Face2Face with David Peck

Adam Stein and Zach Lipovsky and Face2Face host David Peck talk about their new film Freaks, permanent residency, science fiction with a conscience, perspective, fear and vision and how thematic elements in a story sneak up on you.

Trailer

Synopsis:

A bold girl discovers a bizarre, threatening, and mysterious new world beyond her front door after she escapes her father's protective and paranoid control.

About the Directors:

Zach Lipovsky has been around film sets almost his entire life. He started working in the film industry as a child actor, when his producer mom decided to put him in front of the camera. In these early years, he starred in many Canadian films and television shows, and by high school was creating his own body of work. By- passing college, he joined a filmmaking cooperative and combined his acting and filmmaking experiences with his natural skills in vfx and post production, to create visually stunning yet emotionally engaging films.

Zach co-produced and was Special Effects Supervisor for 'Afflicted', a Canadian genre found footage film that sold at Cannes to CBS, Alliance Atlantis and Sony. In 2013 the film premiered at TIFF, winning Best Canadian First Feature. The film went on to win Best Picture, Screenplay and Direction at Austin Fantastic Fest and Best Special Effects at Sitges - Catalonian International Film Festival.

In 2013, Zach was tapped by the Hollywood Reporter as one of the Next Generation: 20 Young Canadian Stars on the Rise in LA and in 2014, Playback, Canada's Film Industry Magazine, featured him as one of The 2014 New Establishment - Top 5 to Watch.

Zach is directing his next feature in Vancouver for Legendary Films, Sony Pictures & Lorenzo di Bonaventura, 'Dead Rising'. He is also working with Rhombus Media on 'Dogs of War', a comic book styled War of 1812 epic.

Adam Stein graduated from Harvard University and the directing program at the USC Scholl of Cinematic Arts.

Prior to directing, Stein edited several independent features that played at film festivals such as Sundance, Tribeca, and SXSW.

In addition to “Freaks”, Lipovsky and Stein directed Disney’s live-action adaptation of KIM POSSIBLE and were nominated for Emmys for their directing work on the Disney XD hit series MECH-X4

Image Copyright: Adam Stein and Zach Lipovsky and My Way Entertainment. Used with permission.

F2F Music and Image Copyright: David Peck and Face2Face. Used with permission.

For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Steven Warshaw and Gabe Polsky and Face2Face host David Peck talk about their new film, Red Penguins, the politics of hockey, national pride, optimism and hope, cultural peculiarities, listening to others and capitalism run amok.

Synopsis:

Complete with gangsters, strippers, and live bears serving beer on a hockey rink, Red Penguins tells the wild forgotten true story of capitalism and opportunism run amok in Moscow. Shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Pittsburgh Penguins and the famed Red Army hockey team formed a joint venture that redefined what was possible in the new Russia. Eccentric marketing whiz, Steve Warshaw, is sent to Moscow and tasked to transform the team into the greatest show in Russia, attracting some of the biggest names in Hollywood and advertising along the way. He takes the viewer on a bizarre journey highlighting a pivotal moment in U.S.-Russian relations during a lawless era when oligarchs made their fortunes and multiple murders went unsolved.

About our Guests:

Steven Warshaw was the Pittsburgh Penguins man in charge on the ground in Moscow. With a “special talent for generating firestorms in arenas,” Warshaw was instrumental in the success of the Russian Penguins and was asked to stay after the venture fell apart. He did not. He is currently the Arena Guest Services Supervisor at Madison Square Garden in New York City.

Gabe Polsky wrote, directed, and produced the feature documentary In

Search of Greatness - a cinematic journey into the secrets of genius as told through the greatest athletes of all time. It was released theatrically to critical acclaim in 2018 and was nominated several awards including a WGA Award. In 2017, Gabe Executive Produced Genius, the 10 time Emmy® nominated TV show on National Geographic about Albert Einstein. He and his brother Alan acquired the rights to the Albert Einstein Estate and the best-selling Walter Isaacson biography, which became the bedrock of the series.

In 2015, Polsky directed, wrote, and produced the award-winning documentary Red Army which was released by Sony Pictures Classics to universal acclaim. Executive Produced by Jerry Weintraub and Werner Herzog, the film premiered at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. The story chronicled the epic rise and fall of the Soviet Union, through its famed Red Army hockey team.

