvising.

“Her essence is still freestyling; it’s very emotional,” he said.

Together, the couple has three kids. Wapichana said that he supports Flow on the stage and at home.

“Brisa is at a really cool moment in her career; she’s flying a lot,” he said. “She’s in high demand, so I stay home more with the baby; I pick up a lot of the household responsibilities, so she can flow.”

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As the curtain rises on the musical “Mar i Cel,” it begins with an introductory history lesson.

It’s the year 1609, and the king of Spain, in Madrid, issues a royal decree to deport the so-called Moriscos, the Spanish Muslims forcibly baptized and converted to Christianity.

For centuries, medieval Spain had large Muslim and Jewish populations. But during the Inquisition, these religious minorities were aggressively persecuted. An estimated 300,000 Moriscos were expelled, and tens of thousands were executed.

That sets the stage for the actual story of “Mar i Cel,” which means “sea and sky” in Catalan, and begins 20 years later somewhere on the Mediterranean Sea.

Today in Barcelona, Spain, the beloved musical that’s had a few runs over the past three decades is back in stages for a fourth, and perhaps final, time. The current production has been running since September 2024 and will end this July.

The tale is about a Muslim pirate and a Christian woman who fall in love during Inquisition-era Spain. But the story also tackles the darker issues of bigotry, deportation and cycles of violence — something that some say may be more relevant than ever today.

As a huge ship enters the stage at the beginning of the musical, the expelled Moriscos have now become pirates. They climb ropes and swing from mast to mast, in a whirlwind of acrobatics.

Their captain, Saïd, is vigorous, mercurial and reckless. He scolds one of his subordinates for dreaming of a better life, one with money and a family.

“We’re not sweethearts, but warriors,” he tells him.

Meanwhile, below deck, prisoners beg for water and pray to their Christian God.

Devout Blanca is the heroine of the love story, with Saïd as its hero.

The name of the performance, “Mar i Cel”, is a metaphor for their forbidden love at the center of the story.

The original play was written in the 1800s by Angel Guimerà, a key figure in the renaissance of Catalan culture. The popular musical came along a century later, in 1988, put on by the theatre company Dagoll Dagom, with music by composer Albert Guinovart.

“I put all my soul and all my energy, my passion [into it],” Guinovart said.

He was only 25 years old then and said he didn’t even like musicals much.

But he enjoyed “The Phantom of the Opera”, which became an inspiration for him.

“I identify my soul and my sensibility about music with that kind of music — very lyrical, very melodic, with a classical touch also,” he explained. “But the spirit of the melody, I think, is what is more important for me.”

He never could have imagined how popular “Mar i Cel” would become.

Over the years, more than 1 million people have seen it, with versions in Spanish and German.

In Catalonia, generations have grown up with its songs — even some of the actors in the latest revival, like soprano Clara Renom.

She said she first went to see “Mar i Cel” 10 years ago on a high school field trip. And it was a turning point that made her want to become a singer.

Renom plays Saïd’s mother, who he recalls when telling Blanca about his childhood.

During this emotional scene, Blanca learns about the suffering of the Moriscos who were expelled from Spain.

“During rehearsals, we would all cry a lot, singing was hard,” she said. “We couldn’t fathom the injustice [that had happened].”

In the musical, Saïd’s story awakens Blanca to a harsh truth: She’d been taught to fear the Moriscos, but her own people were guilty of heinous crimes against them.

Renom said that things haven’t changed all that much in the world today. Tragedies continue, like in Gaza, children are being separated from their mothers and are dying.

Right now, the future of “Mar i Cel” remains uncertain, because after 50 years, the Dagoll Dagom theatre company is shutting down.

But Renom said she’s hopeful.

“I believe we’ll see ‘Mar i Cel’ again,” she said. “‘Mar i Cel’ is a legend, it’s the history of Catalonia.”

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Most actors would cross Siberia barefoot to audition for “The White Lotus.”

