#idigthis

The second installment of I Dig This is with Paul Kjelland, who is our Office and Community Engagement Coordinator here at 371 Productions.

I dig a ton of stuff, so I will try to keep this brief.

M12

M12 is a group based in Colorado that does work that really inspires me. I found out about them through Chip Thomas when he came to Milwaukee a while back for the Artists Now! lecture series. We were talking about the group ReciproCITY that I am apart of, and he thought it sounded like a similar approach to art making as projects being organized by M12.

Check out M12's projects here.

Stitch

This is a Milwaukee based group doing incredible and important work. I recently had some of their members on a Night School panel about segregation I curated at Inova for the Mary Nohl Fellowship. Milwaukee is the most segregated city in America, and Stitch addresses this head on through the projects they organize. Every summer they put together an open mic series that is hosted in two different locations on the North and the South sides of MKE. They also do a mural project that is displayed in both parts of the city. Everything they do is steeped in learning about each other and becoming more comfortable in parts of the city you may not be familiar with. Real stuff here.

Check out the Stitch website here.

A People's Art History of the United States

My close friend, frequent collaborator, and studio mate Nicolas Lampert recently released his 8 year long research project A People's Art History of the United States. It has been an incredible inspiration to my own work to have conversations about the project over the years. I cannot recommend this book enough.

When artists join social movements, they become agitators in the best sense of the word, and their art becomes less about the individual and more about the common vision and aspirations of many. Their art challenges power and becomes part of a culture of resistance. —FROM A PEOPLE’S ART HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES

Check out the website for A People's Art History of the United States here.

Also, he has a book release at Boswell Books Tuesday, Dec. 3rd where he will give what I'm quite sure will be an amazing presentation.

Music

I listen to a ton of music, so I will just toss up a cross section of what I have been into lately:

The Pretty Things- I've been playing a bunch of this 60's + English rock band. I'll bet you have heard them, if not look them up.

MIA- I have been getting into a bunch of the tracks on MIA's new album  Matangi. Here is a single that was released a while back, but the video is too good to pass up.

Leif- Check out his new album Treehouse. In addition, this is a great video. Thanks Mary Tremonte for turning me on to Le1f.

We are starting a new set of posts here at 371 Productions called I Dig This. Every Monday we will put out a list of projects, of music, or films, or people that are inspiring us. This week we will kick off the series with President of 371 Productions, Brad Lichtenstein.

Here we go.

Gimme Shelter:

I just went back to the Maysles documentary Gimme Shelter, and specifically this scene of the Stones listening to the track of Wild Horses that they just recorded in the studio. I love the camera work. The guy shooting is Kevin Keating, my first real boss in documentary. I love the rack focuses, the slow pans, the attention to faces as the band listens,, the patient shooting, and the details like the boot tapping and the courage to stay on Ron Wood (I think that's Ron) even when he looks directly to camera . I watched it before doing a quick video shooting workshop last night.

Tom Waits:

I've been rediscovering Tom Waits lately. There's a verse I wrote a long time ago: "you've got the bury the dog, you've got the bury the dog, you've got to bury the dog, before the children wake up" that I keep hoping will blossom into a song that I can give Tom to record. Talk about a fantasy!

Steve Lambert:

I am such a fan of Steve Lambert and just love, love, love his Capitalism Works for Me project. So glad it found a home in Times Square for a spell.

Eve Mosher:

Photo by Hose Cedeno