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M I S S I O N
Insight Arts is a contemporary arts organization dedicated to increasing access to cultural work that supports progressive social change. Our unique organizational model allows us to engage in community based, regional and national work. We organize our work around three core values:
1. Access to information, education and art is a basic human right.
2. Meaningful social change is dependent on the creation of cooperative social and political structures.
3. Time for contemplation and analysis is crucial to community and individual empowerment.
These values have facilitated the development of an organization with three main areas of cultural work:
a. offering free arts education classes to youth and adults,
b. presenting regular performances, exhibitions and other special events related to our core values and
c. providing rehearsal space and administrative support for a wide variety of performance collectives and artist projects.
insightartsliberation.org
info@insightartsliberation.org
E V E N T S
The Official Insight Arts Calendar
Insight Arts
De la Memoria a la Resistencia - Tuesday, June 30
Insight Arts invites you to a special event!
H.I.J.O.S. (Sons and Daughters for Identity and Justice against Forgetfulness and Silence) will be presenting "De la Memoria a la Resistencia. Por la vida de nuestros héroes y mártires / From Memory to Resistence. For the lives of our heroes and martyrs."
Tuesday, June 30
7 PM
The Center for New Possibilities
1505 W Morse Ave
For more information please contact Jhonathan F. Gómez at (773) 412 0746
Imagining a Healthy Economy - Thursday, June 25
INSIGHT ARTS INVITES YOU TO COME SHARE YOUR IDEAS IN AN ONGOING DISCUSSION OF THE CURRENT ECONOMIC CRISIS
IMAGINING A HEALTHY ECONOMY
Please come and help us imagine a healthier global economy. This month we are specifically focusing on efforts to stimulate and stabilize the economy via federal stimulus funds.
Who are these funds targeting?
How will they help working class communities like East Rogers Park?
Is this crisis an opportunity to rebuild our economic structures in ways that are more fair and less cruel?
Gihan Perea Executive Director of the Miami Workers Center is feeling "not stimulated" by the stimulus funds. CLICK HERE to read "Not Stimulated (Part 1)."
Deepak Bhargava and Sally Kohn from Center for Community Change argue that many Americans suffered economic hardship prior to the current crisis. CLICK HERE to read "Our Economic Woes May Be Bad - But They Aren't New."
This is a FREE event!
Thursday, June 25
7:30 to 8:30 PM
The Center for New Possibilities
1505 W Morse Ave.
Imagining a Healthy Economy will take place every fourth Thursday of the month. For more information send an email to info@insightartsliberation.org.
Creatively Engaging in Social Movements - Saturday, June 27
SATURDAY, JUNE 27, 2009 FROM 6 TO 8 PM
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago
Sharp Building (37 S Wabash), Room 404
Admission is FREE and open to the public.
Please RSVP by Friday, June 26 to info@insightartsliberation.org
“Creatively Engaging in Progressive Social Movements: Critical and Meaningful Lenses on Immigration” is a forum bringing together the dynamic work of award winning documentary filmmaker Marcela Morán, the Latino Union of Chicago and immigration activists and artists in a discussion on im/migration and how artists contribute to the struggle.
Casa del Migrante is a documentary short dealing with human rights violations toward Central American migrants traveling through Mexico. At Casa del Migrante Nazareth, a migrant shelter in the border town of Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, Mexico, we hear first hand accounts of the migrant’s plight. Through interviews we learn about the migrants’ travels to the US/Mexico border, their encounters with Mexican authorities, and their hopes and dreams for a future in the United States. Central American migrants report being in constant danger; many report abuses committed by Mexican authorities during their journey. “Casa Del Migrante” was shot entirely in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, Mexico, the Mexican border city that not long ago fell victim to a surge of drug related violent crimes. (10 minutes, Morán).
The screening of Morán's film, "Casa del Migrante," will follow a roundtable discussion about im/migration issues including routes of migration, the Casa del Migrante in Latin America, and immigrant struggles from local to global perspectives.
Panelists will include local Chicago activists and artists including Jhonathan F. Gómez, Father Claudio Holzer, Luis Juarez, Marcela Morán, Nicole Marroquin and Juan R. Villalobos. A Q&A with Morán will also follow the screening.
The forum is a collaborative project presented by Insight Arts and the Latino Union of Chicago. This event is co-sponsored by the Department of Art Education at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
For more information call (773) 338-5933
Women Out Loud - Friday, June 26
CAROL NG-HE & MARCELA MORáN
Women Out Loud! the longest running open mic in Chicago is a nurturing space for women and women-identified writers and performers to share work. Following the open mic on June 26 are featured guests, performance artist Carol Ng-He and filmmaker Marcela Morán.
Born and raised in Hong Kong, Carol Ng-He is a Chicago-based interdisciplinary artist and art educator. She received a Master’s degree of Arts in Art Education from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a Bachelor’s degree in Arts from Columbia College Chicago. Carol has exhibited and performed locally including Hyde Park Art Center, Jane Addams-Hull House Museum, Koehnline Museum of Art at Oakton Community College, Woman Made Gallery, Effe Leven Gallery, Mess Hall, Links Hall, and the Duncan YMCA Chernin Center for the Arts in Chicago. In her interdisciplinary art practices, Carol explores the hybridity of cultural life, and interactivity of human intellectual exchange across time, space, and imagination.
Carol is featured on Chicago Artists Resource. Her publications include Silk Road Theatre Project’s Alternative Cultural Education and Stepping In and Out: Performance Art in the Community College ESL Curriculum on Community Arts Network, as well as Reflection on the Role of Artists: A Case Study on the Hidden Visual Curriculum of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, in Teaching Artists Journal (Volume 6, Number 4). She was a recipient of the Sumasil Foundation grant 2005-2006. As a teaching artist, Carol freelances at the Silk Road Theatre Project. Currently she teaches at Columbia College Chicago, Roosevelt University, and Oakton Community College.