Patravadi Mejudhon didn’t even want to go across town.

“One day, somebody called and said, ‘Please come audition for “The White Lotus,”’” the veteran actress told The World.

“I said, ‘No, I don’t think I have time.’”

Patravadi could’ve made time. But in her mid-70s, she’d long since abandoned any Hollywood ambitions, having tried and failed to catch a break in Los Angeles when she was young. She’d instead devoted her life to becoming the godmother of Thai theater, performing for smaller, discerning audiences.

Also, Patravadi didn’t know a thing about “The White Lotus,” nor cared that the HBO series (about Americans behaving badly in tropical locales) would set its third season in Thailand. Her children, however, couldn’t believe their mom had just snubbed one of the most-prestigious shows on television.

Fortunately, Patravadi’s phone rang. Again.

“They said Khun Mike White wanted to meet me. At the Oriental Hotel.”

Khun is Thai for “mister” and Mike White is the triple-Emmy-winning creator of “The White Lotus.” Apparently, the director had come to Bangkok. He seemed determined to meet her.

She still didn’t understand why. Patravadi had tasted stardom in Thailand, as a TV and film actress, but that was decades ago. She’d since retired from the screen, living quietly as a theater maven, helping younger Thai actors perfect their craft.

She agreed to meet White, just to hear him out. But she already knew her answer. 

Thanks. But no thanks.

In a lengthy interview, Patravadi explained how he ultimately won her over — and why the acclaimed director was so intent on casting her in the first place. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Patravadi’s mother once served Thailand’s royal family. 

“She was kind of a lady-in-waiting for the king. But in the evening, she’d read for the queen.” 

Those connections paid off. After leaving the palace, her mother landed a lucrative concession running ferries on the Chao Phraya, Bangkok’s iconic river, plied with rice barges and lined with glittering temple spires. 

Patravadi was groomed to take over the business, but her interests lied elsewhere. She was spellbound by traveling theater troupes that performed at a Buddhist temple by the river for boatmen and other common folks. 

“I snuck out with my nanny to watch. Because my mother didn’t want me going out at night.” 

Thai high society, back then, held a dim view of entertainers dancing for their supper. 

“They called it a low profession. It’s not suitable for our family. But I liked it.”

Her parents indulged Patravadi when she was a girl, allowing her to study acting, singing and dancing. But they expected her, as a young woman, to buckle down and focus on the family business. It didn’t take. Patravadi ended up in California, honing her acting chops at the Pasadena Playhouse, just 15 miles outside Hollywood. 

“I went to auditions, and I got extra parts here and there. No big parts, nothing interesting … very low-grade movies. I didn’t think it was proper. I thought, you know, I better go back to my country. It’s more dignified.”

In 1973, Patravadi scored her first major role. She played a lovesick woman in a Thai film called, “There is No Heaven for You,” the story of a romance gone wrong. She won Thailand’s equivalent to the Oscar and, to her delight, received a golden trophy from none other than Thailand’s king. Even her mother had to admit it: Patravadi had arrived. 

“She became a big fan. Secretly.”

But Thai cinema didn’t deliver the dignity for which she longed. Thai TV and film parts rolled her way, but “when I said, ‘I’d love to read the script,’ they’d say, “Well, we make them up along the way.”” 

Hollywood used to do this too: concoct dialogue on the fly to save time and crank out films cheaply. 

“Nobody learned their lines. Somebody would tell you what to say. And I told them, ‘I can’t do that, because I have to know what I’m doing.’ That’s why I’d say no.”

In 1992, she set up her own theater, along the riverbanks, not far from where she’d watch ragtag theater troupes in her youth. It started off in the parking lot. 

“People said, ‘This is impossible. No one’s going to come.’” 

