| Year Six 2005-06
Some of the highlights include a commissioned documentary on women
from Chiapas, a dance performance by Palestinian youth,
and teen art exhibitions and recording sessions. In May, VBB will
present its fourth Words for Peace, an annual
event through which issues of global peace are explored: this year
VBB is flying in writer and activist Anthony Arnove to
kick off dramatic readings from Voices of a People’s
History, a book he co-authored with Howard Zinn. Valiente,
our biennial award will be given to writer Farnoosh Moshiri,
an Iranian exile who has written extensively against the Iranian
regime.
Antzetik lom tulan chi’x yayic: Women with Strong
Blood
Dir. Arie Hidalgo, Mexico. 2005. 52 minutes. Color.
Bush’s Beans presents Mariachi MECA
Sunday, October 2, 2005, 7:00 PM
General admission: $5 (no one turned away)
DiverseWorks
Antzetik lom tulan chi’x yayic: Women with
Strong Blood is centered on the testimonials of
indigenous women from Chiapas, Mexico and features a documentary
(commissioned by VBB) produced by San Cristobal resident Arie
Hidalgo and Colombian immigrant Carolina
Herrera. Also included in this program are: a
talk by anthropologist and activist Christine Kovic,
co-editor of Women of Chiapas; famous Mariachi
MECA under the direction of Alan Arce; arts
and crafts from Chiapan women on display and for
sale; and snacks and refreshments by Cinia Gonzalez. Strong
Blood is curated by Arie Hidalgo, Carolina Herrera,
Sehba Sarwar, and Oskar Sonnen. This event is cosponsored
by DiverseWorks and Multi-Cultural
Education and Counseling through the Arts (MECA) |
Haiti: The Untold Story (53 minutes, color)
Directed by: Kevin Pina (Flashpoints correspondent
and filmmaker)
Thursday, November 3, 2005, 7:30PM
General admission: $5 (no one turned away)
The Black Labrador Pub: 4100 Montrose, Houston (77006)
Since the forced ousting of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide,
thousands of followers of his Lavalas Family political party
have been killed, forced into hiding or exile, jailed and
hunted down by the US-installed government of Gerard Latortue.
All of this occurred under the watchful eyes of the “international
community.” This documentary is but a small glimpse
into recent events in Haiti that tell the untold side of
the story. Kevin Pina will be present for
the screening! This show is cosponsored by the Black
Labrador Pub and KPFT Pacifica Radio 90.1 FM. |
IBDAA: Palestinian Youth
Friday, November 11, 2005, 7PM
General admission: $20 general, $15 students, $10 children/seniors/
Free for Katrina Survivors
Texas Southern University
Granville M. Sawyer Auditorium
Ibdaa is an internationally acclaimed Palestinian
dance troupe composed of youth from the Dheisheh refugee
camp in Palestine. Ibdaa's renowned dance troupe of ten boys
and ten girls has performed in festivals and events in Palestine
and more than ten countries around the world. Through traditional
folkloric dance and theater, the troupe depicts the history
and aspirations of Palestinian refugees. Proceeds benefit
Ibdaa Cultural Center in Dheisheh. This show is cosponsored
by Arab Voices, ADC-Houston, The Arab-American Cultural and
Community Center (ACC), Free Press Houston, and Palestine
American Council. |
Lee High School Artists: Recording
Session
Friday, December 9, 2005, 3:15 pm
General admission: Free (reservations required)
Lee
High School
Recording Session is a culmination to a Fall Lee High School
after-school workshop that incorporated , visual art, writing
and music. The workshop will be led by Dave Dove (Deep
Listening Institute Director), Leslie Hewitt (Core
member, Glassell School of Art), Jason Jackson (Deep
Listening Institute student) and writer Sehba Sarwar (VBB
Founding Director). During the two months of working together,
students who engage in a variety of improvisational exercises
will present their final work at an open recording session. This
project is made possible in part by the After-School Initiative
(ASI) and is cosponsored by Lee High School and Deep Listening
Institute Houston. ASI is collaboration between the Education
Foundation of Harris County and Harris County Department
of Education’s CASE (Cooperative for After-School Enrichment)
division. |
Haiti: Harvest of Hope (1998,
57 min) and
Haiti: The Untold Story (2005, 53 min)
Double screenings of Kevin Pina’s
documentaries
Friday, January 13 and Saturday, January 14, 2006
Admission: $5.00 (no one turned away)
Addisaba Ethiopian Restaurant, 7668 De Moss Drive,
Houston (77036)
Two of Kevin Pina’s insightful documentaries
about Haiti will be served along with delicious Ethiopian
food. Haiti: Harvest of Hope is the quintessential
primer for understanding the roots of the current crisis
in Haiti. The film dramatically captures seminal moments
in the history of Jean-Bertrand Aristide and the Lavalas
movement that swept him into the presidency in December 1990.
