richardmurray

https://twitter.com/Hardcore888/status/1437089180090314752?s=04

for fans of the blade film , look at this 

It proves Blade was mismanaged and the lack of foresight by new line cinema which is in truth warner bros, is paralleled by warner bros. failures in total. The multiculturalism, the collective possibilites warner bros. had access to they snubbed with blade which had great possibilities in retrospect. 

in by July 2000, blade was second only to the original superman, that started the modern superhero film financial dominance era or the batman series of films which in retrospect was far more valuable than the superman franchise. 

in 2003, the daredevil movie with ben affleck, that many in media panned as a failure did as well as either of the blade movies... hmmm so daredevil from ben affleck was hard done by. Interesting how spider man financially is the king of marvel movies. I admit, I am not a fan of spider man . I don't hate the character but it isn't my first choice of comic book characters.

interesting how by 2008, spider man is showing itself is stewarded far better than superman or batman and shows the dominance of marvel's characters in film in general. 

2010, Interesting how batman has single handedly as a character saved DC in the film world and how batman is more closely like a marvel hero than the most popular dc hero collection 

2013, when marvel succeeded with the avengers and their long form of storytelling that provided a huge challenge to dc.. and dc hasn't recovered

by 2018, the original batman movie with michael keaton was still being watched? i find that odd. 

by 2019 what do you see? I know what I see. A genre started with the original superman film. A film about a aracial white male alien  with the most individual power, saving the world.  Has been replaced by two human rich white men who use their skills plus money to battle evil. An accidental hero in a teenager from fiscally humble origins, a black prince from a magical black kingdom that never dealt with modern history, a collection of superheroes representing various cultures or views saving the earth plus other worlds. 

The answer to shirley chisholm's question is yes

Some art to enjoy 

Here is the Dexterity test:) 

The sleeping princess, can you tell the story in the image? 
https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/DAStory-challenge-post-competitive-entry-892543224?ga_submit_new=10%3A1632227117

The Teleman- Issue #1 - gifcomic is linked in the description
https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Teleman-cover-page-892545782?ga_submit_new=10%3A1632228657

The ancient town of Dalila- what is going on!?:) 
https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/The-Ancient-Town-of-Dalila-892549276?ga_submit_new=10%3A1632231916

Microcalligraphy based on Kloir
https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Microcalligraphy-based-on-Kloir-892550129?ga_submit_new=10%3A1632232969
 
Dexterity Test - about 3 hours- I had to use my left hand, the right hand, it is over too quickly...:) 
https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Dexterity-Test-892551259?ga_submit_new=10%3A1632233707

Nurse Leechman - isn't she cute 
https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Ms-Leechman-PPPMonstercuties-892552269?ga_submit_new=10%3A1632234592
 
The Night Table- can you guess some of the references in my film noir short:) 
https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/The-Night-Table-892553358?ga_submit_new=10%3A1632235077
 

My reply

I noticed your prime comment under the video. You say many will disagree and that is of course online. But, I want to speak to that first before I state my position toward your video. 

A difference exists between a person of a certain race: gender/phenotype/religion/age/geographic lineage et cetera being employed as a thespian in comparison to said person's community being represented positively. 
As a black man, I heard a million media outlets spout overjoy with the existence of a highly paid thespian who is black. While they chagrin that the culture of black people <which is very large, just for edification includes black people of america/africa/asia/europe or all the lands within> is absent or a negative caricature. 
I know you are correct in your position. You are happy that asian statians <asian americans exists in jamaica/brazil/mexico not merely the usa> are getting opportunities to be paid thespians of the highest financial order in the film world. But, you are also unhappy that the asian statian experience is still rarely touted by the film wood in the usa. I know it is silly to say the people who disagree with you are wrong... but they are wrong.

Now, to my position, I thought about the world. No country in humanity , to my knowledge, has a film industry that respects the minority populaces<minority in terms of numbers> equal to the majority populace. so, in the USA the majority populace is the white anglo saxon protestant<are most people in the usa white? the answer is yes>. In china it is the han chinese<I know different communities exist in china but I read han chinese were the largest, if I am wrong correct me>. In the same way Asian statians are not presented as part of the USA fold in film media in the usa, usually, Ugyars are not usually represented in chinese film media. I am not saying anything is wrong or right as much as , it is uncommon for any visual industry to treat the minority communities as equal to the majority community.  
But, I realize a solution may exist to that problem. and it goes back to your point about cinema in india. I didn't realize india had various woods that seem to have a more equal standing to each other in india. The solution in the usa and I think everywhere is to have more varying woods. For example, the black community in the usa has made films since the time of oscar micheaux, but no one says, the Black Statian-Wood. It is black films, stateless/centerless from an industrial perspective. They are in the independent film wilderness. In the USA it is the hollywood scene or the independent scene. That has to change. The independent scene needs to stay, but the black, the asian, native american , and et cetera minority  communities need their own industrial film industries in the usa. In that way is the only way I think you can not only get thespians of all races but also positive representation in film in the usa to all races. 