But the Patravadi Theater grew into one of the country’s top-performing arts centers. This is where she cemented her legacy as the grand dame of Thai drama, exacting high standards from actors (and herself) while nurturing other Thai performers to pursue their dreams. Over the years, Patravadi still took film and TV roles but, having built her own sanctuary, she had the luxury to say no. 

“I don’t like to be in the limelight. I don’t like red carpets. I want to be quiet. And perform. And be a normal human being.”

That is more or less what she told White when they met at the Oriental Hotel, just a few years back. Patravadi had quit taking outside jobs to focus entirely on yet another arts academy she’d created: Vic Hua Hin, in a coastal area several hours’ drive from Bangkok. She was content with her life and didn’t need the headache.

Thanks. But no thanks.

Patravadi recalled White telling her, “I’m going to bring you back.” To stardom, he meant. But stardom didn’t mean much to her. She’d tasted it before and moved on.

That made her even more perfect for his role. For the third season, he’d invented a well-heeled, silver-haired woman named Sritala, the owner of The White Lotus spa on a Thai island. This character was once a flashy singer in her youth, but had since lost her luster — and now resorted to performing for Western hotel guests, just to bask in the spotlight glow once again.

Patravadi finally understood.

“She was a star, which… I know how it feels. A star when they get old? They get forgotten.” 

She had to concede that — given her aristocratic upbringing and her bumpy adventures in show business — few could execute this role quite like her.

She took the job. Once Patravadi was on set, something clicked. Maybe this experience would satiate a long-buried desire to work on a crème de la créme program. Fifty years ago, LA casting agents weren’t too keen on casting a Southeast Asian woman, “so I wanted to learn how Western people do movies, because I never learned that. How they do sets, how they design. The stuntmen, the soundmen. It was exciting.”

The third season of “The White Lotus” is stacked with renowned American and British talent — and perhaps the most-famous pop star in Asia, let alone Thailand. That would be 27-year-old Lalisa Manobal, who was born in a rural Thai province and later joined the K-pop group BlackPink. An acting novice, she plays a resort worker.

“The first time she met me, she kneeled on the floor like Thai girls do,” Patravadi recalled. “And she said, ‘Oh hello, teacher!’” 

For a Thai person, this is no less extraordinary than Rihanna supplicating at your toes. Lalisa wanted Patravadi’s advice. 

“And I thought to myself, wow, she’s a famous star, yet with the manners of a Thai girl who has enormous respect for her elders.”

The two developed a cozy rapport on set. 

“I was like that when I was young. Singing and dancing and creating a lot of crazy things. And I was thin like her, too. I told Lisa, ‘When you’re 77 like me, light some incense and tell me your weight.’”

Patravadi is enjoying a second wind, thanks to “The White Lotus.” A Thai television channel is suddenly interested in hiring her to produce a 12-part series. 

“I’ll be acting, writing, directing and producing, because Thailand doesn’t have that much budget. Compared to ‘The White Lotus’, I think it’s 1%. But I told my people, ‘We can do it. Thai people can do anything, you know?’”

Patravadi has also become a fan of the show she once spurned. 

“Yes, yes, I finally got HBO. I could ask to see the whole thing in advance” — the entire third season of “The White Lotus” — “but I’m just going to watch it week by week like everyone else.”

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Sophie Javadi-Babreh grew up surrounded by carpets. They were so much a part of her life that she even refers to them as her brothers and sisters.

“It’s like … they’re colorful, the patterns and the touch of them. They were really enjoyable to be around,” she said.

Sophie and her brother, Hugo Javadi-Babreh, spent hours playing on them. The piles of rolled-up carpets made great jumping pads.

“We lived, danced and sometimes even slept on rugs,” Sophie recalled of her childhood.

Sophie’s father has owned Thames Carpets since 2001. Today, she’s using social media to spread the word about the business and the stories behind the carpets.

“In this business, you travel to source rugs quite often, and as a kid, that was cool because I got to constantly be around all these beautiful antiques and auction houses,” she said.

