TEA WITH THE COLLECTIVE
For this episode of The Cedar Public Access Channel, we join Deeq Abdi, Ifrah Mansour, Ritika Ganguly, Tou SaiKo Lee, Alexandra Buffalohead, and Lady Midnight for socially-distanced tea and discussion as they reflect on their year as members of The Cedar's Artist Collective, a group of artists engaged to serve as paid year-round curatorial artists and cultural liaisons to The Cedar. During this program, the artists explore many topics, including the role of the artist in society, their role as advisors to The Cedar, and their own practices for staying healthy, grounded, and hopeful during a year of isolation, global crisis, and civil unrest.
With the Artist Collective members sipping some of their favorite teas during the discussion, we encourage audience members to brew some of their own tea before the show and sip on it as they enjoy the program!
The Cedar Public Access Channel is an online stream that presents creative content planned and produced by artists in collaboration with The Cedar. You can tune in through The Cedar’s Facebook or YouTube.
Facebook link: https://www.facebook.com/thecedar/
YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/user/MadeofCedar
Learn more about The Cedar Artist Collective:
https://www.thecedar.org/artist-collective
The Cedar Public Access Channel is an online stream that presents creative content planned and produced by artists in collaboration with The Cedar. You can tune in through The Cedar’s Facebook or YouTube.
GET TO KNOW EACH MEMBER OF THE ARTIST COLLECTIVE
DEEQ ABDI
Deeq Abdi was born in Somalia, the nation of poets, after the outbreak of the civil war. Abdi started using poetry as a form of expression from a young age, when he learned the finer points of Gabay; an ancient form of Somali poetry from family. After moving to the United States in 1998, Deeq embraced other forms of expression, including spoken word poetry and hip hop. Living in Minneapolis with a Somali mother and Irish American father gives unique perspective on creating art and culture.
IFRAH MANSOUR
Ifrah Mansour is a Somali, refugee, Muslim, multimedia artist and an educator based in Minnesota. Her artwork explores trauma through the eyes of children to uncover the resiliencies of blacks, Muslims, and refugees. She interweaves poetry, puppetry, films, and installations. She's been featured in BBC, Vice, Okayafrica, Star Tribune, and City Pages. Her critically-acclaimed, “How to Have Fun in a Civil War” premiered at Guthrie Theatre and toured to greater cities in Minnesota. Her first national museum exhibition; “Can I Touch It” premiered at Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Her visual poem, “I am a Refugee” is part of PBS’s short Film festival. "My Aqal, Banned and Blessed" premiered at Queens Museum in New York. Learn More: www.facebook.com/ifrahmansourart
TOU SAIKO LEE
Tou SaiKo Lee is a spoken word poet, storyteller, hip hop recording artist and community organizer from St. Paul, Minnesota. He collaborated with his late grandmother, Youa Chang or Zuag Tsab who does the traditional art of kwv txhiaj (Hmong Poetry Chanting) to form the duo "Fresh Traditions." Lee is developing inter-generational and world-wide creative resources for cultural identity through storytelling, multimedia and language learning with songs. Lee is releasing a memoir about their collaboration with his grandma to honor her passing titled My Grandma can Freestyle. He is releasing his first Hmong language Hip Hop album titled Ntiaj Teb Koom Tes which translates to Unified Worldwide in 2020.
ALEXANDRA BUFFALOHEAD
Alexandra Buffalohead is the Arts and Cultural Engagement Manager at the Native American Community Development Institute and All My Relations Arts Gallery in Minneapolis, MN. Buffalohead is a 2019 Emerging Curator Institute Fellow and has curated exhibitions at High Point Center for Printmakers in Minneapolis, and Artistry's Inez Greenberg Gallery in Bloomington. Buffalohead earned a BA from Augsburg University, an AS from the Art Institute International of Minnesota, and an MA from the University of Saint Thomas. She has been a keyboard player and vocalist in the MN-based band Bluedog since 2006. Their music is influenced by the life experiences of First Nations people.
LADY MIDNIGHT
Lady Midnight, she is an experience. She is an ethereal vocalist and performance artist who draws upon her multidisciplinary background in visual art, dance and Afro-indigenous roots to create work that timelessly reflects our collective lives. Lady Midnight was named Best Twin Cities Vocalist of 2017 by The City Pages and released her highly anticipated debut album Death Before Mourning in 2019. As Lady Midnight, she has recorded with international touring artists Bon Iver, P.O.S., Brother Ali, as well as performed with internationally acclaimed icons Common, Moby, Andra Day, and Aloe Blacc, among others. Lady Midnight has dedicated her life to using the arts as a power for change and confronting trauma.
RITIKA GANGULY
Ritika Ganguly, PhD., is a Minneapolis-based singer, composer, performance artist, and anthropologist, born and raised in New Delhi, India. She applies anthropological insights to practical problem-solving in the areas of equity in the arts and cross-cultural medicine. Her consulting practice and artistic practice both strive for an equality based on difference, rather than on the similarity of things, people, and knowledges. Ritika was commissioned as a composer by The Cedar Cultural Center in 2016, received the Jerome-supported Naked Stages award in 2017, and an MRAC Next Step award in 2018 for her research and new musical work in Baul (Bengali Sufi music/poetry). She has trained in multiple genres within Bengali music and in contemporary Indian theater. Her compositions bring disparate musical styles, literatures, and disciplines together.
Learn more about Ritika at: https://beta.prx.org/stories/204658 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC92MMMXkiZLY7zjUtZmDXDQ?feature=emb_ch_name_ex
This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a Minnesota State Arts Board Operating Support grant, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.