Well... it is another Friday, another day to love, to Oxum, Oshun, Freya, or Venus, another day to Kizomba!
The routine from Steven and Rashida suffers from an awful camera person but they have some uncommon repititions or carries that are worth a look
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90TcJ-6VUGU

Some old tunes from the descended of enslaved black community in the usa 

PHoto is Valaida Snow

• 0:12:13 Delta Rhythm Boys in "Take the 'A' Train" (1941).
• 0:14:46 Fats Waller in "Your Feet's Too Big (1941).
• 0:17:45 Count Basie Orchestra in "Take Me Back, Baby" (with vocal by Jimmy Rushing) (1941).
• 0:20:19 "Preacher and the Bear" featuring The Jubalaires (vocal quartet)
• 0:23:23 "Ring Those Bells" (Black children vocal quintet, unidentified; Possibly The Cabin Kids.)
• 0:24:22 The Ali Baba Trio in "Patience and Fortitude" (1946) (featuring Valaida Snow singing and playing jazz trumpet with trio of guitar, bass and accordion!)
• 0:27:06 "Rocco Blues" featuring Maurice Rocco (piano and vocal)
• 0:30:00 Gloria Grey sings "Oh By Jingo" (looks later, circa 1950 or so)
• 0:32:42 "I Want A Man", sung by Annisteen Allen and accompanied by Lucky Millinder and his Orchestra (huge big band)(1943).
• 0:35:36 Woman jazz harpist (LaVilla Tulos) playing "Swanee River"

enjoy

George Clinton @ Sausalito Art Festival 2019
From ROnald Reed
photos: www.flickr.com/photos/ronwired/albums/72157670810291077

I still have my sun-man poster from the Olmec corporation. and I still have my original sunman with the pig villain guy:) 

MAttel adding sun man to he man is interesting, I wonder who owns the sun man rights , did any of the black people involved get anything? 

Title: Black Mermaids
Artist: Natasha Bowen - author of skin of the sea
Citation/link: QRcode

Well... it is another Friday, another day to love, to Oxum, Oshun, Freya, or Venus, another day to Kizomba! Ebo & Nana, I love how they chose semi public settings. Part to dance is the ability to do it when people are watching and Nana, to be honest, has a body that is noticeable. For the first 48 seconds this routine is all about her, slowly rolling into a crescendo; they then go into some nice little steps, they love popping don't they. from 1:08 to 1:13 is a very nice turn popping all the way; she never simply move to his guidance; she always add her own subtle movement into every place he guide her; i have not seen a female dancer be that consistent using that style. I think Ebo has to get stronger. In the end, his dip could had been better or ill chose; I think a half turn into a dip would had been better, not forced, like the regular.  

truth on the statian empire- I just love the fact that he is honest about the usa as an empire, I find so few, including Amanpour the interviewer seem unable to say the usa is an empire, like admitting it is a sin or some truth that if said destroys the peace in the world or something. 
amanpour with lawrence wilkerson 
https://edition.cnn.com/videos/tv/2021/09/10/amanpour-wilkerson-9-11.cnn 

NO TRanscript but I will try to remember

To Afghan women

“The Other Afghan Women” | Video | Amanpour & Company | PBS

Transcript

WELL, YOU KNOW, WHEN WE THINK ABOUT THE WAR IN AFGHANISTAN, WE TEND TO HAVE A VERY VAGUE IDEA OF IT, BUT IN FACT ON THE GROUND THE WAR IS ONLY FOUGHT IN PART OF THE COUNTRY AND THAT'S IN THE RURAL, SOUTHERN AFGHANISTAN, AND SO I WAS REALLY CURIOUS TO SEE WHAT WAS LIFE LIKE FOR PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN LIVING, IN SOME CASES THROUGH FOUR DECADES OF CONFLICT.

SO I DECIDED TO TRAVEL THIS SUMMER TO INTERVIEW DOZENS OF WOMEN TO TRY TO FIND OUT.

I'M JUST CURIOUS, HOW DID YOU FIND THESE WOMEN AND WERE THEY OPEN TO SPEAKING WITH YOU?

I KNOW YOU SPENT A SIGNIFICANT AMOUNT OF TIME WITH A WOMAN NAMED SHAKIRA, WHO SEEMS SURPRISED SHE SHARED HER NAME WITH ONE OF THE WORLD'S BIGGEST POP STARS.

MANY OF THESE WOMEN HAVE NOT MET FOREIGNERS.

SHAKIRA TOLD ME SHE HASN'T MET A FOREIGNER WHO WASN'T CARRYING A GUN.

SO THEIR ONLY EXPERIENCE WITH THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY IS THROUGH VIOLENCE, THE MILITARY.