When she finished her studies in London, she decided to return to Henley-on-Thames in Oxfordshire, where her family lives, to help grow her father’s business.

Before social media, her father learned about auctions and clients through printed catalogues and word-of-mouth. But Sophie saw an opportunity to expand the business to a wider, global audience.

Five years ago, she began posting about the carpets on Instagram, including information about their origin and designs.

In one video, she described how the rug was made by the Qashqai tribe in southwestern Iran. In another one, she told viewers about the handwoven rug made by the Kurdish Sanjabi tribe. It has “very sharp, diagonal designs, which they achieve with a unique weaving technique,” she pointed out.

“Whenever I talk about a rug now, I can look at where it was made and then it leads me down this rabbit hole of finding out about the culture of where it was made, what the symbols mean. They’re not just rugs. They carry huge references to cultural history,” she explained.

Sophie’s father, Bahram Javadi-Babreh, was born in a stable in a small village in northwestern Iran. He started weaving carpets when he was around 5 years old because his family needed the extra income, he said, and he hated it at the time.

“It was [a lot] of pressure,” Bahram explained, “because I was so small. I was one of the fastest weavers. The yarn used to cut through our hands.”

He used to weave very quickly, 60 knots per minute, he recalled, because if he didn’t finish the job in time, the people running the factory would sometimes punish the weavers.

Bahram, however, didn’t let the experience limit him. He learned to read and write on the side, during breaks and at night.

Once, a client commissioned him to weave a carpet with the design of the ancient Persian city of Persepolis. It was tough, but he was able to do it.

And the client was so impressed that he paid him handsomely. The money then helped him go to school full-time. Bahram eventually went to the UK to study engineering in the 1970s.

But his mind was still absorbed in the world of carpets. He would often try to get his hands on auction catalogues.

“I loved them,” he said, “absolutely loved them. I used to look at the pictures of them on the train and I used to miss my stop. Then I used to go back, and again miss it.”

Bahram was a weaver, but he also knew how to repair carpets. At one point, the original owner of Thames Carpets, Joseph Bernadout, who had founded the business in 1956, was desperately searching for someone to help fix a damaged rug during a cleaning process.

The cleaner had cut off the signature of the weaver and the owner was suing the business.

Luckily, they found Bahram, who was able to fix the problem. Bernadout brought Bahram into the business as a sign of appreciation and later handed over Thames Carpets to him.

Bahram’s talent in fixing carpets has taken him to some interesting places, like Princess Diana’s bedroom, where he fixed the Turkish rugs that needed repair — and the Duke of Wellington’s home.

He also restored the carpets at Windsor Castle after a fire in 1992 destroyed parts of the estate.

“I always say that I am the luckiest man in the world. Because the work I am doing takes me to different levels of people,” Bahram said.

Thames Carpets’ Instagram page now has about 84,000 followers. Sophie’s posts tell the history and the art of handmade carpets, but they also capture the bond between a father and daughter as they run a business together.

The 27-year-old said people from around the world have reached out to her after seeing her Instagram posts.

“I’ve had quite a lot of people that are a similar age to me saying that it’s helping them connect with their [own cultures] … [especially] if they have a Middle Eastern background but they were raised in a Western society, they’ve enjoyed learning more about that side of their heritage,” she said.

Social media has helped her turn a somewhat niche craft into one that is more accessible to people.

Each carpet tells a story of patience, culture and craftsmanship, she added, and she wants to share that with the world.

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Richard Chen, 24, a website and application developer living in Paris, remembers the exact episode of the animated television series “Dragon Ball Z” that made him want to be an artist. 

He was 4 years old, and it was a fight between the characters Goku and Cell. After that, he said, he was hooked on Japanese anime and manga, and he was always drawing himself, emulating their style. 

Late last year, Chen was able to meet some of the artists behind the art form at Tokyo’s Comiket, the world’s largest comic festival, where he also peddled his own work.   

