Being non-productive is like fingernails on a chalkboard to me.

As I sit here, in between meals, at the dining table of my father in law’s home overlooking the Valle dei Templi in Agrigento, Sicily all I can do is overthink.  For many reasons, it’s hard for me to “work” here.  I can see three of the largest of these Greek temples sitting in a line parallel to the coast with the blue of the Mediterranean filling in to the horizon.  These are the temples of Juno, Heracles, and Concordia. There are several other structures and temples surrounding the area and recently a theater was discovered nearby that is currently being excavated. It’s an incredible experience to walk among these ruins and ponder the story of humanity from both a personal and public perspective.  To think of the number of narcissistic politicians, ruthless militants, architects, artists, slaves, fathers, mothers and children that rose before dawn and labored until the last possible moment to erect these monuments to human frailty. These temples desperately beg mercy from the gods –  they are symbols of humanity’s perpetual lack of control and power –  The stone itself symbolizing the weight of the unknown, the mysteries of the universe, and the cavalier handling of human suffering by the deities. 

As I write on my laptop, my daughters are both on iPads – one working on a powerpoint presentation about Italy and the other one using drawing tutorials on youtube to improve her skills at creating Manga characters. Hands are forever impossibly difficult.

Their grandfather is in another room aging.

This morning I watched a video of Jimi Hendrix playing his 12 string guitar and I remembered the feeling of hiding in my room at 16 years old listening to “Little Wing” and thinking there was a chance it was all worth it and I might have something to offer the world if I could just live through the next couple of years. A white suburban girl in Pennsylvania saved by Jimi. I did not understand my place in a racist country, my own feminism, nor the dangerous environmental path humans had blazed. What I had was personal desperation and a need to flee. I had no way of understanding all the complexity in that moment but Jimi gave me hope. Transcendent hope. I’ll take it.

As we enter this time named 2017, I’m thinking about being useful, being productive, pushing boulders up hill, and hope.  I’m wondering what I can do to guide these young women into the future with confidence, self-sufficiency and the desire to contribute to change.  Though I am discouraged and frustrated about the political future of the United States and the steep climb ahead, I’m also dusting off the listening ears of my teenage self and hanging on to the act of productivity as a life force, guiding principle, and meditation.

Put the iPads away, girls, and go outside and get some Sicilian sun. I’ll be cooking and listening to “Little Wing” on headphones.  We’ll figure this out too – how to connect the crumbling past with an invented future. Gods be damned.

 

 

but i am uncharacteristically optimistic.

Letter to a Young Artist : on the occasion of his last day in the Studio for Interrelated Media Department at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design

Pozen Center for Interrelated Media
December 15, 2016
Boston, MA

Dear Danny,

This has been one of the most challenging semesters in my teaching memory.   With more than the usual dose of dishonesty, corruption, war, racism, misogyny, and intolerance, it has left some of us shattered, exhausted and demoralized.  Our community has also struggled internally – with high expectations, misunderstandings and disappointments; with not enough fast enough, and with too much too soon.

Then, one of our own, a young, optimistic, free spirit, dies in a fire fueled by the furnishings of nonconformity and risk-taking, while he was doing his job – making the sounds of imagination, expansion and mindfulness. 

And now, here we are with you, in this most forward-thinking, hopeful moment. Shaking your hand and gently nudging you out the door of art school as you finish your academic to do list in this experiment we call home. You have continued to grow, to make art, to push, pull and focus yourself forward. 

You are the reason we are here – your single voice, your signature. You are a unique moment that braids together all that came before you, all that you are, and all that you will do. You are magic. You are light. You are everything that matters. 

I wish for you all the complexities of a journey into the depths of struggle that only artists can plumb, alongside the heights of understanding and clarity that comes with your vision, bravery, and irreverence. Your smile and nervous energy will propel you. Your sense of humor and contemporary click will get you noticed. Your willingness to work hard and connect will sustain you. You are an antidote. 

Though loss is fundamental in the circle of life, in this moment, your presence fills the universe.  You are an artist. And through you we all survive.

With admiration,

Nita

Some historical precedents:

• Letters to a Young Poet, by Rainer Maria Rilke, 1929
• Letters to a Young Artist, by Peter Nesbett (Editor), Sarah Andress (Editor), Shelly Bancroft (Editor), 2006
• Letters to a Young Artist: Straight-up Advice on Making a Life in the Arts-For Actors, Performers, Writers, and Artists of Every Kind Paperback, by Anna Deavere Smith, 2006

Clear and concise list of 50 effects of white privilege.

https://www.deanza.edu/faculty/lewisjulie/White%20Priviledge%20Unpacking%20the%20Invisible%20Knapsack.pdf

testing new facebook connection so that i can spend less time reading other peoples crap

Here are some great resources for how to move forward after the election debacle of 2016 collected by Deborah Weiner, Interim Director of Lifespan Religious Education at Follen Church in Lexington MA. I’m so grateful to have connected myself to the deep thinkers, activists, and caring people in the Unitarian Universalist community:

What Do I Say to My Kids About This Election?