SO IT WAS DIFFICULT FOR ME TO ACTUALLY MEET THEM AT FIRST.

I HAD TO GO THROUGH GRANDMOTHERS BECAUSE IN THESE VERY CONSERVATIVE, TRADITIONAL AREAS IT'S VERY UNUSUAL FOR MEN, UNRELATED MEN TO SPEAK WITH WOMEN, UNRELATED TO THE TALIBAN.

IT'S BEEN THIS WAY FOR A LONG TIME.

SO I FIRST MET WITH SOME GRANDMOTHERS AND THEY REFERRED ME TO OTHER PEOPLE AND EVERY SINGLE TIME I MET SOMEBODY, I ASK THEM, TELL ME YOUR LIFE STORY FROM THE BEGINNING.

WHEN THEY DID THAT, I WAS REALLY SHOCKED, EVEN AS SOMEBODY MYSELF WHO HAS BEEN COVERING THIS CONFLICT FOR A DECADE, I WAS SHOCKED BY THE LEVEL OF VIOLENCE THEY HAD SEEN.

WHETHER IT'S AIR STRIKES OR ROADSIDE BOMBS OR KIDNAPPINGS OR WHAT NOT.

YES, BECAUSE SO MUCH OF WAR, ESPECIALLY FOR THOSE THAT DON'T LIVE THROUGH IT, THE TOLD THROUGH THE LENS OF THE GOOD GUYS AND BAD GUYS.

ONE WOULD ASSUME OBVIOUSLY THAT THE GOOD GUYS WOULD BE THE AMERICANS AND ALLIES THAT COME IN AND SUPPORT THE AFGHAN ARMY AND IT'S NOT AS SIMPLE OF THAT.

THIS IS REALLY WHAT GETS TO THE CRUX OF YOUR PIECE HERE.

I WANT TO JUST READ ONE VERSE FROM IT.

YOU WRITE THE TALIBAN TAKEOVER HAS RESTORED ORDER TO THE CONSERVATIVE COUNTRYSIDE, WHILE PLUNGING THE LIBERAL STREETS OF KABUL INTO FEAR AND HOPELESSNESS.

THIS BRINGS TO LIGHT THE UNSPOKEN PREMISE OF THE PAST TWO DECADES.

IF U.S. TROOPS KEEP BATTLING THE TALIBAN IN THE COUNTRYSIDE, THEN LIFE IN THE CITIES COULD BLOSSOM.

THIS MAY HAVE BEEN A SUSTAINABLE PROJECT, BUT WAS IT JUST?

CAN THE RIGHTS OF ONE COMMUNITY DEPEND IN ON THE RIGHTS OF ANOTHER?

IS IT REALLY AS BINARY OF A CHOICE AS THIS?

DO THESE WOMEN FEEL THEIR LIVES ARE BEING SACRIFICED FOR THE LIVES AND FREEDOMS OF WOMEN IN LARGER CITIES?

YOU KNOW, EVERY SINGLE WOMAN I MET I ASKED THEM ABOUT WOMEN'S RIGHTS.

I SAID, YOU KNOW, THE UNITED STATES SAYS THAT ONE OF THE REASONS WHY THEY'VE INVADED AFGHANISTAN AND THEY SUPPORT THE AFGHAN GOVERNMENT IS TO BRING RIGHTS TO WOMEN

The question here is what makes a good biographical film in modernity?  Respect is structurally in the same model as biographical pictures from the 1960s and before. Starting in the 1970s with films like coal miners daughter, the biographical film became more tell all, more telenovela. Fans plus non fans liked paying for tickets to know all the details. The genious aretha show fits that modern model. Respect doesn't. But it is interesting, the word respect means to look again. From that view, Genious aretha is speculative, while Respect is respeculative. And I think that is what aretha wanted. 
You forgot to mention that they performed all the songs in the film. That is interesting. I think that reflects aretha franklins musicality, as someone who believed in the artists fine tuning themselves and making their craft, not using mechanical aids or copies or manipulations. 
So, Respect is what Aretha franklin wants, a second look, a more traditional look, a less gossipy look at her life. 
As for me, I want no public book or film or series or anything about my life, no matter what I do. 
video 

fire tutorial 

What else would you draw in a picture with a dragon?
I made a headless dragon for my idea, so my dragon was holding its head but I can also see a pearl or some objectanything can be held by a dragoneven luck  
What tutorial would you like to see next?
Anything is fine. The key for any artists is to look at competitions or tutorials as invitationals. Either invite the artists to create, so do so technique can always be judged but contentment is something the artist must learn to have to their work gardless what others say or do.  

https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Make-Fire-Tutorial-890526278?ga_submit_new=10%3A1630467215