 “I got to talk with artists that I admire a lot for a few years now, and it’s like a dream to be able to talk to them face-to-face and not only through social media,” he said. 

Twice a year, more than 300,000 comic enthusiasts from around the world travel to Tokyo to support their favorite artists who market their self-published books, known as dojinshi. While most of the artists are Japanese, some foreigners like Chen are able to get table space through a lottery. 

In the end, Chen, a.k.a. Fude, sold half of the stock that he had on hand — a sizable volume devoted to virtual YouTuber Amane Kanata, a popular figure in Japan — which he said he was especially proud of since he’s only been drawing seriously since 2018, and it was his first Comiket.

“In the past, I had a low-esteem of myself,” he said. “So, I thought that I wouldn’t make it [at the festival] like the artists that I respect. So, yeah, I’m really happy.”

For both established and emerging artists, Comiket, which began in 1975, is an opportunity for plenty of exposure and networking — with well over a quarter of a million people still coming to the festival even after the pandemic slashed its numbers in half. The summer Comiket is scheduled for mid-August. 

Professor Patrick Galbraith of Senshu University in Tokyo said that Comiket displays the changing trends in Japanese comics, which has led to big breaks for several popular artists, including Takahashi Rumiko.

Her widespread success started in 1978 with her series, “Urusei Yatsura,” which was one of the first to go under the popular “magical girl” genre of comics.

“She created something that was much more pop, much more sort of cute, that kind of thing,” he said, adding that she tried out some of her characters and story ideas at Comiket. 

Takahashi went on to make several popular manga series, including “Ranma ½” and “Inuyasha,” which sold well over 100 million copies in Japan alone, and are now household names worldwide. 

They were also translated into English and turned into TV series broadcast in the US on the Cartoon Network for many years.

Galbraith said that Comiket is one of the ultimate places for freedom of expression. There’s everything from storylines about teens enjoying a quiet life to fighters who combat bad guys with their nose hair. 

“It’s a really open market, and anything goes. I think the only limitations are you can’t copy someone else’s work, like directly copy, photocopy, or trace” others’ work, or break any obscenity laws, he said. 

The comics are also accessible — most books can be had with a quick 500 yen coin, or just over $3, and an arigato, Japanese for “thank you.”  

Though, some fans show up just to share their appreciation for an artist. 

Cosplayer June Lovejoy, from the US, who was dressed up as Alastor from the American animated series, “Hazbin Hotel,” said that some of her fans brought her gifts. 

“They don’t buy anything, and they just give you presents and walk away. Someone just showed up and said, ‘I bought this at Costco for you,’ and it’s a giant plush of a monster eating Reese’s. But he didn’t buy anything. He just said, here you go, and he left,” Lovejoy said.

She and others said that it’s all part of the joy, serendipity and success that is Comiket.

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Broadway musicals often try out in cities like Boston and Philadelphia before debuting in New York. But a new show has traveled a much farther distance. “Maybe Happy Ending” has been produced six times in South Korea over the past decade.

The performance opened on Broadway last fall and has established itself as a stealth hit. That means, unlike many current shows, it’s not based on well-known intellectual property, and it doesn’t feature big Hollywood stars.

“Maybe Happy Ending” is an intimate science fiction story about two retired robots who fall in love. Their situation is an attempt to shed light on the human condition in this digital age.

When director and choreographer Michael Arden was approached to work on the production, he said the basic premise of the idea didn’t appeal to him.

“It’s not a great elevator pitch,” he recalled. “When I first received the script and read the tagline, I thought, ‘Oh no.’ And then, by the time I finished reading and listening to it, I was completely devastated and overcome with emotion.”

The show’s authors, South Korean-born Hue Park and American Will Aronson, began working on the script over a decade ago. Park, who has written lyrics for Top 20 K-Pop hits, said he was inspired by Damon Albarn’s song “Everyday Robots” while sitting in a Brooklyn coffee shop.