Polsky co-directed and produced The Motel Life, a feature film starring Emile Hirsch, Dakota Fanning, and Steven Dorff. The film won numerous international awards and was described by Indiewire as “a perfectly formed indie with a heart of gold.”

In 2016, The New Yorker commissioned Polsky to make a short documentary called “The Blimp-Maker”. Additional producing credits include: Werner Herzog’s Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans which was named in over 40 top-ten lists of 2009 and His Way , an Emmy® nominated documentary released by HBO in 2011.

Image Copyright: Norddeutscher Rundfunk and Studio Hamburg and Gabriel Polsky. Used with permission.

F2F Music and Image Copyright: David Peck and Face2Face. Used with permission.

For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here.

With thanks to Josh Snethlage and Mixed Media Sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hugo Weaving, Bolude Watson, Ben Lawrence, Andrew Luri and Face2Face host David Peck talk about their new film, Hearts and Bones, PTSD, relationships and hope, the power of community, the image and why finding our way home matters.

Trailer

Synopsis:

War photographer, Daniel Fisher has returned home to the news of his partner’s pregnancy. Determined not let fatherhood alter his way of life, he begins preparations for an upcoming exhibition and his next overseas assignment. However, as the birth of his child draws near he struggles to keep his rising anxiety hidden.

Meanwhile, South Sudanese refugee, Sebastian Aman has created a safe life in Australia with his wife and child. His peaceful life is disturbed when Dan’s exhibition threatens to display photographs of a massacre that occurred in Sebastian’s home village, 15 years earlier. When Sebastian approaches Dan with an appeal to not display any images of the massacre, an unlikely friendship develops between the men.

Bonded by their shared trauma, Sebastian introduces Dan to members of a community choir. These survivors of war offer Dan an escape from the anxieties of imminent fatherhood, much to the frustration of his wife. When Sebastian uncovers among Dan’s photographic archive an image of his daughter, thought to have died in war, the men set about finding her.

Amid the search for the young girl, Dan unearths disturbing details surrounding Sebastian’s past and the startling revelations threaten to destroy both families. Amid the pain, each man must face their painful past in order to regain their salvation.

Hearts and Bones - a story about hope and the mysterious bonds of family, friendship and fatherhood.

About our Guests:

Ben Lawrence is an internationally award-winning director and photographer. His short films have screened at Edinburgh, Clermont-Ferrand, Los Angeles, San Gio and Sao Paulo film festivals.

His photographs have been recognized at the International Photography Awards in New York, The Australian National Photographic Gallery Portrait Prize, the HeadOn Portrait Festival and The Spider Awards for photojournalism in London.

In 2018, his critically acclaimed debut feature documentary, Ghosthunter screened at multiple festivals around the world and was nominated for a prestigious Illuminate Award at the Sheffield Film Festival. It also earned an AACTA Award nomination for Best Feature Length Documentary and won the Best Australian Documentary Award at the Sydney Film Festival.

Hugo Weaving has enjoyed an enormously varied and successful career in film, theatre and television. He has won numerous awards, including three Australian Film Institute awards for Best Actor in a Leading Role - in Jocelyn Moorhouse's PROOF (1991), THE INTERVIEW (1998) - for which he also won Best Actor at The Montreal World Film Festival, and LITTLE FISH (2005). In 2011, he was an inaugural AACTA award winner for his performance in ORANGES AND SUNSHINE. In 2015 he won his second AACTA award for THE DRESSMAKER. In 2016 he won another for his work in HACKSAW RIDGE, and followed this up in 2017 with another for JASPER JONES.

Weaving is also well known for his roles in THE ADVENTURES OF PRISCILLA, QUEEN OF THE DESERT (1994), as Agent Smith in THE MATRIX trilogy, as Elrond in THE LORD OF THE RINGS and THE HOBBIT trilogies, and as 'V’ in V FOR VENDETTA (2006). Other films include LAST RIDE (2009), CAPTAIN AMERICA (2011), CLOUD ATLAS (2012), MYSTERY ROAD (2013), THE MULE (2014) and STRANGERLAND (2015). Hugo’s recent TV credits include PATRICK MELROSE released in 2018 and Australian series SEVEN TYPES OF AMBIGUITY (2016).

His many theatre appearances include Sydney Theatre Company’s ARTURO UI, as well as HEDDA GABLER and UNCLE VANYA (both enjoying successful U.S. tours in 2006 and 2011 respectively, the latter earning him a Helen Hayes Award), MACBETH (2014), ENDGAME (2015) and WAITING FOR GODOT (2013) with a London season in 2015. He has also voiced characters in several highly successful films, including BABE, HAPPY FEET and TRANSFORMERS.

