Seeing Color

Hi everyone. I hope you are safe wherever you are. I am currently back in Zhuhai and settling down. I still have quite a lot to do such as unpacking and getting a multi-entry visa but otherwise, after four COVID nasal tests and two anti-body tests, I am out of quarantine. Life feels strangely normal and post-COVID here with China having essentially tested everyone and closed its borders to the world. I hope with all the news on the vaccine that the world can open up soon. We shall see. But for today, I am interview Yon Natalie Mik, an experimental dancer and researcher who works at the intersection of dance, performance studies, and ethnology. Natalie began her dance career studying classical ballet before branching out to other dance forms and disciplines. Currently, Natalie is pursuing her Ph.D on choreography and ghosts in contemporary transnational Asian performance. I met Natalie during my time in Berlin and even saw two of her performances, but I did not have a chance to interview her until recently over zoom. The sound quality is not the best, but hopefully it isn't too distracting. We chat quite a bit about Natalie's early life and path through dance, Asian studies in Germany, teeth blackening, and Asian squats. I hope you enjoy this.

Links Mentioned:

• Natalie's Website
• Natalie's Instagram
• Gayageum
• Prumsodun Ok
• Eun-Me Ahn's Dancing Grandmothers
• Teeth Blackening

Follow Seeing Color:

• Seeing Color Website
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram

Hey everyone. It has definitely been a crazy week and it seems things are turning out ok. It was four days of election news and uncertainty, but there is some sort of clarity now. I feel some kind of hope, in spite of 70 million Americans voting for an outright racist. With the bar so low, it seems the situation can more likely get better. I partially didn't release an episode last week because of the timing, but also I was in the middle of flying back into China. I was a bit stressed out with the whole ordeal of getting the all the proper documents, visas, COVID tests, and jet lag. At the moment, I am currently in Xiamen and day six of hotel quarantine. In addition to the COVID test I had to take in order to board the airline, I received another COVID test upon landing, before being directly shuttled to a hotel where will be tested for again before I leave. After that, I can travel back to Zhuhai and around China.

So anyway. Enough about me. For today on the podcast, I am interviewing Marcus Scott Williams, a writer I met last winter at Vermont Studio Center. I can't believe it has been almost a whole year since that residency and right before the whole pandemic started. I spent a lot of time with Marcus that snowy January and even did my first stick and poke for him. Before our interview, I read Marcus's last book, Sparse Black Whimsy, and found it to be a smooth stream of consciousness mixed with poetic examinations that are both playful and thrilling. I've linked the book in the episode descriptions if you are interested. Marcus had a long and winding path to get to where he is today, which we chat about, along with vulnerability, questioning the need to be right all the time, and paying attention to the minor details in life. I hope you enjoy this.

Links Mentioned:

• Marcus's Website
• Marcus's Instagram
• Sparse Black Whimsy: A Memoir
• RITFB Podcast

Follow Seeing Color:

• Seeing Color Website
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram

Hey y'all. I hope your week is going well. This is the last episode where I revisit a previous guest to cap off my two year anniversary of this podcast. Sometimes, I wonder who I am celebrating this with and who is listening, but for those of you out there, I hope this is bringing some moments of joy. Anyway, I talked with Tereneh Idia and Justin Favela for the past two episodes and you can check those out as well if you missed them. For this week, I have my good friend, Carol Zou, someone who I have known for over a decade. Carol's work facilitates creative social change projects with a focus on racial justice, informal labor, and public space. Informing a lot of Carol's work is the belief that we are most free when we help others get free. I was able to catch up with Carol late at night and we talk over some drinks through zoom, which the sound quality leaves much to be desired. I did my best to clean it up, but hopefully you can bare with it. Our chat is informal, which is to say a bit all over the place, and we discuss motorcycles, being rooted in place, Chinese congee recipes, and how to spend your time at art residencies. I hope you enjoy this.