The song started with, “We are everyday robots on our phone in the process of getting home,” Park explained. “And I was like, ‘Oh, I want to see a little quiet, intimate show about who we are becoming in this digital era.’ But the protagonists are human-like robots.”

He texted his writing partner, Will Aronson, and they got to work. The pair has premiered several musicals together in South Korea, and Aronson also speaks Korean fluently.

“Maybe Happy Ending” is set in Seoul, where the show had a tryout production in 2015, with several subsequent productions since.

“Shows in Korea don’t do open runs generally,” Aronson explained. “They’re usually two- to three-month runs. And then, if it’s going well, it’ll come back a year or two years later. We’ve been very fortunate that the audience did respond and it’s come back consistently.”

Even as the show became a hit in South Korea, Aronson said the team had plans to perform in the United States. There was a reading of the English language script in 2016. “And at that point, we paired with our current producers,” Aronson said. “And there are several new songs. We took some Korean songs out and put some new songs into this version.”

The Korean version is about 15 minutes longer, but the story is basically the same: A pair of retired Helperbots — humanoid servants Oliver and Claire — embark on a surprising romantic relationship.

Darren Criss, who starred in the “Glee” series, plays Oliver in the Broadway production. He draws on everything from Commedia dell’arte to Kabuki styles and even silent film stars like Buster Keaton to create his mechanical man.

“In order for me to make it seem like this person is clearly not a human being, it has to be over-expressive,” he explained. “Overexaggeration, like you would with a child: This is happy; this is sad; this is scared.”

Helen J. Shen made her Broadway debut as Claire. “I have found since opening, since previews, my portrayal of Claire has really evolved,” Shen said, “and gotten more ‘roboty’ [or] less ‘roboty’, kind of seeing how going through that spectrum can help tell the story better.”

The two robots discover they really need each other. Claire has to borrow Oliver’s charger since hers is on the fritz. They eventually go on a road trip to an island off the coast of South Korea.  

Composer Will Aronson added that sometimes the characters’ emotions come out in the music that’s not actually sung.

“We knew that because they were robots, they couldn’t really sing, say, power ballads because it just would not be in character,” he said. “It would break the world of the show. But of course, we want big moments in theater, right? The show has several big musical sequences that have no dialog that are purely staging and music.”

One example is a magical moment where Claire and Oliver see fireflies — which they call tiny robots. And despite themselves, they fall in love. Co-author Hue Park said writing “Maybe Happy Ending” was a “self-meditative journey.” He started it after breaking up from a long-term relationship, losing a close friend to cancer and turning 30.

“It was around the time of my life, I was sort of like growing up or coming out of a certain age,” Park recalled. “And I got to thinking … ‘Why am I putting myself in that situation, depending on my significant other or sharing my life with a friend?’ Because it’s really painful when they inevitably have to end.”

But robots, like humans, have a shelf life — their batteries run out, their components wear out.  And, after having a romantic, goofy love affair, Oliver and Claire decide to wipe their memories. Or do they?

“There’s nothing cynical about this piece, and I think that’s key to it,” said director Michael Arden. “That actually, I think we’re desperate to go to the theater to feel things that, hopefully, when we leave, cause us to kind of make the more loving, more hopeful, more generous choice. And I think I have to believe that that’s what’s happened here.”

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Shaman Gino Raúl Grünewald Condori stands on the street corner of a working-class neighborhood. His hands are in the air. He’s making an offering to Pachamama, also known as Mother Earth.

Herbs and coca leaves are laid out on a colorful blanket on the ground. Condori throws incense on the flames of a small fire and pours alcohol and wine on the four cardinal points, each time asking for Mother Earth’s blessing and guidance.

This is a ceremony to mark the beginning of carnival season for the Tobas Andino Sajama Guerreros folk dance troupe. Thirty-three-year-old Diego Maldonado is one of the leaders. He’s been dancing since he was 10.