Tutorial for a dragon

What story made you fall in love with fantasy?
difficult. The earliest fantasy tale I can think of is high john the conqueror or anansi. In my household my parents loved telling stories. the earliest I will say is, high john the conqueror. 
What dragon character is your favorite?
Well, what determines a dragon is complicated. Does a dragon need wings? need to have blood, can it be a robot? so, I will answer this question in parts. my favorite dragon from antiquity is the Dragon that Ra or Horus depending on the telling rides on the Nile. I love that blue color. My favorite dragon in cartoon world is smog in the rankin bass lord of the rings. The first film/live action dragon I saw was falcor and yes, I have to get to that museum in germany where you can ride him. My favorite dragon villain is... Mecha Godzilla, the original Toho or the modern. 
What tutorial would you like to see next?
For me, any. I see myself as a mature artists. I like the way I draw. I am satisfied. No artists can do it all. So, any tutorial is great. For me, I collect it all and maybe a story or two will come from them one day 
https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Make-a-dragon-tutorial-in-steps-890524814?ga_submit_new=10%3A1630465943

headless horseman dragon

https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Headless-Horseman-Dragon-890525581?ga_submit_new=10%3A1630466561

1960s fashionable dragon

https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/1960s-Fashionable-Dragon-890525831?ga_submit_new=10%3A1630466918

Happy 21st birthday, deviantart 

https://www.deviantart.com/hddeviant/art/Birthday-Deviant-Submission-890524465?ga_submit_new=10%3A1630465518

last poets- related to what

the last poets full album

Title: harriet tubman demon slayer cover

Artist: Derek Laufman

LINK

the mermaid storm
A LOWCOUNTRY LEGEND

‘The Mermaid Storm’ is a collaboration between painter Julyan Davis and poet Glenis Redmond, begun when Davis was artist-in-residence at the Gibbes Museum in Charleston, South Carolina (2018). 

The collaboration depict a narrative: that of the Cymbee, the Kongo Water spirit who crosses the Middle Passage, bearing witness to summoning events in the history of American slavery. The story depicts her capture, and Charleston’s subsequent Mermaid Riot. It culminates in the Cymbee’s place in the South today. The most recent product of this joint venture has been the creation of a vinyl record of Glenis’s poetry, recorded, produced and pressed at Asheville’s own Citizen Vinyl.

The project owes its inspiration to several historical studies on Afro-Christian Syncreticism and its reflection in folk and religious art, but primarily to Ras Michael Brown’s excellent ‘African-Atlantic Cultures and the South Carolina Lowcountry’ (Cambridge University Press 2012).

‘Simbi there. Cymbee here. Name her.
People of the Congo know her well.
Simbi’s spirit must be honored and fed
With each drink, food, dance and treasure.
Without ceasing, she finds reasons to mother.
Wrap her long arms around her people
Across either side of the deep Atlantic.’

Glenis Redmond (poem for Station X)

If the African slave could successfully smuggle one thing across the Middle Passage, it was their oldest faith. This heritage had survived Portuguese colonialism and would flourish in the Carolina Lowcountry, remnants of it enriching the hush harbors and lasting to this day. The Simbi, or water spirit, was not left behind.

As with so much in the New World, one culture would knot itself around another. The Kongo Simbi meshed with the white man’s mermaid. The resulting Cymbee was no variant of the decorative creature of Western Art, however, but remained an elemental force, and one to be feared and left alone at all costs. Provoke her wrath and the skies would darken. If captured, the water spirit of the Lowcountry had the power to draw hurricanes out of the Cape Verde waters, beckoning them to her rescue. The Simbi (or Carolina Cymbee) was a manifestation of outrage, existing to right the world’s balance through catastrophe.

‘The Mermaid Storm’ is an emancipation myth, but it also raises questions about the ways Christianity (whether Portuguese Catholicism in the Congo, or American Protestantism in the South) has disconnected mankind from nature.

Glenis Redmond travels the world as a Road Poet. She divides her time between two posts: as the Poet-in-Residence at The Peace Center for the Performing Arts in Greenville, SC, and at the State Theatre in New Brunswick, NJ.

She has served as the Mentor Poet for the National Student Poets Program. In both 2014- 2016 she prepared student poets to read at the Library of Congress, the Department of Education and for the First Lady, Michelle Obama at The White House. She traveled to Muscat, Oman to present poetry workshops and readings for Black History Month sponsored by the State Department.

Glenis is a Cave Canem Fellow and a North Carolina Literary Fellowship Recipient and a Kennedy Center Teaching Artist. She helped create the first Writer-in-Residence at the Carl Sandburg Home National Historic Site in Flat Rock, NC.

http://www.julyandavis.com/mermaid/

the Center for Disease control said today, the day this post was made, the sars-cov-2 virus which makes carriers exhibit the covid-19 disease , was not created in a laboratory or known by the chinese before the commonly called pandemic. 