Exhausting day of processing all this…. comforting scared children worried their immigrant father and friends might get sent away… consoling tearful exhausted students that are gay, activist, black, muslim, etc etc.. seeing comments by FBers that are pro-trump.. listening to members of our local UU church talk about how we need to listen to those that are angry and disenfranchised enough to vote for such a person.. sad that i disagree so deeply and profoundly with so many in my own family… scared of the violence that will befall on innocent people by sanctioned sexual predators, racists and militarized and emboldened police … wondering what I can DO to stem the bleeding that the country feels.

7/28/16  #1

This is a poem about truth.

 It seems so subjective sometimes.
Yet events occur, one after the other, in time and space.

Sometimes only the stars witness.

 

When I shake with fear,

When nausea overwhelms,

When there is a deep feeling of knowing,

That is truth.

 

Talk to me, you said.

Communication, you said.

Yes. That is the path towards truth.

So many are so desperate for an exchange. To be heard. To be respected. To be appreciated.

 

Yet threatening is not talking. Blaming is not talking. Assuming is not talking. Telling lies is not talking. Building walls is not talking. Shooting first is not talking.

 

As my country teeters on the precipice of choosing two divergent paths of leadership,

Let’s hope we choose a path towards understanding, equity and acceptance.

And we look inside ourselves to face our mistakes, take responsibility, and do the right thing.

The stakes are high – both salvation and survival.

 

Often doing the right thing is inconvenient. Ask Jesus. You lose some of your power when you share the responsibility and the resources. 

 

Truth is unconditional.

 

This is a poem about love.

 

7/29/16

 

#2

 

This is a poem about children.

They come in many forms – research, novels, buildings, social justice campaigns, major motion pictures, pets, and gardens.

Yet those living, breathing, sweet smelling, poopy versions are unique in their authenticity, magnetic attraction, and complete dependence.

 

They grow, question, disrespect and surpass.

They take what you’ve taught them and up the ante.

They teach you what you didn’t want to know.

 

Because I said so.

I love you.

I hate you.

I’ll always be here for you. No matter what.

You promised.

I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.

 

Mother bears and father rocks,

Attacking, defending, blocking, smashing, cheating, twisting – anything to protect.

 

And this is what it takes to get the job done. To finish the work.

To plow through resistance and rise against gravity.

To publish the book, to get the grant, to save lives.

To make a person.

 

The arc of evolution bends towards survival.

With each generation change occurs.

Each step is a decision, with a tendency to lean right or left, and an invitation to be strong.

 

This is a poem about parenting.

 

7/30/16

 

#3

 

This is a poem about denial.

 

Hoping everything is ok will not make it so.

Praying for me won’t pay my bills or keep the car on the road.

Having faith in magic does not teach me how to use a shovel.

 

Here on earth, my tears always fall downward.

They seep back into the dirt and feed the next chance.

 

If you don’t ask, you’ll never know.

If you don’t want to know….

 

The room is silent, the colors fade, the violins become white noise, and the pepper doesn’t kick.

 

You can only blow away the ghosts when you look in a mirror.

Sorry to interrupt but you look quite scared.

 

I love the blisters on my hands, the scars on my face, and taste of my lemons.

What has made you afraid has made me brave.

Daisies grow towards the sun, not the wall.  And its hot, complicated, and dangerous near the sun.

 

Get in there and dig.  Because keeping it superficial eventually cracks.

 

This is a poem about fear.

 

7/31/16

 

#4

 

This is a poem about Family.

How easily the trust can break,

When not all the facts are in.

Or, how stubborn the ties that bind hold.

New wounds reopen old ones and the cut goes deeper still.

Blood may be thicker. But water quenches thirst, washes away the dirt, and floats us through the rough seas.

I’m held up by the bonds of love, shared experience, and all those hands on deck when I want to move mountains.

It’s a choice.

This is a poem about me.

 

8/2/16

 

#5

 

This is a poem about noise.

 

There is no breathing room in a life of challenge, opportunity, 24 hours news cycle, narcissism and false gods.

 

Impatience,

Stress,

Expectation without understanding,

Thinking in 140 characters, video loops, titles without content.

 

$ and booze ease the pain, relax the tension, loosen the lips.

 

Our failings, uncontrolled, rule the day.

 

Stop

Think first, hold out, wave your arms inside a personal bubble,

Scream in a pillow then write it all down.

 

Waiting reveals

Listening gives

piano soundboard, wings of a hummingbird, drops of rain, refrigerator buzz, distant bark,

in between the lines,

another perspective.

 

It’s cold, honest, and stings.

 

This is a poem about silence.

 

8/4/16

 

#6

 

This is a poem about life.

 

It’s a gift, isn’t it? This fleeting touch down with breath and muscle, 

with carnal excitements and fists of fury.

 

To eat. To feel warmth. To have ideas and freedoms. To enjoy generosity and inspiration.

 

To be loved. To be heard.

 

To see truths under the circus tent. To fight to fix and give voice to the silent.

 

Stealing a moment from filing the claim, or being on time, in order to notice:

 the person, the difference between Cobalt and Egyptian blue, the fallen penny,

and the injustice.

 

Inconvenient, extra, essential, slow.

Often bad, sometimes brilliant, transformative.

Indirect, complex, circuitous, challenging.

The only way to stop time.

 

This is a poem about art.

 

8/12/16

 

#7

 

This is a poem about getting over it.

Recoiling from a sharp dart is not

being any kind of tight.

Holding my defense in place is not

a rigid fragility.

Memory is subjective.

He said, she said. You did, I did.

You are wrong. I am right. 

No, it wasn’t like that. You don’t know how I feel.

 

What matters is the focus on the solution.

To seek the road to the next step, to the moving on, up and over.

Dwelling

on the past is not the same as –

Releasing

the pain,

the misunderstandings,

the mistakes.

 

To dwell is to live in.

To release is to be free – To get beyond it.

 

Strength in vision, integrity, desire:

To shake hands, hug….. to save lives and hearts.

 

The clarity of responsibilities and loyalties.

Honesty: yes.

But extremism only leads to destruction.

 

Is it me or is it you –

feeling unwelcome, disrespected, inconvenienced,

wrongly accused?

 

We are each the sum total of every moment, interaction, loaded comment, impatient brush off, passive aggressive act. 

Start fresh?

Never

Try again?

Always.

 

This is a poem about compromise.

 

8/14/16

 

#8

 

This is a poem about privilege.

 

The few, the hard to find.

Extended to the 1% plus a few friends.

 

Born into it or buy it.

 

Education, the appreciation of aged cheese, to recognize the taste of tannin, and green olive, the sound of crickets with a full belly and your back to an open field.

 

The freedom to take a risk, fall, and get up again for another try.

 

Clean water, warm clothes, a vacation.

Fly your freak flag.

Check the ballot box.

 

To swim in the pool.

 

To walk down a street without suspicion. 

But with respect.

 

This is a poem about rights.

 

8/15/16

 

#9

 

This is a poem about pushing.

 

I want it now. Reaction. Impulse. Primal lurch towards sugar.

Applause, and attention. Laughing at.

Immediate gratification.

 

No thought about the hangover tomorrow morning.

 

But wait… Is the distance too far, the slope too steep?

 

Upstairs brain

Risk benefit analysis

Executive functions and delayed satisfaction

 

Knowing when to stop – read the room, empathize and shift perspectives

Give and take. Laughing with.

Competing joys rather than muscle.

 

This is a poem about playing.

 

8/15/16

 

#10

 

This is a poem about inconvenience.

 

I don’t like talking on the phone. I get antsy. I need to do.

I need to scrub, type, mold, lift, move, glue, organize and fold.

 

To chat for me is like twisting Styrofoam or the screech of a chalkboard.

The greeting cards and thank you notes, the little gifts of acknowledgement and Facebook birthdays.

My sands of time flowing faster away.

 

I’m working on this. 

It’s so easy to create love.

That moment of exchange, of meeting eye to eye, the hug, the quick call.

 

No

Condescending patriarchal savior guilt,

Throwing change to the stop sign begger.

The monthly donations of 35 dollars – to save women, oceans, and the news.

 

It starts at home.

 

I love the ringlets in your hair.

Let me carry that for you.

Hi Dad – I just called to say hi.

 

This is a poem about generosity

 

8/19/16

 #11

This is a poem about what is public.

The common ground good wealth space pursuit of happiness

Fresh air, warming
Faucet water, with and without lead
A drive across state lines, a walk in the woods,
A book to read, a letter to mail.

Taxes. The expectation of civic tolerance.
A gate a fence a hedge a lock a wall a fee a citation a slap a fine
A hoop to jump through.

Property.  The owning class.
Land, yachts, diamonds.

People.
Through debt, servitude, loyalty
Your prisons. My feelings of mistrust, hatred and disgust towards you.

My home my wallet my passwords my thoughts,
My midnight fantasies.
You can’t go there.

This is a poem about what is private.