The second screening for the night is Pina’s new documentary Haiti:
The Untold Story (previously screened on November 3,
2005), about Haiti after the ousting of Aristide in 2004. Cosponsored
by La Nouvelle Generation. |
Thirteenth Annual Iranian Film Festival
Presented by the Museum
of Fine Arts, Houston and Rice Cinema and
co-sponsored by VBB
January 20 - February 12, 2006
Admission: Visit www.mfah.org for schedule details
and links
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Rice Cinema, and
the Children's Museum of Houston
Making Houston a part of a North American circuit showcasing
highly-touted Iranian national cinema, the 13th Annual Houston
Iranian Film Festival will span four weekends with screenings
of more than 20 films at The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston;
Rice Cinema; and the Children's Museum of Houston. Programming
will feature new and recent dramatic features, documentaries,
personal appearances, and an animated children's film. This
Festival is also cosponsored by The Asia Society Texas. |
Dosti 2006: A Forum on Peace and Development
in South Asia
Presented by Dosti and co-sponsored by VBB
Sunday, January 22, 2006 3:00-7:30 pm
Admission: Free but registration required (http://www.pakindiadosti.org/)
Grand Hall, Ley Student Center, Rice
University
Dosti 2006 is an occasion for Pakistanis, Indians and people
of all nationalities to come together and work for peace.
This year is the third such gathering and VBB’s Displaced
Corps performance group along with musicians from
Houston’s Deep Listening Institute will
present the opening act. The performance aims to be in sync
with Dosti’s vision: to create a space where people
come together to talk about peace and harmony in South Asia.
This year, Dosti will focus on exploring the positive impact
peace can have on economic and social development. Dinner
will be served. Dosti 2006 is also cosponsored by the
Association of Pakistani Physicians of North America, the
Association for India's Development, and Rice University's
South Asian Society. |
Bellaire High School Students: 3 Dangerously
Cool Artists
February 17 – March 17, 2006
OPENING RECEPTION: Friday, February 17, 2006, 7:00 – 9:00
pm
Admission: Free
VBB Shotgun House, 2519 Holman
3 Dangerously Cool Artists is the first group show
by young visual artists who attend Bellaire High School. Alyssa
K. Barrineau, Nuria Bravo, and David
Mendoza work in a variety of mediums. Between the
three, the work focuses on structural concerns such as composition,
form, and lighting; emotional concerns rendered from a personal
language; and the intersections of popular and high art trends. |
South Asian Writers Speak: Women, War
and Trauma
Presented by South
Asia Institute and Center for Women and Gender Studies,
University of Texas at Austin; cosponsored by VBB
Wednesday, March 8, 2006, 2:00-5:00 pm
Admission: Free
WCH building, 4th floor, Meyerson Room, UT-Austin, Austin,
TX
In honor of International Women’s Day, a group of
six South Asian writers (from Pakistan, India and Bangladesh)
will present a talk and readings to students at the University
of Texas – Austin on the role of women in literature
in times of war and trauma. The six writers, Sorayya
Khan, Waqas Khwaja, Mahmud
Rahman, Alka Roy, Sehba
Sarwar and Ilona Yusof offer a
wide spectrum of perspectives on living through wartime and
trauma, either in their native countries or abroad. The topics
will range from partition narratives to natural disasters
(like the recent earthquake in northern India and Pakistan
and the effects of these moments on the female population,
domestic violence, religious intolerance, and ethnic and
economic exploitation of women). All writers will also present
a panel at the Association of Writers and Writing Programs
convention the following day in the Austin Convention Center. |
Hardly Soft: a mixed media
installation
Anila Quayyum Agha & Marie Weichman
March 24 – April 28, 2006
OPENING RECEPTION: Friday, March 24, 2006, 6:00 – 9:00
pm
Admission: Free
VBB Shotgun House, 2519 Holman, Houston (77004)
Both Marie Weichman and Anila Quayyum
Agha have their art practices steeped in socially
compelling works based on identity and gender roles. Agha
states: “My current works are a series of collaged
drawings that incorporate a combination of translucent
and opaque effects on paper, representing the many facets
of women in the abstract. The end result of my use of the
stylistic overlapping of form, color, and patterning is
that of a therapeutic encounter with a sublime excess.” Weichman
has created a response to Agha’s work to “make
parallels and construct differences that result from our
environment, circumstances and upbringing alongside genetics,” thereby
taking dialogue a step further to “find these differences
endearing and enlightening, making me understand the importance
of diversity within this so called humanity.” |
2006 Valiente Award: FARNOOSH MOSHIRI
Friday, March 31, 2006, 6:00-900 pm
Admission: tickets start at $50
House of Linda Marroquin
Valiente is a VBB biennial event honoring artists who take
risks in their work to speak out on social justice issues.