Links Mentioned:

• Carol's Website
• Carol's essay for A Blade of Grass
• Vampires vs. the Bronx
• The People's WPA
• Yarn Bombing Los Angeles
• I May Destroy You
• Chewing Gum
• The Princess Weiyoung
• Story of Yanxi Palace
• AmItheAsshole subreddit

Follow Seeing Color:

• Seeing Color Website
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram

Hey everyone. Thanks for tuning in to round 2 of the special two-year anniversary edition where I revisit three past guest of the show. Last week, I talked with Tereneh Idia, an internationally based fashion designer, which if you haven't listened to yet, go check it out. But for this week, I am chatting with Justin Favela, an artist known for his colorful large-scale installations and sculptures that manifest his interactions with American pop culture and the Latinx experience. In 2018, Justin won the Alan Turing LGTBIQ Award. He also hosts two culture-oriented podcasts, "Latinos Who Lunch" and "The Art People Podcast." I met Justin 3 years ago and have maintained a close long-distance friendship with him since. Hopefully you can hear our familiarity with each other in our banter as we chat about José María Velasco, performance art, working for Hollywood, and finding a ranch for the future. Justin also inspired me to create this podcast, so visiting him again on the two year anniversary seemed important as we reflect on both the past and present. I have got one last special guest for next weeks episode. Until then, I hope you enjoy this.

Links Mentioned:

• Latinos Who Lunch
• The Art People Podcast
• My first interview with Justin
• Roxanne Gay
• The Ajumma Show
• Jade+XD Fodcast
• We Love Trash Podcast
• The Read Podcast
• Another Round Podcast
• For Colored Nerds Podcast
• José María Velasco Gómez
• Marjorie Barrik Museum - Future Relics
• Lou Diamond Phillips
• La Bamba 
• Ritchie Valens
• Selena
• Seven Magic Tires
• Justin's Show at Mass Moca
• Justin's Show at the Amon Carter Museum

Follow Seeing Color:

• Seeing Color Website
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram

Hey everyone. I hope you are well. The news is going more crazy with each passing day, although I think we have a new definition for the words karma and irony in relation to the current US state of affairs. I finally got my mail-in-ballet, which I quickly filled out and dropped off at my local town hall, so that is out of the way. I did get information about my returning to China, although it is a national Chinese holiday this week so everyone is on vacation and the instructions for renewing work visas are still very unclear. So more waiting around, as has been the case for everyone.

But for today I am doing something different to celebrate the fact that somehow I have been doing this podcast for 2 years. So for the next three episodes, which I will be releasing every week as opposed to bi-weekly, I will be revisiting three special guests from earlier episodes. For this week's episode, I will be chatting with Tereneh Idia, who I first talked to in Episode 8, which I will link in the show notes. As a quick overview, Tereneh was born and raised in Pittsburgh and is an internationally based fashion designer and founder of Idia'Dega. She also has a bi-weekly column for the Pittsburgh City Paper, which she recently won a Golden Quill award for Excellence in Written Journalism. This podcast had its most concrete beginnings in Pittsburgh and I thought it would be good to be able to chat with Tereneh about recent events in relationship to Pittsburgh, a city which I hold close to my heart. We also talk about some of current events, zoom meetings, protests, monuments, and so much more. Again, thank you to everyone who continues to listen to my rambling thoughts and I hope you enjoy this.

Links Mentioned:

• Tereneh's Website
• Tereneh's Instagram
• Tereneh's Twitter
• My first interview with Tereneh
• Aurora Borealis. My First Muses. - Frick Museum
• Pittsburgh City Paper
• There are Indigenous People in the Present
• What is the correct way to protest?
• Pittsburgh Post-Gazette removes a Black reporter from George Floyd protest coverage
• Other Border Wall Project
• OAM PGH

Follow Seeing Color:

• Seeing Color Website
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram

Hey everyone. I hope you are all doing ok. The recent passing of Ruth Bader Ginsburg is bringing up a lot of complicated feelings for me, as I am sure it is for many people. Of course, we must remember the shift in power in the Supreme Court is just one of many things that has been failing over the course of US democracy. It means come this November, voting for the US elections is important, but so are all the local elections and difficult discussions about what it means to exist on this planet where we are all entangled with each other. Yeah...I just don't know. Yeah.