Andrew Luri was born in Juba, which is now the capital of South Sudan. He came to Australia via Cairo Egypt, to Darwin then to Melbourne. He is married and has seven children. Music is his hobby and he is a Church and community leader.

Andrew loves comedy and studied at Charles Darwin University, he also studied Counter Terrorism at Swinburne University. He is multi skilled and has had many different jobs over the years.

Hearts and Bones is his first film and the culmination of a childhood dream.

Bolude Watson is a Nigerian born American raised actress. Moving to Sydney, Australia in 2014 from Los Angeles, has proven to flourish her career, staring in Ché Baker’s SciFi film ‘Blue World Order’ as female lead Marion Connors and most recently she just wrapped the film ‘Hearts and Bones’ directed by Australia’s brilliant director, Ben Lawrence where she played Anishka the wife of a South Sudanese immigrant with a dark secret.

Bolude’s television credits include roles in shows such as ‘Deadly Women’ and ‘Your Numbers Up’. Bolude is also co-creator with Michela Carattini of The web series ‘Americans in Oz’ which made its online debut last year.

As an African American and with a deep passion for story telling Bolude’s goal is to be part of the movement that creates a space for diverse voices in film and television

Image Copyright: Hearts and Bones Films Pty Ltd, Spectrum Films Pty Ltd, Lemac Films (Australia) Pty Ltd, Create NSW and Screen Australia. Used with permission.

F2F Music and Image Copyright: David Peck and Face2Face. Used with permission.

For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here.

With thanks to Josh Snethlage and Mixed Media Sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Jason Anderson and Face2Face host David Peck talk about short form cinema, coming of ages stories, diversity, perspective, fresh new voices and some of the films to look out for at TIFF 2019 and why it’s a pretty good year for weird.

TIFF 2019 - TIFF is a not-for-profit cultural organization with a mission to transform the way people see the world through film. Buy tickets here: TIFF 2019 running from September 5th to the 15th and check out TIFF trailers here.

About our Guest:

Jason Anderson is a programmer, writer and lecturer based in Toronto. He’s the lead programmer for Short Cuts, the Toronto International Film Festival’s annual program of shortform cinema.

He’s also the director of programming for the Kingston Canadian Film Festival, the country’s largest standalone festival of Canadian movies. He’s served on juries for festival such as Hot Docs, Vienna Independent Shorts, the Tel Aviv International Student Film Festival and Nordisk Panorama. Previously a longtime critic and columnist for Toronto’s Eye Weekly and The Grid, he currently writes about film and music for such publications as Uncut, Sight & Sound and Cinema Scope.

He was a writer and script consultant for The VICE Guide to Film, authoring episodes on Jane Campion, Spike Lee and Alfonso Cuaron. He teaches film criticism at the University of Toronto and feature journalism at Ryerson University. His first novel Showbiz was published by Toronto’s ECW Press in 2004. Raised in Calgary, he lives in Toronto with his wife, daughter and too many records.

Image Copyright: TIFF and Jason Anderson. Used with permission.

F2F Music and Image Copyright: David Peck and Face2Face. Used with permission.

For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here.

With thanks to Josh Snethlage and Mixed Media Sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Alan Zweig and Face2Face host David Peck talk about his new film Coppers, first responders, trauma, cop humour, guilt and PTSD, and why it’s time to finding ways to empathize with the other.

Trailer

Synopsis:

In 2009 director Alan Zweig made A Hard Name, a film about ex-convicts, and 10 years later comes Coppers, a film that explores the lives of the men and women who helped convict them in the first place. Hurt people hurt people, as they say. The only thing the men and women in Coppers have in common is that they’re retired and ready to look back. They tell gruesome stories, sad stories and a few funny ones but the gruesome stories dominate — they’re just part of the daily grind. Heads indeed can roll and guts can spill. Most cops have seen that happen at least once in their career.

It’s a profession marked by adrenaline and chaos but also by suicide and marital breakdown. Some coppers feel they can sail past the mayhem and decomposing bodies. But no one leaves the job without a mark, and not everyone bounces back.