This year’s Valiente (courage) Award goes to writer Farnoosh
Moshiri. Born in a literary family in Tehran, Iran,
Moshiri received degrees from the College of Dramatic Arts
of Tehran, the University of Iowa and the University of Houston.
She is the author of the novels Against Gravity (just
released), The Bathhouse, and At the Wall of
the Almighty and a collection of short stories, The
Crazy Dervish and the Pomegranate Tree. Among the many
literary awards she has received are the Barthelme Memorial
Fellowship, the Barbara Deming Fiction Award for Peace and
Social Justice and two consecutive Black Heron Press Awards
for Social Fiction. Moshiri fled Iran in 1983 after a massive
arrest of secular intellectuals, feminists, and political
activists. She resided in Houston from 1987 to 2003 and is
currently an associate professor of English at Syracuse University
in New York. The gathering, held at the home of Linda Marroquin
will include a talk on immigration issues by Lee
High School students, music from youth and the director
of the Deep Listening Institute and delectable
refreshments.
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Cultural Narrative: David Barsamian
Thursday, April 13, 2006
Admission: $5.00 (no one turned away)
Artery
David Barsamian is director of Alternative
Radio, the award-winning internationally syndicated program
which airs in Houston on KPFT Pacifica Radio 90.1 FM, on
Wednesdays at 2PM. Over the years, Barsamian has written
book-length interviews with many well-known activists such
as Arundhati Roy: The Checkbook & the Cruise Missile,
Tariq Ali: Speaking of Empire and Resistance, and
Noam Chomsky: Imperial Ambitions. Barsamian has
written Louder than Bombs and The Decline & Fall
of Public Broadcasting. He is the winner of the Upton
Sinclair Award for independent journalism and the 2006 Democracy
Media Award. An internationally celebrated activist and a
powerful speaker, Barsamian will speak on “Another
World is Possible: People Power in the Age of Empire.” This
event is co-sponsored by the Artery. |
Gulf Coast (dis)placed
Presented by Houston
I-Fest and cosponsored by Voices Breaking Boundaries
Sunday, April 23, 2006, 5pm-6pm
Gulf Coast (dis)placed) features writers from Houston's
Displaced Corps: Leslie Guana, Vivek Mittal, John
Pluecker, Sehba Sarwar and Nicole Zaza who
will reading selections from their work. Displaced New Orleans
musicians David and Roselyn will present jazz/folk/blues
music. This show is curated by John Pluecker, a recipient
of an Individual Artist Grant Award. This grant is funded
by the City of Houston through the Cultural Arts Council
of Houston/Harris County. |
Words for Peace 4:Dramatic Reading of Voices
of a People's History
Sunday, May 7, 2006, 7:00 pm
Admission: $5.00 (no one turned away)
DiverseWorks
A dynamic multi-media event that features local artists/activists
rendering a dramatic version of Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove’s Voices
of a People’s History of the United States. Artists
include: Paula Anicete, Hitaji Aziz, Duane
Bradley, City Council Member Ada Edwards, Chuck
Jackson, Autumn Knight, Vivek
Mittel, John Pluecker, Sehba
Sarwar, Anita Wadhwa, Chris
Nevarez and Irma Estrada from Lee
High School and Colbe Beaver and Khefren
Savannah from Community Builders Cadre. Event includes
talk by Anthony Arnove, author of Iraq:
The Logic of Withdrawal and telephone introduction by Howard
Zinn. After-party on the dock features open mic
and poetry performed by E-Quality, graffiti
art by Hyroglifx Koncepts, capoeira by Grupo
de N'Golo, music by Free Radicals,
home-made delectables by Nusrat Malik, and
much more. Tabling by numerous organizations including Jovenes
Immigrantes Por un Futuro Mejor (Immigrant Youth for a Better
Future) and the Organization of Chinese
Americans. This event is cosponsored by DiverseWorks and KPFT
Pacifica Radio 90.1 FM.
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