Anyway, for this week, I am returning to an older recording I did with Vicky Truong while I was living in Berlin over a year ago. Born in Australia, raised by a half Chinese-Teochew half Vietnamese father, and a half Chinese-Teochew (ti-jiu) half Thai mother, Vicky grew up with an abundance of different cuisines and cultures. She lived in France for three years where she worked in the Fashion Industry before moving to Berlin working as a teacher, activist, and artist. I met Vicky through a few Asian diaspora centered events where I learned more about the work Vicky was doing. Vicky started Rice is Life, a project celebrating Chinese Teochew, Vietnamese, Thai and Australian foods. Vicky also leads a diversity and inclusion workshop series called Eye to Eye, which we talk about in our conversation. We also chat about her growing up in Australia, appreciating our cultural heritage, and how an unfortunate event at Berlin Art Week helped lead her to the work she does today. Listening to this brought back many memories to my time in Berlin and how far away it seems now. In any case, as always, stay safe, stay healthy, and please vote this November.

Links Mentioned:

• Vicky Truong's Website
• Vicky's Instagram
• D.A.M.N. (Deutsche Asiat*innen, Make Noise)
• korientation
• I Am Not A Fortune Cookie
• Zairong Xiang
• Hornback Ad
• Nobuyoshi Aracki

Follow Seeing Color:

• Seeing Color Website
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram

Hi everyone. I hope you are doing well wherever you are. I don't have too much new to report. But for today, I have a great episode with Almaz Wilson, an artist I met back in January while I was at Vermont Studio Center. Almaz got her BA in Biological Anthropology from the University of Maryland and an MFA from the University of Florida. I got to know Almaz during the many hours talking over meals and late at night after a long day in the studios. As a sidenote, I planned the release of this episode a bit poorly as Almaz had an exhibition of her work in New York City back in February 22. We talk about her show in the interview and I should have released our chat before then. I need to plan these releases better. I actually had a chance to see her show before it went down as I had just flown back from Asia as the world began to change from COVID-19. It was nice to see the work all hung up after doing a few studio visits with Almaz while the work was in progress. In addition to talking about how she is preparing for her exhibition, Almaz and I talk about different ways to take up space, thinking about art criticism, and building things up in order to move on. I hope you enjoy this.

Links Mentioned:

• Almaz's Website
• Almaz's Instagram
• Denyse Thomasos

Follow Seeing Color:

• Seeing Color Website
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram

Hey everyone. I hope you are doing well. I have had a lot of things on my mind lately, the future of this podcast being one of them, not to mention the futures of the myriad of other responsibilities in life. I have been taking some amazing zoom classes lately and reading some dense theory stuff that I probably understand only a small portion. Also, China opened up its visa process to Europe and parts of Asia, so maybe I'll be able to go back before classes start and can avoid the whole remote teaching while in a 12 hour time zone difference. Of course it is hard to predict the future right now and I am grateful I even have a job. I will keep you updated.

For today, I have the wonderful Emily Lu, a poet I met in Vermont last January. Emily was born in Nanjing, China before she and her family moved to Canada. Emily got her B.Sc. at the University of Toronto and her M.D. at Queen's University. She is currently finishing up her residency training in psychiatry while she continues to write poetry. This tension of being both a psychiatrist and poet is one we talk about in our discussion, along with Emily's thoughts on translations, her experiences growing up in Canada, and finding confidence in the unknown. Emily ends our chat with a lovely reading of one of her poems.  As always, stay safe and healthy and I hope you enjoy this.

Links Mentioned:

• Emily's Twitter
• Emily's Chapbook
• An essay that just came out by Emily
• Franny Choi
• Jeremy Dutcher
• Micro Seasons
• Bescherelle

Follow Seeing Color:

• Seeing Color Website
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram

Hey everyone. I hope all is well with y'all as this new normal of COVID-19 is settling in. I don't have too much news...still awaiting returning to China and still not sure I can be physically there by the fall semester. I have a few logistical things with my living situation in China that is causing some headaches but otherwise I am safe in the US. One small thing I am part of is this video project curated by Isaac Leung of Videotage in Hong Kong. My video is showing on Videotage's website but it is also all over public screen in the streets of Lisbon, Portugal...so I guess if you happen to be in Lisbon, you might see my video at random street corners. I'll post a link or two on instagram.

