Category: From Martha’s Desk
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Listening and Being Heard
Being heard isn’t as easy. Opportunities to be heard are rare, and it’s even more rare to feel heard.
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Artstars as Ordinary People
Any practicing artist in any medium will recognize the existential struggles of the mostly ordinary people who are the Artstars.
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Remembering Cleven "Goodie" Goudeau
He gave generously of his time to everyone, and his knowledge of every aspect of the visual arts was vast. But he didn’t just know a lot, and he wasn’t just helpful and kind, he was also prolific.
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Ms. Roberta Flack 2012
I’m a Roberta Flack fan. The first time ever I heard her voice, I was touched by her depth of feeling and purity of sound. She reached out to a part of me that is innocent, full of awe, and imbued with love. That is a great place to dwell when you can find yourself…
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Thanks for Listening
Dear All, This will be my last letter from the editor of Listen & Be Heard. Times are changing, and I am changing with them. Listen & Be Heard the open mic, Listen & Be Heard the newspaper and website, and Listen & Be Heard Poetry Cafe have all been learning experiences for me from…
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Using what we already have.
It is important for arts advocates to work together for common goals in the arts, to band together just as big business and financial institutions do, to forward our own agenda. But it is just as important to be able to look in the mirror and examine each and every asset that we have no…
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If You Laugh, it’s True.
What the ratings do show is that the Arts are more integral to politics than is generally acknowledged. In fact the Arts are major tools for propaganda and can be quite dangerous and cruel in the hands of dictators. Corporations have their own reasons for using artists and the Arts to manipulate behavior.
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State of the Arts in the New Economy
Now is the time to advocate for a different perspective on what is important to us and future generations. Don’t allow the Arts to continue to be looked upon as charities, when in reality artistic activity can lead the way to economic prosperity.
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The International Connection
The international connection is the single most valuable aspect of our modern technology. In the hands of creators, in the hands of the collective imagination for the future, we have a vast ocean of possibilities available to us like never before. We can connect with our international neighbors as easily as we can walk across…
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Arts and Politics
Arts, Arts Education, Culture, these topics aren’t important enough to enter the discussion when everyone’s worried about their bank accounts and where in the world to shoot bullets. But it is the Arts that will sustain us even when the stock market fails and our sons and daughters die in foreign lands.
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Is this a letter or a journal entry?
I figure that I’m somewhere in the middle in terms of technical know-how and understanding. For those who know more than me, I can be entertaining with my mishaps, and remind those with mastery how the rest of us perceive what’s happening as we learn. For those who know less than me, I can be…
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Learning to work with available tools.
The tools that are available to us today have evolved. With a little effort we can overcome our trepidation about technology we’re not used to, and begin to use it. I love the fact that I can host (for free) a live radio show that people anywhere in the world can call in to. And…
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A Listen and Be Heard Wish List
Listen & Be Heard Network plans to record and air a weekly arts news program. Volunteer must live in the vicinity of Vallejo, CA, USA and be available for studio work one morning a week for two hours. If interested please send a cover letter and resume to Martha Mims at editor AT listenandbeheard DOT…
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Do you make a living doing that?
I went to a party and someone asked me “what do you do?” My answer to that question tends to be different every time I give it a whirl. So this time around I said I was a writer, a poet. The next question was inevitable. It doesn’t seem to change no matter what my…
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Communication and Concentration of Creative Construction
This system that we were all born into here in America dictates that if you are ambitious about producing and presenting big arts projects you will have to go out with your hat out and ask people, companies, corporations and governments for money, because your work will not have any dollar value on its own.…