I want to say more humans have died of hunger each year in my entire life than anything else, including wars or viruses so.. I wonder about the choice of pandemic for a virus effects on a populace.

Also I heard today in a show called firing line on the public broadcasting station, pbs, nyc from petraeus, a general in the usa military that most afghans in afghanistan want an end to the war or usa presence in afghanistan. So most afghans wanted the usa out. so the afghans fleeing the taliban are the minority that didn't want an end to the usa presence or didn't comprehend what an end to the usa presence means, but one way or the other, they are a minority. 

The question is, do minorities have rights? The rule of the people favors the majority populace of people. the rule of the people does not facor individualism or the individual. How can an individual's needs outweigh a group, how can the needs of a few outweigh the most? 

SATT Wars - Seat At The Table Wars 

I can not deny joy at any black person being paid by whites , when the black community does not control the industry they are being paid in. The USA film industry is primarily funded or administered by whites, it is a white industry. It is a white industry that employs blacks. But, if any community wants greater control of their identity in any industry in any country they must own or control said industry. Black people do not own the film industry in the usa, so expect to be disrespected in it. 

Thandiwe Newton was disappointed by how things played out for her character in Solo: A Star Wars Story.

Kurt Krieger - Corbis / Corbis via Getty Images
In the 2018 spinoff, Thandiwe portrayed Val, an outlaw and member of Tobias Beckett’s gang who teamed up with Han Solo.

Jonathan Olley / ©Walt Disney Co. / courtesy Everett / Everett Collection
As one of the first female Black leads in the franchise, Val was killed off less than halfway through the movie — which wasn't actually supposed to happen.
"I felt disappointed by Star Wars that my character was killed. And, actually, in the script, she wasn’t killed. It happened during filming," Thandiwe revealed to Inverse.

Antony Jones / Getty Images for Disney
She continued, "It was much more just to do with the time we had to do the scenes. It’s much easier just to have me die than it is to have me fall into a vacuum of space so I can come back sometime."
Instead of Val's death, Thandiwe says the character was supposed to have a much more mysterious ending, leaving the opportunity for her to return in the future.
"When we came to filming, as far as I was concerned and was aware, when it came to filming that scene, it was too huge a set-piece to create, so they just had me blow up and I’m done," Thandiwe explained.

John Parra / Getty Images
She added, "I remembered at the time thinking, This is a big, big mistake — not because of me, not because I wanted to come back. You don’t kill off the first Black woman to ever have a real role in a Star Wars movie. Like, are you fucking joking?"

Dave J Hogan / Dave J Hogan / Getty Images
The lack of representation and treatment of Black characters in the Star Wars universe has long been an issue and is one that John Boyega also recently spoke on.

Jesse Grant / Getty Images for Disney
"What I would say to Disney is do not bring out a Black character, market them to be much more important in the franchise than they are and then have them pushed to the side. It’s not good," John told GQ.
He added, "Like, you guys knew what to do with Daisy Ridley, you knew what to do with Adam Driver. You knew what to do with these other people, but when it came to Kelly Marie Tran, when it came to John Boyega, you know fuck all."
Following John's comments, he says he had a "transparent" and "honest" conversation with Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy that was "beneficial" to them both.
Here's to hoping there will be better representation in future Star Wars projects.
 

Article Uniform Resource Locator 

Thandiwe Newton Revealed What Was Actually Supposed To Happen To Her Character At The End Of "Solo: A Star Wars Story" (yahoo.com)

A New Line Inspired by Dancehall and Handicraft
By Alice Cavanagh 

The designer Rachel Scott has honed her skills at brands in Milan and New York, but when it came to creating her own label, Diotima, she looked homeward to Jamaica.

As a teen in 1990s Kingston, Jamaica, the fashion designer Rachel Scott was acutely aware of the tension between the decorum dictated by her Jesuit high school, where skirt lengths were checked on a regular basis, and the liberating dancehall scene she was swept up into at night. “There was this idea of being proper and having to present a certain way in the daytime — it was ridiculous,” says Scott, 37, speaking over Zoom from the lush green garden of her family’s house in Kingston, where she is visiting. But the soundtrack of her adolescence — the hip-swaying hits of local artists like Lady Saw, Shabba Ranks and Chaka Demus & Pliers that she heard at parties — left the more lasting impression. “Dancehall will forever be influential to me,” she says of the genre, which has roots in music of the African diaspora. “It’s like this explosion of exuberance.”

Scott explores this juxtaposition between dancehall and colonial notions of propriety, along with wider ideas about the fusion of Jamaican and European cultures, in her new women’s ready-to-wear line, Diotima. (The label takes its name from the ancient Greek priestess and philosopher Diotima of Mantinea, whose theories on beauty resonated with Scott.) Her brand’s first collection, which will be available next month, establishes a language of long-line proportions and understated, often natural materials that the designer intends to explore anew each season. She cites a well-cut white linen suit as one of the pillars of her debut offering: the style was a staple of ’90s-era Jamaican musicians like Ranks, and Scott offers a version updated for today with soft shoulders and pleated pants. “I was trying to get this element of dancehall, but I didn’t want to do it in a nostalgic way,” she says.

