Kind morning /Բարի լույս* to you, dear neighbors, artists, collaborators, community partners, co-conspirators, supporters of arts in Skid Row and of doodles without borders,
*the morning greeting in Armenian translates as “kind morning” (բարի լույս [baree looys])
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HIGHLIGHTS in and near SKID ROW, December 2023
Some neighborhood events, celebrations, and parties to join
1) Thur, Nov 30 10a-3p – #NotAnotherLoss National METH AWARENESS DAY – Community Resource Fair @ General Jeff/Gladys Park (808 E 6th St, Skid Row), multi-group collab led by UCEPP
2) Fri, Dec 1, 7pm: Four Movie Shorts – MOVIE NIGHT at Skid Row Museum (250 S Broadway)
3) Sun, Dec 10, 10:30a-4pm – Re/Sound by Street Symphony @ 677 Imperial St, 90021
4) Fri, Ded 15, 6pm: Holiday Party by LA Poverty Department @ Skid Row Museum
5) Sat, Dec 16: 12-4pm: A Holiday Called Home by Urban Voices @ Inner-City Arts (720 Kohler St)
6) Mon, Dec 25, 10a-12noon: Christmas Carol Crawl by Urban Voices in Skid Row neighborhood
7) >>>For Skid Row neighborhood centering YEAR END/ HOLIDAY PARTIES NOT YET FINALIZED stay tuned with (a) Peace and Healing Center, (b) LACAN, (c) UCEPP
Here you can find a Printable/Online Monthly Skid Row Calendar of some arts and community activities in and around Skid Row neighborhood.
ONGOING
Thur-Sat, 2-5pm from Sept 16th to Dec 18th: Enough is (never) Enough: Hard Truths and the People Who Live Them. On exhibit at Skid Row Museum (250 S. Broadway).
MARK YOUR CALENDAR
2024: Year of rootedness in art, creativity, and community as liberatory and grounding practices, especially through crises. Year of saying the unsaid things; seeing politeness and charity for the grotesque oppressive violence they can hide behind them, and casting them aside in favor of kindness and solidarity.
THOUGHTS ALOUD
#NotAnotherLoss is a hashtag that will be used in the upcoming Meth Awareness Day, but the words carry beyond the struggle against overdosing, to struggles against dispossession, oppression, banishment, and mur/er: be it economic, ethnic, racial, gender, or social. From Skid Row to Palestine, from Congo to Kurdistan, from Artsakh to Turtle Island and beyond.
All these as life affirming struggles FOR collective liberation.
dwb ONLINE:
1) Doodles without Borders (dwb) is now on Instagram / Facebook.
2) There is a monthly dwb Skid Row Community & Arts Calendar. If you do community strengthening work in Skid Row and know of an event/meeting that should be on there, please share.
3) Latest addition – dwb wishlist! You can find it here: bit.ly/dwbwishlist
Why support storage of Skid Row artist work?
Support Artwork Storage as a Human Right (and Collective Responsibility)
A shameless plug asking for your support of Community Arts Depot, a sister project addressing the vital need for artwork storage and access focused on Skid Row neighborhood members and residents.
Artwork Storage as a Human Right – a glimpse from the Community Arts Depot story.
UPDATE: We received a mini-grant from Skid Row Arts Alliance as well as a grant from CCI which will help to cover rent, insurance, and other expenses, many thanks to both groups!! And to all the individuals who have supported and continue to support us; we could not have gotten here without you!!! More details to come in the coming months, including possible additional resources we may be able to expand! We still continue to need support as this project’s sustainability is wholly dependent on grassroots support. To donate to the campaign click HERE!
Quote of the month:
[*Trigger warning*: discussion of neurodivergence, mental illness, madness outside dominant framing]
Today I am thinking about mental health. In every possible way. Collective and individual mental health. I just read/listened to “There is no revolution without Madness” and it made me mad about how the mainstream has stigmatized, pathologized conversations about madness, sanity, mental stress, trauma, neurodivergency (mental illness). My thinking comes from 15+ years of working alongside people who are neurodivergent / live with mental illness, close family members living with mental illness, etc. A part of the suffocating power of stigma that the whitestream/mainstream holds over us around mental illness is the appearance of inability to discuss the liberating aspects of understanding madness and sanity WITHOUT fetishizing or diminishing the real struggles of many people in our deeply ableist society.
With that, “Freedom exists outside Sanity. It will never be “sane” to negotiate your individual life for collective liberation. … We want sovereignty within our communities and lands that keep us peacefully. Such desires— kind stewardship— are interrupted, bulldozed, shot point blank, enslaved, tortured, maimed, brutalized, strung up and buried by the te//orist organizations called the nation-state. … Madness kisses us in our chapters of despair. … We are mad to survive in the face of imminent death and have been mad— through generations, through genocides, fast and slow. And so what? So what of the madness? If you surrender to the Mad, you can ride it.” – Ismatu Gwendolyn discussing Dr. La Marr Jurelle Bruce‘s “How to go mad without losing your mind” in her audio/essay titled “There is no Revolution without Madness”
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Community Artivism 