“For those of us who are Aymara, who have been dancing for a long time, and who learned this from our grandparents and ancestors, this is really important,” he said. “We learned this from the cradle. We watched our parents and our grandparents practicing these traditions before us. It’s necessary, and it’s important.”

The Aymara are the second-largest Indigenous group in Chile. Their central homeland is in the highlands of Bolivia, but they’ve lived in what is now Chile and Southern Peru since pre-Columbian times. As of 2015, they made up almost a third of the population of the province of Arica.

Carnival in Arica is largely a celebration of Aymara Indigenous identity.

“This carnival is like a revival of Bolivian heritage,” said Paulo Noya Matos. His family is from Bolivia, but he grew up in Arica. “It celebrates and validates Andean Culture. It transcends borders and makes you feel part of Andean territory.”

Noya Matos performs in a Tarqueada dance group. They march with thick, long wooden flutes. They say their song calls for the rains this time of the year — planting time in the region.

Nearly 80 different dance troops will perform over the next three days. They’re performing one of more than a dozen different traditional dances. Each has a different style, look, music and significance. But they’re all tied to Mother Earth and celebrate people’s connection to their Indigenous roots.

That is no small feat in a country that pushed Chilean nationalism and assimilation throughout the 20th century.

Noya Matos said that there was a lot of discrimination against Peruvian, Bolivian and Aymara cultures. He said he faced discrimination growing up for being of Bolivian descent.

But times are changing.

Lilibeth Diaz and Judith Mamani dance the Morenada, a typical folk dance originally from the Bolivian cities of La Paz and Oruro. They typically wear huge smiles and extravagant yellow Cholita dresses. 

“We dance with our hearts. We sing with everything we have, because these are our roots,” Mamani said. “We sing. We dance and give everything we have in this carnival, because we carry it in our blood.”

Afro-Chilean dance and culture have also taken center stage in the carnival. Black communities have a long history in Arica. Spanish colonizers forced African descendants to work the land here for hundreds of years. 

All of these groups are standing up for their identities and celebrating their ancestry.

“This carnival is a mixture of cultures where we all embrace with one healthy objective. To maintain our culture viva — alive,” Fredy Amaneces said. He’s originally from Peru, but he’s lived here in Chile for 25 years. “We will continue to show future generations that this will not die. That this will continue.”

Amaneces is one of the leaders of the Tinkus Ruphay Masis Cultural dance group. They’ve been dancing Tinku, a powerful and lively dance from the Bolivian city of Potosi. They wear purple, with large, colorful headdresses.

“This is how we thank Pachamama for everything she has done for us,” said Condori, who has overseen carnival dance groups and spiritual ceremonies for years. “Ritual. Dance, Music. Song. Sharing with the community. Giving freely to others.”

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At first glance, the artwork looks like a classic Ottoman miniature. But up close, scenes pulled from present-day movies, internet memes and pop culture come alive.

Thirty-five-year-old Murat Palta has made a splash in the Turkish art world by imagining how a 16th-century Ottoman miniaturist would depict the world today.

Artists in the Persian, Ottoman and Mughal empires hundreds of years ago perfected what is known as miniature art: highly detailed illustrations that depicted moments in history, sumptuous palace life and scenes from folklore and mythology.

Today, Palta blends traditional miniature techniques with modern themes, creating detailed scenes that juxtapose historical and contemporary elements. By embracing the technology of his time, just as the original miniaturists did, Palta has found a way to keep this centuries-old art form alive and relevant for a new generation. He constructs each element individually on paper and then pulls them together on an iPad like a collage, before reproducing them on canvas.

“No 20-year-old would just sit and think, ‘Let’s inspect miniature art from the 16th century!’ Nobody would do that!” Palta said. “But with my art or style, they have a special interest growing in this field, and it’s a good thing.” 