          Credit...Joshua Kolbo
Some of the more voluminous styles were inspired by early 20th-century images of women washing clothes by a river, their full skirts gathered up in their hands. “I wanted to pay homage to that strong Caribbean woman,” says Scott. There is a sense of polish, of primness even, that runs through the collection and harks back to her school days — she has softened the overt sexiness of a backless orange dress with risqué cutouts at the waist by employing delicate techniques like draping, pleating and ruching — but it is consistently subverted: a black pleated mid-length skirt, for example, has a thigh-high slit. Similarly, a range of swimwear styles — including a white crocheted bikini and a ruched fluorescent tangerine one-piece — are a departure, Scott concedes, from the more demure offerings she’s created for the New York brand Rachel Comey, where she is currently vice president of design. “I have this joke with Rachel that her taste in swimwear is north of the Equator,” she says with a laugh. “But I needed to cut the pieces higher on the leg and show some butt.”

Scott left Jamaica 20 years ago to study studio art and French at Colgate University in New York, though she was sure she would one day return home. “It might sound lofty, but this idea of nation-building has always been very important to me,” she says, citing the legacy of the former Jamaican prime minister Michael Manley and the work of his mother, the sculptor Edna Manley, as foundational to her sense of cultural responsibility. First, though, in 2006, she moved from New York to Milan to study fashion design at the Istituto Marangoni, and after graduating she stayed in the city to hone her skills at Costume National, working in the brand’s rigorous atelier under the founder Ennio Capasa. “I remember Ennio stopped me in the middle of a fitting once and said, ‘I’m going to teach you how to hold a pin,’” she says now with fondness. After four years in Italy, Scott returned to New York to take a design role at J. Mendel, and in 2015 she joined Rachel Comey.

Last year, the pandemic and the growth of the Black Lives Matter movement prompted her to reflect on what starting her own project might look like. “Being in this industry as a woman of color, I used to have this idea that if one person spoke about Jamaica, then I’d lost my chance, but last year I realized that’s a ridiculous idea,” she says. “I thought about how my perspective has been influenced by my time in Italy, my background in French and philosophy and how that could come together and add something new and unique to the discussion.” One aspect of her vision was trying, in a modest way, to shine light on Jamaican crafts, such as crochet, which is a recurring motif in the collection. Her research also led her to local practices, including Hardanger embroidery, in which white linen or cloth is adorned with lacelike patterns in white thread, and the method of dyeing textiles using heartwood from logwood trees, which imbues fabric with a purplish tinge.

Beyond the mass-produced pieces sold in the country’s souvenir shops, crochet in Jamaica remains a very real domestic practice that has been upheld for generations, and Scott found eight women, most of them based on the island’s north coast, in the Saint Mary and Saint Ann parishes, to realize her designs. “The craft was always a creative outlet for women to work on at night,” she says. Whether alone or operating in circles, the women produced Diotima’s fitted T-shirts in floral-patterned crochet (in either red and black or white) and tank tops with large, intricate black-and-white doilylike adornments, as well as filmier crochet embellishments for silk organza skirts and dresses. This handiwork, then, is not only an aesthetic choice but also an expression of cultural identity and an authentic creative partnership. “I’m always asking myself, ‘How do you pay respect to the people that continue these crafts without exoticizing them?’” Scott says. “It’s important for me to keep this as a collaborative relationship.” Indeed, working side by side with local artists is something she has wanted to do since leaving Jamaica and, though she’s still based in New York, it’s also its own form of returning home. As Scott says, “I have this sense of duty to participate.”'

Article URL
https://www.caribmemag.com/single-post/a-new-line-inspired-by-dancehall-and-handicraft?postId=78416e23-b367-469c-9444-bd1070887c14

Sneakers are often designed for men by men. So track star Allyson Felix built her own
BY ELIZABETH SEGRAN

Felix’s new company, Saysh, is designed to be an alternative to the male-oriented sneaker companies that drive the sports world.

Allyson Felix [Photo: Harrison Boyce/Saysh]

Allyson Felix is the most decorated Olympian in track and field history. But a few years ago, she had a problem: She had no shoes to wear.  In 2019, she publicly cut ties with Nike, her main sponsor, when she asked the company for maternity protections and was stonewalled. A few months later, she signed a new sponsorship contract with women’s activewear label Athleta, which vowed to support her as both an athlete and a mother. But Athleta didn’t make sneakers. So what would she wear to her next race? “We hated the idea that she would go and offer free advertising for a brand that didn’t want to sign her,” says Wes Felix, Allyson’s manager and brother. “One day, I looked at her, and said: ‘What if we built our own shoe company?'”