The thirteen retired police officer in Coppers tell stories of fights, shootings, accident scenes and sudden death. There are sweet stories and funny ones but the gruesome stories dominate because this is what cops see everyday. At its heart that’s what this collective story is about - the trauma we expect the police to clean up and what that experience does to them.

About the Director:

Alan Zweig is a Toronto documentary filmmaker known for using film to explore his own life. In his 2000 film Vinyl, Zweig explores what drives people to become record collectors. Zweig spends a large portion of the film exploring his own life in regard to record collecting, feeling it has prevented him from fulfilling his dreams of a family. I, Curmudgeon is a 2004 film about self-declared curmudgeons, himself included, was shot on a camcorder, with Zweig using a mirror to record his own experiences. Lovable is a 2007 film about our preoccupation with finding romantic perfection. Those three films are often referred to as Zweig's "mirror trilogy" and have been shown in retrospectives he's enjoyed at Hot Docs, on TVO and at the Cinematheque in Winnipeg.

In 2009, Zweig moved from autobiographical subject matter to explore the struggle of ex-convicts to lead normal lives in A Hard Name, which received the Genie Award for Best Documentary. He followed that in 2013 with 15 Reasons to Live, inspired by the book of the same name by Ray Robertson. The film is a series of 15 short stories dealing with the things that make life worth living. That same year, his film When Jews Were Funny, won the prize for Best Canadian Feature Film at the 2013 Toronto International Film Festival. In this film he returned to the autobiographical genre and explored the question of whether Jewish culture was disappearing as it got further away from Eastern European Ashkenazi roots that influenced Zweig and others. Hurt, his documentary film about Steve Fonyo, was released in 2015. It won the Platform Prize at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival and went on to win the Ted Rogers prize for Best Canadian Feature Length Documentary at the Canadian Screen Awards. In 2017, Zweig directed Hope, a follow-up to Hurt, which premiered in Hot Docs. Also in 2017, his documentary film There Is A House Here, premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Coppers will be Zweig’s tenth feature length documentary and his eleventh feature length film.

Image Copyright: Alan Zweig and Primitive Entertainment. Used with permission.

F2F Music and Image Copyright: David Peck and Face2Face. Used with permission.

For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here.

With thanks to Josh Snethlage and Mixed Media Sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Collin Friesen and Face2Face host David Peck talk about his new film Sorry For Your Loss, dark humor, how we deal with death, why the future matters and understanding your voice and craft and pushing back against societal norms.

Trailer

Synopsis:

Marking Collin Friesen’s directorial debut, this heartfelt comedy follows exhausted new dad Ken (Justin Bartha) as he heads home to bury his own estranged father. He is guilted into fulfilling his father’s dying wish – to have his ashes scattered on the playing field of the local pro football team.

It’s a task that proves tougher and funnier than it should be but with the help of his lonely, hippy mother (Lolita Davidovich) and his father’s old golf buddy (Bruce Greenwood), Ken learns a little about himself, his marriage, and most importantly, that there’s nothing about dying that makes you a saint.

About the Director:

Collin Friesen was born in small town Saskatchewan and grew up in Winnipeg, Canada. The son of a high school teacher and church secretary, Collin got his BA from the University of Manitoba before getting a job as a reporter for a local TV station. After working for the CBC in Alberta for two years, he cashed in his life savings and went to film school in Los Angeles.

After graduating from the AFI, he sold his first script, The Big White, which was turned into a feature starring Robin Williams and Holly Hunter.

Collin has also worked on the Fox series The Lone Gunmen, and completed other assignments for various studios.

Collin lives in Silverlake with his finance and Greencard.

Image Copyright: Collin Friesen and FarPoint Films. Used with permission.

F2F Music and Image Copyright: David Peck and Face2Face. Used with permission.

For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here.

With thanks to Josh Snethlage and Mixed Media Sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michael Ungar and Face2Face host David Peck talk about his new book, resilience, the seduction of hope, herd immunity, why selfishness often backfires and why the self help industry isn’t working.

You can buy his book here: Change Your World: The Science of Resilience and The Path to Success

Synopsis:

How much can grit, motivation, and positive thinking actually matter when the world around us is starved of support and opportunity? A billion-dollar self-improvement industry always puts responsibility for change on our shoulders. But this approach, which owes more to the myths of rugged individualism and victim-blaming politics than to credible scientific research, produces few real and lasting improvements to our health and happiness.