Marcela Morán is an award-winning filmmaker and educator. She is an Assistant Professor of Communication at Texas A&M International University in Laredo, Texas and has been leading Media Del Monte, a summer youth media-training institute in rural South Texas, since 2007. Morán earned a BS in Radio/TV/Film from the University of Texas at Austin, and an MFA in Film from Ohio University. She is a border woman, raised on the US/Mexico border in Laredo, Texas and Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, México where she currently resides. Her work deals with migration/immigration, border landscape and bicultural issues. She is currently working on two documentary projects dealing with a network of five immigrant shelters in Latin America, Casas de Migrantes, (three in Mexico and two in Guatemala), run by Scalabrini missionaries.
Morán's latest production, Audiencia, will be screened during Women Out Loud!
Synopsis:
Audiencia is a short film about the underground Lucha Libre scene in Laredo, Texas focusing on the audience's participation at the venues. Mexicans from both sides of the border speak passionately about their favorite sport and what it means to be part of the audience.
Come and share your words, and/or just take a break from the week’s work woes and listen to fabulous women writers/performers read/do spoken word/sing. As always, men are welcome to applaud and cheer! $5 suggested donation, $3 for open mic participants.
Women Out Loud!
Friday, June 26, 2009
7 to 9 PM
The Center for New Possibilities
1505 W Morse Ave
Chicago, IL 60626
Queering the Night - Friday, June 12
FEATURING LOUIE PASCASIO & LOVIEN 'JOEY' FLORES!
The Center for New Possibilities
Friday, June 12, 2009
1505 W Morse Ave
7 to 9 PM
On June 12, in celebration of Philippine national day, Queering the Night features Louie Pascasio and Lovien 'Joey' Flores.
Louie Pascasio is a theater artist whose work revolves around directing, music composing and on some rare occasions, writing for the stage. He's been involved with theater for as long as his gray hair has seen the light of day. He has directed plays for PETA (Philippine Educational Theater Association), Pintig Cultural Group, CIRCA, Bindlestiff Studio and Asian AIDS Project in San Francisco. He is currently the Executive Director for CIRCA Pintig. He works at the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools.
Joey is excited to take the centerstage as a writer. While a closet poet, she is one of CIRCA Pintig's favorite actors and was last seen as Charlie at its May 2008's production of Short Acts 2. Her acting credits also include Caregiver and Mirrors Remembered for Open Wound, Manimal Crackers for Short Acts 1, Dreamweavers, and Sister Outlaw. She will be reading original work as well as performing memorable stage roles.
At the open mic, artists may share work that deal with race, class, gender, immigration, and other serious issues that contextualize a queer identity, but may also talk about family, love, relationships, sex, and other experiences that make for a full and exciting existence in a terribly homophobic world. We're excited to have Xan Sutton back as QTN's hostess extraordinaire.
Imagining a Healthy Economy - Thursday, May 28
INSIGHT ARTS INVITES YOU TO COME SHARE YOUR IDEAS IN AN ONGOING DISCUSSION OF THE CURRENT ECONOMIC CRISIS
IMAGINING A HEALTHY ECONOMY
Please come and help us imagine a healthier global economy. This month we are specifically focusing on the US based non-profit sector. The recent crisis in the global economy is having a particularly deadly effect on US based non-profit organizations.
What are the effects on our efforts to build social justice movements with so many organizations facing cutbacks and dissolution?
What are the effects on working class and poor communities ability to access important services?
"The Nation" recently published "The Perfect Storm" by Eyal Press in its March 30, 2009 edition. The article examines the non-profit crisis. We will reference this article in the discussion.
CLICK HERE to read "The Perfect Storm."
This is a FREE event!
Thursday, May 28
7:30 to 8:30 PM
Center for New Possibilities
1505 W Morse Ave
Chicago, IL 60626
Imagining a Healthy Economy will take place every fourth Thursday of the month. For more information send an email to info@insightartsliberation.org.
Women Out Loud! - Friday, May 22
F E A T U R I N G
BEA RODRIGUEZ & EMILY BIENEK
Insight Arts presents Women Out Loud! an open mic for women and women-identified writers/poets/performers that happens every fourth Friday of the month, 7-9 pm at the Center for New Possibilities on 1545 W. Morse. Women Out Loud! is a venue where women can spit fiery words in a nurturing space, and men are welcome to applaud and cheer.On May 22 Women Out Loud! features Bea Rodriguez & Emily Bienek. Born and raised in the Philippines, Bea now lives in Chitown, where she is celebrating her Saturn Return and looking forward to the summer. Her poetry (English and Tagalog) and short stories have been published in Manila. Pronouncing, her first script, won WILDsound Film's First One-Page Screenplay Contest in the US.
Emily Bienek is an artist currently working on raising public awareness about the HIV/AIDS crisis in South Africa through Ubuntu Designs. The term "Ubuntu" means "I am me because you are you" in Xhosa, one of the most commonly-spoken languages in South Africa. It is one of the many Xhosa words for "community." Emily will be facilitating workshops to design stencil designs for Ubuntu apparel while providing understanding about the HIV/AIDS crisis in South Africa. Works will be showcased at Women Out Loud!
Come and share your words, and/or just take a break from the week’s work woes and listen to fabulous women writers/performers read/do spoken word/sing. Open mic starts at 7 pm and is followed by the featured writer. $5 suggested donation, $3 for open mic participants.
The CENTER FOR NEW POSSIBILITIES located at 1505 W Morse Avenue, is a space coordinated by Insight Arts, a contemporary arts organization dedicated to increasing access to cultural work that supports progressive social change. Our unique organizational model allows us to engage in community based, regional and national work.