02-07-2024

Obviously, since Gwylène is in France (and broke a leg), whatever it takes two to do around the house and in the studios, now must be done by one person only!

Not really true – I do not do so much around the house or spend enough time in the studio to account for the slow pace of the diary, these days! Priorities are shifting presently. Besides a more focused concentration on the Tale and the start of a kitchen cabinets project for Bill Carson, I sense a growing physical challenge. I now understand that, as Jim Campbell’s mother would tell her son: save some strength for tomorrow. That is what I do!

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For the last two days, TINYisPOWERFUL has been present at a State of the South Enterprise Conference: 4 very diverse artists, among 60 small business entrepreneurs! I personally have tried to stir the pot a bit, and gotten more vocal about the indispensable  presence of art in life. Art and the Spirit of the Arts, in/with community, that is.

Now, I am trying to come up with a set of key phrases and words, to be proposed as  powerpoints, at the start of the Question/Relay session we are leading at 6:30 tonight.

Here it is:

TYNYisPOWERFUL

Collective of in/with community artists

To promote the arts and the spirit of the art

Intentionally Intergenerational – Interracial – Local

QUESTION/RELAY process

Not a TedTalk

A Dialogue designed to prioritize listening over cross-talking

A game of musical chairs:

Question – Answer – Question – Answer – Question …

At TINYisPOWERFUL, we trust that Transformation and Liberation – Change, that is – are collective quests for the individual good of each of us as social beings, and for our sense of Belonging.

Things have gone pretty well so far. We were well prepared and everyone was on their best behavior. It seems that participants to the Booklet session, from their feedback to the general attendance, appreciated the spirit, the free spirit of the exercise. As far as I was concerned, other workshops were typical of this kind of conferences. They had to do with non-profits, business plans, business loans or such … and were led by a male! Mostly men also reported to the general attendance. In our case, Victoria was our fierce leader and spokesperson. She invited me to add some words to hers: I proposed that, at the next State-of-the-South conference, there be 2 artists per business session!

02-08-2024

… And then, there was the Question/Relay! … at the State-of-the-South Conference that is. I need to go back to it!

That is where TINYisPOWERFUL hit the emotional button of many of the business folks in the room. We did well there, because we brought exactly what the room needed: a (re)turn to our common humanity. At one point or an other, everyone in the room must have wondered what had happened to the semblance of normalcy required for a conference on business to be conducted successfully! How unusual that there be deep listening, profound self-questioning, some tiers, in such an attentive room, for such an extended time? … Then it was over (still too soon) … Several participants, however, asked us to bring our community tools to their next professional gatherings. Professional does not mean dehumanized or dehumanizing, we said over and over during the conference. Now, the trick will be to find a clean way to sell our Q/R art tools, our humanizing lotion!

02-13-2024

Unfortunately, yesterday afternoon was yet an other potentially dehumanizing experience – at the Union Pier community advisors meeting!

At my sub-group table, at the end of the session, before the notes for each group were posted on a wall, I had to insist that my statement: ‘the economy must work for the people and not the people for the economy’, appear in the notes. This was a minority position obviously, a statement of principle which would have been drowned otherwise! But insisting also helped me to clarify, in my own mind, how the notion of consensus, in fact, erases minority positions. I obviously was not taken very seriously, until I offered that I had lived in Charleston for the last 40 years and opened Fast&French! Ah, then, at least three people gave me a thumbs-up. One even said: Well done, sir! This changed the dynamics. It is getting me ready for the next meeting where I intend to be even more vocal. Mostly, I think I will point out that, although, originally, respect for the History of Union Pier was at the heart of the project, this time, economy is the central concern… But what if there are burial grounds under the asphalt of Union Pier? Shouldn’t we conduct a Cultural Impact Study before the development starts?

All this, hopefully, will be part of my use of activism as a big part of Art in/with community. For this, I must thank Victoria for having brought Marcus into the TINYisPOWERFUL fold. And I thank Marcus himself for being so matter-of-fact about it all.