Dr. Michael Ungar’s mind-bending new book, Change Your World: The Science of Resilience and The Path to Success (Sutherland House Book, May 30, 2019), reveals the emptiness of the self-improvement movement and offers instead a stunning new perspective on success and personal change. What we really need when things get tough and the odds are stacked against us, he writes, are strong support systems and an environment rich in opportunity. Using the science of resilience and real-life stories from across classes and cultures, he shows how nurturing spouses and families, supportive employers, and effective institutions are the real differences between success and failure in our lives. The good news is that it is easier to change your world than it is to change yourself.

Biography:

Dr. Michael Ungar is among the best known writers and researchers on the topic of resilience in the world. His work has changed the way resilience is understood, shifting the focus from individual traits to the interactions between people and their families, schools, workplaces, and communities. As the Canada Research Chair in Child, Family and Community Resilience and Professor of Social Work at Dalhousie University, as well as a family therapist, he has helped to identify the most important factors that influence the resilience of children and adults during periods of transition and stress. He is the author of 15 books that have been translated into five languages, numerous manuals for parents, educators, and employers, as well as more than 170 scientific papers. Dr. Ungar’s immense influence comes from his ability to adapt ideas from his research and clinical practice into best-selling works like Too Safe For Their Own Good: How Risk and Responsibility Help Teens Thrive and I Still Love You: Nine Things Troubled Kids Need from Their Parents. His blog Nurturing Resilience appears on Psychology Today’s website.

Dr. Ungar is also the founder and Director of the Resilience Research Centre where he coordinates over ten million dollars in research in more than a dozen countries. Dr. Ungar regularly provides consultation and training to organizations like the World Bank, UNESCO, and the Red Cross. He is the former Chair of the Nova Scotia Mental Health and Addictions Strategy, executive board member of the American Family Therapy Academy, and a family therapist who works with mental health services for individuals and families at risk. In 2012 Dr. Ungar was the recipient of the Canadian Association of Social Workers National Distinguished Service Award for his outstanding contribution to clinical work with families and communities.

Image Copyright: Michael Ungar. Used with permission.

F2F Music and Image Copyright: David Peck and Face2Face. Used with permission.

For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here.

With thanks to Josh Snethlage and Mixed Media Sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Thom Powers and Face2Face host David Peck talk about documentary film, some of the films to look out for at TIFF 2019, empathy and social change, the politics of story and why Toronto is a special place.

TIFF is a not-for-profit cultural organization with a mission to transform the way people see the world through film.

TIFF 2019

Buy tickets here: TIFF 2019 running from September 5th to the 15th.

And check out TIFF trailers here.

Be sure to listen to Thom Powers on: Pure Non Fiction

About our Guest:

Thom Powers has been an international documentary programmer for the Toronto International Film Fectival since 2006. His TIFF selections have gone on to win critical and commercial acclaim including the Oscar winners Free Solo, Undefeated and Inside Job. As a programmer of music documentaries, he has moderated conversations with U2, Grace Jones, Yo-Yo Ma, Keith Richards, and Neil Young.

He created and oversees TIFF Doc Conference, which has featured speakers such as Werner Herzog, Raoul Peck, and Sophie Fiennes. For nine years, he programmed the Festival’s Mavericks series, featuring conversations with the likes of Martin Scorsese, Chris Rock, and Julie Taymor.

Powers hosts the podcast Pure Nonfiction, for which he has interviewed over 100 filmmakers, among them Agnès Varda, Ava DuVernay, and Wim Wenders.

He and his wife, Raphaela Neihausen, are co-founders of DOC NYC, the USA’s largest documentary festival, and created its offshoot events DOC NYC Pro, Short List, Visionaries Tribute, and Boot Camps. They run the weekly documentary screening series Pure Nonfiction (formerly known as Stranger Than Fiction) at Manhattan’s IFC Center, and host WNYC’s Documentary of the Week that airs on New York’s public radio station and as a podcast.

He has taught documentary producing at the School of Visual Arts MFA Social Documentary program, New York University School of Continuing Professional Studies and held the Allesee Chair in Media at Wayne State University. He is a co-founder of the Cinema Eye Honors, an annual award for documentary excellence, and the Garrett Scott Development Grant for first-time. He has written on documentary filmmaking for Positif, The Boston Globe, Realscreen, Filmmaker Magazine, Criterion, and STFdocs.com.

Image Copyright: TIFF and Thom Powers. Used with permission.

F2F Music and Image Copyright: David Peck and Face2Face. Used with permission.