Anyway. For today, I am talking with Jean-Ulrick Désert, a conceptual and visual artist born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti before his family fled to the US. Originally trained as an architect from Cooper Union and Columbia, Jean-Ulrick got drawn to art and never looked back. He left his architecture job and traveled to France before ending up in Berlin, where he has been since 2002. He most recently represented Haiti at the 2019 Venice Biennale, although the project ran into a few roadblocks keeping it from being fully realized, which we discuss in our discussions. I met Jean-Ulrick through my good friend, Yvette Robertson, who I interviewed in Episode 31. Jean-Ulrich and I chat for quite a while in this episode, but Jean-Ulrick had so many gems that I kept most of it. Our conversation includes how language can reconfigure one's brains, the function of art titles, and thinking about art as healing. I hope you enjoy it.

Links Mentioned:

• Jean-Ulrick's Website
• Jean-Ulrick's Unrealized Haitian Pavilion Project
• My interview with Yvette Robertson
• Wrapped Reichstag
• Okwui Enwezor
• Josephine Baker
• James Baldwin
• Post-black Art
• Thelma Golden reflecting on Post-black
• Infinite Island: Contemporary Caribbean Art at the Brooklyn Museum
• Zwarte Piet
• Charlemagne Péralte
• Martin Puryear
• The Invasion of Haiti in 1915
• Zanele Muholi
• W. E. B. Du Bois

Follow Seeing Color:

• Seeing Color Website
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram

Hey everyone. I hope you are doing well. I am trying to enjoy the summer the best I can by avoiding groups of people. I have been doing a lot of reading these past few weeks, which has been nice. I also spoke with Tereneh last week, a previous guest on the show, who is thinking of starting her own podcast with a few friends which I am looking forward to listening to. Shoutout to Tereneh! Check out my chat with Tereneh on Episode 8, which seemed so long ago.

Speaking of long ago, I have been thinking a lot about my own process in getting my episodes out since the beginning. When I started recording 2 years ago, I was in Pittsburgh for the summer and about to leave for Germany. I decided to record as much as I could before my flight to Berlin, giving me time to see what my habits were in the process of interviewing others and finding my own voice in the process. I figured if I could get around 26 interviews, I would have a year of material for a bi-weekly podcast. I ended up with 28 episodes and released my first episode on September of 2018. Of course, this meant I had a huge backlog of material that was not always current which I slowly worked through, with some episodes continually getting pushed back as I proceeded interviewing new people while in Europe. Since my classes have ended for the summer, I had the time to go deeper into my archives and listen to older interviews, one of which I am releasing this week.

So for today, I am interviewing Celeste C. Smith, a co-founder and current board member of 1Hood, a collective of artists and activists who utilize art as a means of raising awareness around issues affecting oppressed people in the region and around the world. Celeste is also the current Program Officer for Arts and Culture at The Pittsburgh Foundation, a position she just started when I interviewed her. Celeste is a graduate of Chatham University and has served on the Transformative Arts Process Advisory Board at The Heinz Endowments, the Pittsburgh Symphony Community Advisory Council and the Greater Pittsburgh Arts Council Equity in Arts Funding Research Committee. I visited Celeste at her office in Downtown Pittsburgh, which is located in a literal glass castle designed by Philip Johnson, who is most famous for his Glass House in New Canaan, Connecticut. Celeste and I chatted about her many projects at the intersection of art and activism, self-care, building support for the youth, and knowing your self-worth. I regret it has taken this long, but after listening through, I felt Celeste's words still resonate strongly, if not more, today. I will have another older episode next time as well. Thank you Celeste for your patience. I hope everyone enjoys this.

Links Mentioned:

• Celeste Smith
• My interview with Tereneh
• Pamela Lawton
• 1Hood Media
• This Week With Jasiri X
• Portrayal And Perception Two Audits Of News Media Reporting On African American Men And Boys
• The Nefertiti Alliance
• The Legacy Arts Project
• The Shyne Awards
• Nia Arrington
• Youth Power Collective
• Sun Fest Pittsburgh
• Blak Rapp M.A.D.U.S.A.
• Brittney Chantele

Follow Seeing Color:

• Seeing Color Website
• Subscribe on Apple Podcasts
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram