2013

>Temporary Media Zone at 6th and Oxford. August. Funded through the City Redevelopment Authority, MIM will organize a Temporary Media Zone during the month of August on a vacant lot at 6th and Oxford.

>Mural Arts Program. June- September. As part of the ‘What We Sow’ project, MIM will be recording video messages at several Night Markets and Farmer’s Markets throughout the summer, with a focus on stories, recipes and experiences with heirloom produce and local food cultures.

>Hillendale Elementary School. May 2-10. MIM was invited to Hillendale for 5-days as an artist-in-residence to work primarily with the 5th graders to create short videos about their experiences at school.

>Young Audiences, Creatively Green Arts Festivals. April- June. Four Family arts festivals throughout NJ and Philadelphia focus on using creative activities to educate kids and their families about environmental issues. MIM recorded video pledges and messages at each site: Camden, Cook-Wissahickon, Jersey City & Hamilton.

2012

>Decarcerate PA: One day workshop with community organizers, including youth from Youth Arts Self-Empowerment Project to learn creative techniques to document and promote their grassroots campaign to end mass incarceration in Pennsylvania.

>Scribe Video Center: Street Movies! July- August. Messages in Motion will be partnering with Scribe to present a series of workshops with the community partners who will host the 2012 Street Movies. The video produced by the participating sites will be showcased at each Street Movies screening as part of the film program. Partner sites include: Norris Square Neighborhood Project, Bridgeway Inc, Urban Tree Connection and more…

>Squeaky Wheel International Media Arts Residency. May 12- June 14. I am very excited to be joining the SW team in Buffalo, NY to kick off the summer. I will be developing a project titled: Future Cities, Future Spaces. Using the MIM Van and Squeaky Wheel facilities, I will lead a series of creative workshops, encouraging participants to imagine new uses for vacant, underutilized public spaces. How are cities transforming industrial spaces? How are neighborhoods creating safe spaces? What could these new spaces look like, how would they function?

>Casa Monarca From March 26- April 16, I will be meeting with a group of adults who recently completed their first computer class training. We will extend that workshop to produce short videos which will be featured as part of the De Pueblo a Pueblo Festival in Philadelphia, an inaugural festival to honor our local Mexican community by promoting greater understanding of traditional arts, language, and history of our southern neighbors.

>Young Audiences. Messages in Motion has joined the Young Audiences teaching artist roster. YA places teaching artists in schools throughout New Jersey and the Philadelphia region. Our first workshop was with the Emerging Artists Creativity Hub on April 27th. You can see their blog and read more about the day here. Look forward to more YA opportunities in the coming year!

>Mazzoni Center, March 17. MIM will work with a group of student leaders to document LEAD , a day log event aimed at high school students who are active or wish to become involved in the citywide GSA (Gay Straight Alliance) Network.

2011

>Main Line Art Center. October 2-23, 2011. Messages in Motion Might will lead a series of classes that will link the Art Center; stories and history into a film that will be shown as part of the spring exhibition celebrating their 75th year.

>Elsewhere Collaborative. The MIM project will be in Greensboro for 3 weeks in August, exploring creative collaborations with the Elsewhere and Greensboro communities! MIM Partnered with the Interactive Resource Center to offer a series of workshops with adults struggling with homelessness.

>Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, Winston-Salem, NC. In collaboration with the People’s Biennial Exhibition at SECCA, Messages in Motion will be in Residence in August working with the Enrichment Center and iCan House.

>Tookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed Partnership. Intergenerational workshops scheduled in April to explore how neighborhood issues relate to the preservation of the local watershed.

>Orange Korner Arts, Ayuda Community Center. A series of 3 workshops with adults exploring how the arts can be used to create a safe space.

>The LEAP After-School Program, a program of the Free Library of Philadelphia will be offering 10 MIM presentations at local branch libraries in February and March!

2010

>Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign. We will be starting workshops with PPEHRC. They will be creating short weekly episodes based on their lives in Kensington, and the daily struggles to organize, educate and develop leadership to build a human rights campaign led by the poor.

>Teaming up with the Green Guerrillas in Ithaca, we will co-present, Eco-Media: Nature as Inspiration and Motivation- an Eco-justice tour of Detroit as part of the 2010 Allied Media Conference.

>Free Library of Philadelphia Teen Programming; Youth Empowerment Summit

>Mural Arts Youth Action and Art

>ArtWorks! OUTspoken w/YHEP

>Germantown Poetry Festival

>Norris Square Neighborhood Project

>Powerful Voice for Kids- Summer Program at Russell Byers Charter School

2009

>Centro Pedro Claver: Summer Youth Entrepreneurship and Art and Social Change Project

>VOICES, Temple University

>Media Education Lab, Temple University; Powerful Voices

>SEAMAAC: South East Asian Mutual Assistant Associations Coalition, Summer Camp

>Gaining Ground: Discovering the New Iranian American

>Mill Creek Farm

Creative Team

Creative Director:Laura Deutch

Codirector: Katya Gorker

Toolkit Design: Irit Reinheimer

Curriculum Assistance: Dave Moore

Exterior Van Artwork: Bassem Yousri

Logo Design:Christopher Thomas

Technical Coordinators: Bruce James, Martin Lautz, Dave Onion, Carlos Pascual

Past Interns: Christopher Thomas, Colette Boylan

Inspiration & Additional Readings:

>Atkins, Robert, Rudolf Frieling, Boris Groys and Lev Manovich. The Art of Participation, 1950 to Now. New York: Thames & Hudson, 2008.

>Avni, Ronit, Gillian Caldwell, Sam Gregory and Thomas Harding, eds. Video for Change. London: Pluto Press, 2005. Download chapters for free

>Bansal,Lipika, Paul Keller and Geert Lovink, eds., In The Shade of the Commons: Towards a Culture of Open Networks, Waag Society, 2006. www.waag.org/project/shade

>Bishop, Claire, ed. Participation. Cambridge: MIT Press, 2006.

>Borrup, Tom. The Creative Community Builder’s Handbook. Saint Paul: Fieldstone Alliance, 2006.

>Halleck, DeeDee. Hand-Held Visions. New York: Fordham University Press, 2002.

>Lambert, Joe. Digital Storytelling Cookbook. Berkeley, Digital Diner Press, 2006. Download the introductory chapters

>Nold, Christian, Ed. Emotional Cartography. Download a Low res version.

>Tuters, Marc and Kazys Varnelis. “Beyond Locative Media.” Submitted 2006.

Related Projects of Interest:

>Sarai: Cybermohalla

>The Black Factory

>The Stockyard Institute, Pedagogical Factory

>Mobile Journalism Collective

>Ant Farm Media Van 1972/2009 (Interview about the project with Floater magazine)

>Indivisible, Stories of American Communities

>Walk Philly from Termite TV

>Documenta!PE

Directories:

>Groups and Spaces. A Web Portal for Independent Art spaces and Groups

>Plausible Artworlds. Alternative Models of Creative practice

>Community Arts Network. The archive of a great network dedicated to information exchange, dialogue and research of community-based art.cription

Grant funding from: Leeway Foundation, Bread and Roses Community Fund, Temple University, Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority

Support from Termite TV

Thank you to Parkway Painting and Stanley Deutch for the donation of the Van!

• Videos from Holy Child July 23, 2014

  Videos produced as part of a day-long workshop with Young Audiences at Holy Child Academy working with 23 4th-8th graders. Working in teams, they produced these 4 short videos.e:
  

• MIM continues Temporary Media Zone August 25, 2013

  During the month of August, Messages in Motion has been visiting the vacant lot at the corner of N. 6th and Oxford. Each session has used different approaches to engage the neighborhood in creating short video postcards about their interests, their community and their neighborhood. Videos have ranged from short vocal and dance performances, walks around the block, and short interviews with residents.  A series of 4×6 postcards have also been produced based on drawings from the kids and photos they have taken.  This project has been supported by a grant by the Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority, as part of their Percent for Art program.

• MIM to activate a Temporary Media Zone at N. 6th and Oxford in AUGUST June 16, 2013

  With a grant from the Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority, Messages in Motion will be working at the vacant lot, located at N. 6th and Oxford streets, to activate a ‘Temporary Media Zone,”  for the production and distribution of short video messages and hyperlocal media by neighborhood residents.

  During the duration of the Temporary Media Zone, I will create both structured workshops and open ‘studio’ time.  The workshops will invite residents to learn a variety of filmmaking techniques, audio recording techniques, and online tools for documenting personal and neighborhood stories. ‘Open Studio’ time would function as a pop up community media center, where people could record and upload stories, contribute to the project blog, borrow a camera to take photos or conduct interviews.

  In the evenings, there will be movie screenings of both the videos produced by residents alongside a selection of independent and popular films.

  OPENING DAY will take place on SATURDAY AUGUST 3rd 2013.

• MIM visits NJ schools with support from Young Audiences March 6, 2013

  The MIM van will be conducting workshops at Various NJ schools from March-June.
  Stay tuned for more details and videos from the students!

  Philipsburg Middle School February-March, featured afterschool program
  Grace Dunn Middle School, Trenton, March 7th, visiting 6th-7th grade classes
  Wolf Hill Elementary School, Oceanport, June 5-6, visiting elementary school classes

• Decarcerate PA videos! November 5, 2012

  
  On Saturday Nov 3rd I facilitated a workshop with organizers from Decarcerate PA, including 3 members of YASP (Youth Arts Self Empowerment Project), a coalition organization which campaigns to overturn Act 33, which tries juveniles as adults in PA. Decarcerate PA is a grassroots campaign working to end mass incarceration in Pennsylvania. This is a small sampling of the work produced, and just the start to more creative campaign videos.
  Decarcerate PA:
  
  Videos from Members of Youth Arts Self Empowerment Project:
  

• Messages in Motion at the Ever Never Night Market September 22, 2012

  The Ever Never Night Market was a popup carnaval that took place on Saturday Sept 22 at the Little Berlin Fairgrounds in Kensington. I invited people in to the van to record a message to some in the future. I recorded 15 messages that are being sent out over the next 6 months. Some of the messages were public, others were sent privately. Here is a rave review from a group of neighborhood kids who had a blast!
  

• MIM to Start Workshops in collaboration with Street Movies / Scribe Video Center July 16, 2012

  In an exciting partnership with Scribe Video Center, Messages in Motion will be working with 6-8 community groups prior to Street Movies to facilitate video workshops with community groups so that they can produce their own short videos to be shown alongside the Street Movies short films.  Stay tuned as workshops have gotten underway and videos will start to be uploaded within the next few weeks

• Last week in Buffalo… June 14, 2012

  Tomorrow will wrap 5 weeks in Buffalo.

  A whirlwind, of 10 workshops and 12 great videos produced.

  From our workshops with the teens at Seneca Babcock we produced a collaborative video over the last 2 sessions…  One of the students suggested the theme of exploring the lack of opportunities for teens in the neighborhood, and they took it from there…
  

  The public workshop at Squeaky Wheel was also a great success. 10 participants in attendance, many of them came prepared with interesting ideas of places they wanted to document… This workshop deviated from the ‘video postcard’ structure a little bit, and a few people took it in a new direction! These videos are also part of an interactive documentary project titled, Present Spaces, Future Places that will be available online shortly at: http://www.crackingopen.org/futureplaces

  You can view all the Buffalo videos on Youtube

• New Videos from Starlight Studio artists June 2, 2012

  My first stop in Buffalo was at the Starlight Studio and Art Gallery. As part of my residency at Squeaky Wheel, we had coordinated in advance with Starlight to organize 4 2-hr workshops. We worked with a group of 6 adults, none of whom had ever produced a video before, but are all really talented visual artists. With the assistance from Maggie and Dave from Starlight, and Goda from Squeaky Wheel, we led the group through a number of filming, interviewing, storytelling and story boarding activities. In terms of how this place connected to the larger theme of my project here in Buffalo, Present Spaces, Future Places, it became apparent after the first day that Starlight is an important safe space for these artists.  It’s a place where people feel comfortable expressing themselves and exploring their creative voice. They form strong friendships with one another and the staff who are there to support them in their work. Here are the final videos participants produced:

Messages in Motion arrives in Buffalo May 17, 2012

The MIM Van arrived in Buffalo on Sunday night. I will be staying until June 15th, as an artist in residence at Squeaky Wheel.

Under the general theme of “Present spaces, future spaces,” I’ll be exploring creative uses of underutilized  public and vacant spaces. These photos are actually not at all representative of the landscape here in Buffalo… There is quite a diversity of architecture, green spaces, vacant spaces, commercial areas, waterfront, etc…  Last night, for example, I attended a presentation on Pop Up parks. One will be happening on June 9th and I look forward to documenting this creative use of recycled materials and vacant parcels.  Lots of great energy and activity in the city, and I look forward to getting to know the people and their places!

• April 2012: Stop Racism: Yesterday was a very full and productive day with 8  students at the Emerging Artists Creativity Hub, a project of Young Audiences at the College of New Jersey. EACH says:  “Our goal is to provide young artists, ages 13-17, with study and work experience in the arts far beyond the typical high school […]

• April 2012:   Last night  the Reciprocity show opened at the Painted Bride. This show was curated by Pepon Osorio and features work by  7 artists whose projects explore  themes of give and take. I was excited to participate in this show, and it gave me an opportunity to recurate some of the existing MIM documentation. This video was produced by Tyler Community Art student, Stephanie Pennypacker for the Reciprocity show at the Painted Bride April 6-June 6, 2012.

• March 2012: Tonight there was a great turnout for the first of 4 workshops at Casa Monarca. I will be working with this group of 12 adults to produce short videos that will premiere April 30th as part of the De Pueblo a Pueblo festival.

• March 2012:  This Saturday MIM will be at the LEAD workshop at the Science Leadership Academy. Coordinated by the Mazzoni Center Mazzoni Center, dozens of high school students, teachers, and allies from around the city and region will gather from 10 AM to 4 PM, for the annual LEAD event!

• March 2012: ‘No Dumping’ was a video produced by Lesley and Katie at a workshop  in collaboration with the Taookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed

  Partnership.

• Jan 2012: MIM Videos Featured in People’s Biennial at Haverford College Comments Offon MIM Videos Featured in People’s Biennial at Haverford College

  There will be a loop of videos produced by Messages in Motion participants on display at Haverford from January 27 – March 2, 2012. People’s Biennial presents 36 contemporary artists who work in and near cities not traditionally considered American “art capitals”: Portland, Oregon; Rapid City, South Dakota; Winston-Salem, North Carolina; Scottsdale, Arizona; and more…

• December 2011: Here is an excerpt from one stop along the ‘Posadas’ during the International Day of Migrants Rights, here in Philly. “On Sunday, December 18th, people from every continent will be standing up and speaking out for the rights of migrants and against racism.

• November 2011: Teen Tuesday at the Main Library Comments Offon Teen Tuesday at the Main Library

  This series of videos was produced during our Teen Tuesday session at the Free Library of Philadelphia. Check them out… Video by “The True Hagemaru” Video by Dana: Video by Craig: Video by Desmonae and Carolann: Video by Olivia.

• November 2011: Termite TV/MIM featured in NAMAC article looking at community media in Philadelphia Comments Offon Termite TV/MIM featured in NAMAC article looking at community media in Philadelphia

  “Philadelphia’s independent film and video community has a flavor all its own. Two major factors drive the city’s alternative media: an innate sense of community activism and a thriving creative culture. Two groups in particular, PhillyCAM and Termite TV, reflect the larger movement and tell essential aspects of the story.”

• October 2011: MIM sharing 2 brief messages from the General Assembly during Occupy Philly at City Hall.

• September 2011:

  This video was collaboratively produced by participants at the Interactive Resource Center in Greensboro. I had the pleasure of working with a consistent group of adults for about 5, 2-hour sessions and through a series of activities and conversations.

• August 2011: I was fortunate to be introduced to Don Ames via the community at the Interactive Resource Center in Greensboro. He has an incredible story- and I only captured a piece of it. If you want to support his work, he can be reached at d.ames44@yahoo.com

• During the Residency at Elsewhere MIM had several workshops and working sessions with community members:
  on Playshop at Elsewhere

  On Saturday we had a fun playshop/workshop from 2-4pm with a great group of young participants. These are the videos they produced: Through the Eyes of Nicole and Kenzie 21st Century Music by Jack Keels Antique Suitcases by Diane Bong

• 10 New Videos Produced at the Enrichment Center 1

  Here all 10 videos produced by participants during the week-long workshop at the Enrichment Center in Winston-Salem, NC.

• August 2011: Tomorrow MIM will start a weeklong series of workshops in partnership with the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art and Community partners, iCan House and The Enrichment Center. Check back all week for updates!! SECCA is currently hosting the People’s Biennial, where the the MIM project is featured.

• July 2011: Today I facilitated a session titled Messages in Motion: Video Postcards in the classroom at the National Association for Media Literacy Education (NAMLE) conference. In a brief hour, I presented an overview of the project, the process and its possible applications in a classroom setting.

• June 2011: For more information about the CBNC, check out their webpage: http://www.chewandbelfield.webs.com This video was produced by Terry Johnson during a workshop  in collaboration with the Taookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed Partnership.

• It was very excited to finally start our workshops at the Awbury Arboretum, in partnership with The Tookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed Partnership. TTF has recruited 10 amazing participants from the surrounding neighborhoods who are active in their communities to participate in the workshop so that they can make their voices heard on a variety of important neighborhood issues.

• April 2011: Fight the Frack Comments Offon Fight the Frack

  This video was filmed during the march and rally to defend our rivers from fracking! Check out lots of important up to date information on this topic and learn more at Protecting Our Waters.

• April 2011: Orange Korner Arts- Today we completed 3 videos with the women at Orange Korner Arts community center. Join us for a community arts celebration on May 13th at 511 W. Courtland Street, Philadelphia, PA 19140. I have started a series of 3 Saturday workshops at Orange Korner Arts community center with a group of 5 women. These workshops were the first attempt to address the security/safe spaces theme.

• Final workshop at West Oak Lane

  Well we went out with a bang today at West Oak Lane. The largest group, 18 youth showed up and 14 of them worked together to create 5 awesome videos! The average age was 15, and this really helped keep up focused, and keep their messages on point.

• February 2011: Getting to know the Bustleton Library

  Video produced by Vrunda, Aniyia, Vrunda and Elizabeth during an hour long workshop at the Bustleton Library.

• MIM worked with 10 libraries over a few months to offer after school and weekend workshops for youth and families. Cobbs Creek, Cecil B Moore, Germantown, Charles Santore, and more….

• December 2010: Film workshops with PPEHRC youth Workshops started today with the youth group at PPEHRC. We will be meeting weekly with them to create short videos and document their involvement with the PPEHRC farm that is under development on an empty lot a few blocks away. I’m very excited to have started a series of workshops with the folks at the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign in Kensington. After years of amazing organizing work around housing, and welfare rights issues, PPEHRC is taking control of their image and their understanding of technology.

• August 2010- workshop with Norris Square Neighborhood Project: This video was produced in partnership with the Norris Square Neighborhood Project during the Prodigies summer media program.

• July 2010 : Last week I returned to Russell Byers Charter School (last summer I did a daylong class there as well). We got to try out the new MIM toolkits, which was a useful resource have on hand. I showed a few shorts from the one minute junior site to get us started talking about different concepts.

• June 2010: Eco-media in motion: Postcards from Detroit -

  The Face of Environmental Justice: Industry and Possibility: Street Art: A guided tour  with historian, autoworker and organizer Rick Feldman at the Packard and Pole Auto Plants in Detroit. These videos were produced during the tour Eco-media Messages from Detroit tour during the Allied Media Conference. I’m heading out to the Allied Media Conference in Detroit. Stay tuned for videos and posts along the way! I will be co-presenting this workshop on Friday afternoon: TOUR: Eco-Media in Motion: Messages from Detroit (Kid Friendly) Presenters: Climate Confluence Network; Green Guerrillas Youth Media Tech Collective; Messages in Motion; Outta Your Backpack Media; Remedia

• May 2010: These videos were produced in collaboration with the Asian Arts Initiative as part of a multi-week video production workshop focusing on the production of Immigrant Life Stories- in the Termite TV tradition. I facilitated one workshop with the participants today and we went to a festival that was happening at Franklin Square.

• May 2010 Youth Empowerment Summit: This collective video was made with a group of 35 students during a one-hour session at the central library as part of the annual Youth Empowerment Summit. This year’s theme was believe, belong, become- so that became the prompt for this piece.

• April 2010: Workshop with over 20 students from ArtWorks and OUTSpoken- a project of Mural Arts.

• Yesterday was my second workshop with YHEP (Youth Health Empowerment Project). I was invited by Art Works!, a program of Mural Arts to facilitate video workshops at YHEP for the OUTspoken project. OUTspoken is a mutlimedia project which aims to create safe space for the voices of LGBTQ young people and their allies in Philadelphia.

• April 2010 - This was the first postcard I did as a test- but also as a response to the development of Triangle Park on my corner on 6th and Christian Street

• April 2010= first workshop series with Centro Pedro Claver

• November 2009: I just completed co-teaching a filmmaking workshop in Chester with Sonia Arora who connected us to a group of homeschool kids who she had met while filmming her own short documentary on the subject of homeschooling. We offered the class for 4 weeks (2-hr sessions) with a group of 7 students ages 8-13.

• April 2009:
  Today MIM had a fun visit to the Asian Arts initiative where Aggie is working with a few students for a week-long media camp, in which they are addressing issues of identity and representation (with a particular eye toward the Iranian American experience)

• On Tuesday I worked again with the VOICES youth, but this time we met in their neighborhood in Southwest at a rec center at 58th and Kingsessing. We were a group of 14 and I was surprised that we got 12 videos done by the end of the day at 4pm.

• August 2009: On Thursday I did a workshop with 10 students from the Penrose neighborhood, up by Temple. The summer program is part of a several-year leadership training organized by VOICES and offered to area high school students.

• July 2009 SEAMAAC summer camp: I finished the first of 6 weeks with the Seamaac summer camp. Phally and Luce have been my faithful comrades up against a wily group of 8-15 year olds who, if given the chance would be happy playing icebreaker games instead of talking about making movies…