So that’s what they did. In 2020, Allyson and Wes cofounded Saysh, which is designed to be an alternative to the male-oriented sneaker companies that drive the sports world. As she heads to the Tokyo Olympics, she will proudly wear spikes custom built for her by Saysh’s designers. And this September, the brand will release its first product, a $150 sneaker tailored to the distinct anatomy of a woman’s foot. It will also launch an online community that will give subscribers access to workouts, digital content, and chances to interact with other members, including Allyson herself.

A FAMILY BUSINESS
At 35, Allyson is one of the top track and field athletes in the world, with six Olympic gold medals and 11 world championship titles to her name. For most of her career, she’s kept her head down and focused on her sport, but over the past two years she’s emerged as an outspoken advocate for women. She shared the story of her difficult pregnancy to draw attention to the struggles that Black mothers face in the health system, and just last week she partnered with Athleta to launch a $200,000 childcare grant for mothers who are athletes. In many ways, Saysh is the next step in this advocacy.

Wes believes it was Allyson’s experience with Nike that drove her to the brink. “We started this company from a place of pain, hardship, and sadness,” he says. “It all comes back to her feeling like she was thrown away, undervalued, and an afterthought, which broke her in a lot of ways. I’m so glad that we’re bringing Saysh to the world, but I would never want Allyson to go through that again.”

Wes and Allyson have always been close. As children, they were both athletic, so they often spent hours on the track running together. In college, Wes served as captain of the track and field team at the University of Southern California, and for three and a half years after he graduated, he was an athlete sponsored by Nike. But he was always interested in becoming a sports agent or a manager. As Allyson’s star continued to rise, Wes believed he could help her negotiate better deals with corporate sponsors. So, when she was 22 and he was 25, he pitched the idea of becoming her agent for a year, to see how they got along. “We come from a close-knit family with a dad who is a protector,” Wes says. “He said, you need to protect your sister. You guys need to work together in such a way where you can look out for one another.”

More than a decade later, the two are still working together. And while other agents may have cautioned Allyson against cutting ties with a giant like Nike, Wes says he was far more concerned with her happiness and well-being than with her financial success. “As an agent, I was told that I would never again do another deal in the sport for helping Allyson take this stand [against Nike],” he says. “But it was the right thing to do.”

DESIGNING A SNEAKER FOR WOMEN
Most sneakers on the market aren’t specifically designed for women’s feet, say Saysh designers Tiffany Beers and Natalie Candrian, who left their jobs at Nike to work for Allyson. For much of the 20th century, women weren’t allowed to participate in professional sports, so shoe companies designed basketball and running shoes based on men’s feet. These became the prototypes for the modern athletic shoe. “Sports was a man’s world, and the sports shoes were built for men,” Candrian says. “But it’s a bigger problem that persists today. The attention, money, and sponsorships still tend to go towards men.” 

Even now, when scores of women wear sneakers every day, Beers and Candrian have observed that many shoe brands create a single shoe model designed for a man’s foot, then simply make smaller sizes for women. Yet, women’s feet are different from men’s. For one, the fat content in women’s bodies is distributed differently than it is in men’s bodies, so their feet must carry this weight differently. And anatomically, a woman’s heel tends to be narrower and her forefoot tends to be wider proportionally than the heel.

As they developed their introductory product, the Saysh One, the designers built it around women’s proportions. They also created a higher heel, which many women find more comfortable. The end result is designed to feel like pulling on a comfortable pair of jeans that fit snugly and provide support in the right places. “When we started this project, we said, ‘Let’s pretend men’s shoes don’t exist. Let’s pretend shoe’s don’t exist,'” Beers says. “If a woman was going to build a shoe for herself, what would she create?”

Aesthetically, they were focused on creating an instantly recognizable look that could one day be iconic. There are lines that traverse the length of the shoe and crisscross each other on the front. Candrian says the wrap dress was one of her inspirations. “The ideas of the lines crossing diagonally is a flattering visual,” she says. “The lines remind me of a track.”
The shoe is available for preorder in three colors and will ship in September. It will also be available for sale in Athleta stores. And the team already has a pipeline of other products to roll out in the fall and winter, which includes other shoes and apparel. But the goal for everything Saysh does is to create a space that’s entirely focused on women’s needs. “The real vision is to create a community by women for women,” Wes says. “We will keep going back to our community and asking them what they want to see in the world.”