For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here.

With thanks to Josh Snethlage and Mixed Media Sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Joe Berridge and Face2Face host David Peck talk about cities and entropy, why they’re like purpose built machines, liberty, innovation, democracy and urban planning and why successful cities need immigrants.

About the Book:

There is no such thing as a perfect city, but great cities have moments of perfection - perfect streets or buildings, perfect places to raise a family or to relax with a coffee - and all strive for perfection when they undertake grand civic projects revitalizing their downtowns or waterfronts, or building innovation hubs, airports, and arenas, or reforming their governance systems, or integrating streams of new immigrants.

Cities, more than ever, are the engines of our economies and the ecosystems in which our lives play out, which makes questions about the perfectibility of urban life all the more urgent. Joe Berridge, one of the world’s leading urban planners, takes us on an insider’s tour of some of the world’s largest and most diverse cities, from New York to London, Shanghai to Singapore, Toronto to Sydney, Manchester to Belfast, to scrutinize what is working and what is not, what is promising and what needs to be fixed in the contemporary megalopolis.

We meet the people, politicians, and thinkers at the cutting edge of global city making, and share their struggles and successes as they balance the competing priorities of growing their economies, upgrading the urban machinery that keeps a city humming, and protecting, serving, and delighting their citizens. We visit a succession of great urban innovations, stop to eat in many of Joe’s favorite places, and leave with a startling view of the magical urban future that awaits us all.

About Joe:

Joe Berridge, a partner at Urban Strategies, is an urban planner and city builder who has had an integral role in the development of complex urban planning and regeneration projects in Canada, the U.S., the U.K., Europe and Asia. He has been strategic advisor for the development of the city centres of Manchester, Belfast and Cardiff and for the waterfronts of Toronto, Singapore, Sydney, Cork, London and Governors Island in New York City.

He has prepared campus master plans for the Universities of Manchester, Waterloo, Queen's and Western and is now advising on the new hub for Toronto Pearson International Airport. Joe teaches at the University of Toronto and is a Senior Fellow at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy.​

Image Copyright: Joe Berridge. Used with permission.

F2F Music and Image Copyright: David Peck and Face2Face. Used with permission.

For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here.

With thanks to Josh Snethlage and Mixed Media Sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ruth Lande Shuman and Face2Face host David Peck talk about Publicolor, creativity and change, your inner artists, the deprivation of color, empowerment and Pepto Bismol pink and the gap that exists within education.

Video Overview

About Ruth:

A dynamic and passionate innovator, Ruth Lande Shuman is an award-winning industrial designer deeply committed to using design to address two of the root causes of poverty: the under-education of our youth and their lack of job preparedness. Ms. Shuman received her B.A. in 1964 from the University of Pennsylvania and completed her M.S. in Industrial Design at Pratt Institute in 1989 with a thesis on “Modular Forms, Patterns, and Systems in Nature,” where she also completed a six-month post-graduate study on the psychological effects of color.

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A pioneer in using design to engage disaffected youth in their education, Ms. Shuman set her sights on improving the lives of neglected NYC public school students, their teachers, families and communities. Alarmed by low test scores and high drop-out rates and appalled by the dreary and often prison-like facilities that operate as our middle and high schools, Ms. Shuman hit on the deceptively simple—yet incredibly successful—idea that one can fundamentally improve students’ attitudes and engagement by improving their learning environments.

In 1996, Ruth Lande Shuman founded the not-for-profit organization Publicolor to use color, collaboration, design, and the discipline of the commercial painting to engage at-risk students in their education, targeting the most underserved communities, most underperforming schools and most seriously disadvantaged middle and high school students. She quickly realized that lasting change requires an intensive and long-term commitment. As a result, she created COLOR Club, Next Steps, and Summer Design Studio to ensure that students are with us a minimum of 3 days a week for 4-6 years before college, and then all through college. She is very proud that out of a full and part-time staff of 41, 14 are Publicolor graduates.

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Ruth firmly believes that every student is walking potential, and that it is our job to help them realize it. She is surrounded by a team who wholeheartedly shares this view.

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Image Copyright: Ruth Lande Shuman and Publicolor. Used with permission.

F2F Music and Image Copyright: David Peck and Face2Face. Used with permission.

For more information about David Peck’s podcasting, writing and public speaking please visit his site here.

With thanks to Josh Snethlage and Mixed Media Sound.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.