In “The Ides of March,” a 2023 work depicting the year in pop culture, he featured Taylor Swift in her Eras Tour regalia, riding an emissions-spewing mythical creature to symbolize controversy over the carbon emissions of her private jet. In an early 2012 piece, storm troopers dressed as Ottoman janissaries surround a stylized Darth Vader, as he sits to smell a damask rose. This classic pose was often commissioned by Ottoman rulers, in an effort to symbolize their intellectual refinement and appreciation of both moral and physical beauty. 

The World’s Durrie Bouscaren spoke to Palta and discussed the revival of miniature art in Istanbul.

Listen to the full story by clicking on the blue player above.

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Iztapalapa feels like a city within a city. With close to 2 million residents, it is the most populous borough of Mexico City, Mexico, and also the poorest. Residents often experience water shortages and are exposed to high levels of pollution and crime. But walking down the streets of Iztapalapa feels like visiting a street art exhibition.

Pedro Peña, or Mickrone as he likes to be called, is one of 150 artists recruited by the local government to create the murals.

“I can’t even remember how many walls I’ve painted here, but it’s for sure in the hundreds,” he said while giving a walking tour.

In total, close to 11,000 murals have been created by local artists over five years in Iztapalapa. That’s the largest mural project in the world, according to the local government.

The murals are on public buildings, private businesses and homes, even on rooftops — visible from cable cars — and they depict local stories, traditions, characters and neighbors from the area.

Mickrone is especially proud of one of his murals, which went viral on social media. It shows two elderly residents and long-time lovers who were frequently seen in the area. The man is guiding his wife in a wheelchair. He explained that many murals portray locals and everyday scenes — like the man who collects the neighborhood’s garbage or the woman who kneads the dough at the bakery.

The Iztapalapa mural project started as a push to improve the lives of women, in an area where femicides remain a big issue.

María Antonieta Pérez Orozco, former executive director of the City of Iztapalapa, said the municipal security strategy involved installing hundreds of street lights and deploying police officers, but it also involved embellishing the streets with murals.

Many of the murals also convey messages, such as “stop violence” or “If he hits you, he doesn’t love you.”

“At first, people didn’t want murals because they didn’t trust the street artists to do a good job,” Orozco said. But now, people are requesting murals — just like 8-year-old Luciana Daniel recently did.

After her parents agreed, Mikrone painted the child wearing an astronaut suit because, as she explained, one of her dreams is to go to the moon.

“I can’t believe that’s me in front of my house,” Daniel said, referring to her mural.

Mickrone said that the mural also sends an aspirational message to other girls in the barrio, or neighborhood.

Daniel’s mom, Carmen Solís, said the murals have changed the face of the place.

“Everything was gray and dull, and now it’s colorful and bright,” Solís said. And also, as a woman, she said she feels safer walking the streets of Iztapalapa.

Mickrone and his colleagues have now moved to San Juan Tlihuaca, another Mexico City neighborhood, where they hope to conduct a similar intervention.

This might be the biggest mural project in the world. Iztapalapa is the most populated district in Mexico City, but it also has a history of femicide and crime. As part of a program to make the neighborhood safer for women, the local government recruited artists to paint murals, in addition to installing hundreds of street lights and deploying police officers. Many of the murals depict inspiring images and messages against violence. They can be found on businesses, homes and rooftops. At first, locals didn’t want the murals, saying they didn’t trust street artists to do a good job. But now, residents are requesting them. Iztapalapa now boasts over 11,000 murals. Eight-year-old Luciana Daniel asked artist Mickrone (@mickrone_mx) for a mural of her as an astronaut, because her dream is to go to space one day. Luciana’s mom said that the murals make everything feel bright and colorful. And as a woman, she says she now feels safer walking down the street. Listen to the full story by The World’s Tibisay Zea at the link in bio Photos and videos by Tibisay Zea for The World @GBH #IztapalapaMurals #StreetArt #WomensRights #Murals #Mickrone

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