ARTICLE URL 
https://www.caribmemag.com/single-post/sneakers-are-often-designed-for-men-by-men-so-track-star-allyson-felix-built-her-own?postId=70c1753b-91d4-4e9a-ad84-9fbf1a94e483

From the author: Hey everyone, I’m working on something special. I’m not a part of a major studio or have any insider industry connections.
Actually, I’m based all the way in St. Louis. So what you see here I’ve been able to do with a small dedicated and talented group of people. 
Please consider contributing to this campaign in any way you can. A simple share will go a long way. Thank you
SHORT VIDEO AND WAY TO SUPPORT AT THE LINK BELOW 

 https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/underneath/underneath-sci-fi-feature-film-by-david-kirkman&nbsp;

What's UNDERNEATH About?
UNDERNEATH is the first feature film from David Kirkman. During the U.S Civil War, Amir, a slave from Little Dixie, MO is thrust into an intergalactic crisis after encountering an alien from a crashed spaceship. Throughout the film he learns that he's more than what his environment has forced him to be and discovers his inner power to change and manipulate his entire reality...  Amir comes across characters from different planets, characters directly connected to the Haitian Revolution of 1804, finds what it means to truly love, and much much more. So be prepared for something you've never quite seen before on screen with these dynamics in place.

Director's Statement
In 2018, I made short film called Static Shock, based on the character of the same name. It was the first time that a serious take on the character was made live action. Me and my friends made it for $3,000 and at the time of screening the film across the country, we didn't quite realize the gravity of the imagery we created. Long story short, when I released the short film on my YouTube channel in 2019- it went viral. Altogether the series has a combined 2.5 million views online.

In addition to traveling the country, myself and a few people a part of the team were flown out to London, Germany, and the Netflix HQ itself in San Fransisco to screen the series. 

The thing is: people are hungry for stories in film that expand our imaginations of who black people are, have been, and who we can be; in fun and entertaining ways of course. Myself and the Woke Nation team ended up creating the short films ICON (2020), NOBLE (2020), and recently HARDWARE (2021). All of these short films are based in the Static Shock world, honoring the groundbreaking legacy of Milestone Comics from the 90s and the legacy of Dwayne McDuffie.

Now building on everything we've learned from creating those short films, we're leveling up again. As the saying goes: Here we grow again! But with original content. 

I remember growing up being completely obsessed with Star Wars- I mean COMPLETELY obsessed. I was the kid in Ferguson (the birthplace of the Black Lives Matter Movement) who was able to get all of my friends on my street to believe in my little Star Wars fantasies and act it out with me. I'd organize my friends into teams: the Dark Side and the Light Side, and would organize the lightsaber duels utilizing a combination of the $6 lightsabers from Walmart and tree sticks lying around outside. But there was always this disconnect because every major character I really looked up to in Star Wars didn't look like me.

In UNDERNEATH, with your support and donations,  we're going to take everything in the sci-fi genre up a notch. We're intersecting black history, which grounds the lore and gives our world verisimilitude, with Afrofuturism (black sci-fi). Also in the film we explore ancient Kemetic (African) principles and truths in a very entertaining way. 
Thank you so much for supporting this cause, and thank you for believing in me and the Woke Nation team. I look forward to creating history with you.  ~ David Kirkman

MORE QUESTIONS

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/underneath/underneath-sci-fi-feature-film-by-david-kirkman/faqs

Was asked by someone online, the following is my answer

Its fine. I rarely hate any art. I never say any art is bad. No artists is trying to make bad work. So, an artist may fail to achieve what they wanted in terms of audience response or I may dislike a works aspects but it wasn't for lack of trying. .... I will specify a question. IF the question is, how does the what if series settle into the modern media of comic book story discussions? I think it settles into a pit. Modern media is for many the nonviolent warzone. How many black characters? how many female characters? how many white characters? how many christian characters? how many muslims characters? how many young characters? how many old characters? How many hetero characters? how many lgbtq+ characters? how many atheist characters? and then once people get past the quantity of representation. Now the condition of the characters. He is black, but do black people like him? she is fat, but do fat people like her? They are lgbtq+ but do the lgbtq+ like them? The couple are bdsmers but do the bdsmers like them? Number of characters and then how are the characters portrayed. What If is a pander to those questions. People sadly think, that when a character has their traits it means something. I have said this in the past and I will say it now and I will say it in the future. No artist is blockaded to creativity, in my view, but I look at the originators of characters as important to how I define their essense. Give me a black written /black drawn character and I will associate them to being black. I have always been a storm fan. Always will be. But, Storm wasn't designed by a black person. and, a black artists later manipulating what a white artist created. While in no need of validation as art, I do not see or will accept as a black character. What if captain america is a woman? What if Thor is transgender? What if Iron Man, a fiscally spoiled rich kid engineering genious, is Black? What if will have many lovers cause it gives visual form to a small set of infinite possibilities. What if is in my view, a video form of what comics originally were. We forget, before characters became so popular they had their own comics, and became rigid or cultural identifiers, most comics were what ifs? Most comic characters started out in what ifs. A writer has an idea and pitches it to the audience. If the audience like it you will see them in another edition.