_end
Nita Sturiale
Summer 2016

 

Attempting to organize and streamline my 20 years of web sites. keep an eye out for a new nitasturiale.com and say goodbye to lots of old html.

My grandfather was born in upstate New York in 1906. Around 1908, he was taken back to his mother’s homeland, Altofonte, Sicily, and stayed there until he was 18. Because his mother insisted that he keep his American citizenship, he received no Italian schooling other than what he learned on the dusty Sicilian streets. Around 1924, during the beginnings of Italian Fascist rule in Italy, he traveled back to upstate New York in the middle of winter with no coat on his back. He escaped the direction of his country and the lack of opportunity for himself. He came to the US and rarely looked back to Sicily for sustenance or guidance – even discouraging his sons to speak the language. His story is not dissimilar to so many immigrants from so many countries – ambitious individuals escaping lack of opportunity or worse and aspiring for something better.

Fast-forward to year 2000, I marry a Sicilian, also in the US for ambitious reasons. However, instead of running away from Sicily, we make a decision to maintain our connection, dependency, and stewardship of our Sicilian family and olive yard. This translates into a month-long trip every summer with our children into the arms of our nonni, cugini, and amici in Agrigento.
For 13 years I have written, photographed, and mulled over my relationship to Sicily, my children, and the complicated clash between tradition and contemporary reality.

As an artist and teacher, I have long been interested in the psychology, biology, and geography of community, learning, and motherhood. I have wanted to make visible the contributions of the lesser celebrated – the mothers, the house-keepers, the farmers, the peddlers, the students, the artists. Currently, Sicily is in economic shambles with 38.8 percent of young people without jobs, twice the national average. Corruption, despondency, and depression is high and locals feel invisible in the global theater. Our grandfathers’ flights continue to have relevancy. Yet, you have never had a peach unless you’ve tasted one from Sicily. The food, the family loyalty, the intense commitment to survival and beauty – I affirm that these assets are to be preserved in a climate of change, globalism, and capitalist bullying. During these many summers, I have prepared myself and my Sicilian supporters to embark on a project that will bring many of these interests together while also providing opportunities for several participants, both Italian and American, to bridge our cultural divide at least for a time.

I am seeking $25,000 from various resources in order to realize the following project.

“Regali”

Each summer I am struck by the treasure-trove of objects in my father-in-law’s house that represent several lifetimes of acquisition. For him each painting, figurine, sterling silver money clip, or vintage car, is a story, a memory, a way of proving the relevancy of his nationality and connection to tradition. Though his generosity with us is extreme and unconditional, we live an ocean and a sea away and these objects inevitably stay with Nonno. Each time his son leaves “home” and returns to the US with his American wife, I feel we chip away at the importance of these objects. Sicilian culture is often sited for its hospitality and warmth. It is true. In Sicily, gift giving is an obsession, a cultural norm and highly refined system. The research of Paul Zak and others has shown that the act of giving has also been linked to the release of oxytocin, a hormone that induces feelings of warmth, euphoria, trust, and connection to others: more generosity, more empathy, stronger community. Giving changes us at a molecular level.

For this project, I will invite 10 artists that will be organized into 5 teams. These teams will meet, interview, and document at least 30 local citizens of Favara, Sicily, a town in the province of Agrigento, in southern Sicily. These will be a broad range of people (bakers, butchers, fishermen, pharmacists, farmers, teacher, mothers, grandmothers, politicians, lawyers, etc.). Each will be asked to offer up an object that will be included in a gallery exhibit of gifts. The artistic teams will draft interview questions and document the citizens via audio/visual means in the particular style that each team chooses. These documents will be exhibited alongside the objects. The artists involved will work side by side for 2-3 weeks in July of 2014, with a physical exhibition to be installed during the last 3 or 4 days of the residency. The exhibition will remain up for a month following the residency and travel to the US to be exhibited at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design (the US exhibit is outside the scope of this grant proposal).

The participating artists will be 5 emerging American artists and 5 emerging Italian artists. We will do a call for artists as soon as possible and choose them based on their portfolios, skillsets, availability and visa status, as well as letters of recommendation. For the 5 American artists, I am particularly interested in bringing Massachusetts College of Art and Design students in their junior or senior year as well as recent alumni. As a MassArt faculty member, I choose Massart because of my personal connections obviously, but also because it represents an arts community dedicated to the public sphere and social action. As the only freestanding, public college of art and design in the US, MassArt has a unique position. All the participating artists should be interested in community -based social practice and international relations, and be skilled in audio/video technology.

I am working closely with “Farm Cultural Park”, a new contemporary arts center in the midst of Favara, founded by Andrea Bartoli in 2010. The Farm is an ambitious and exciting urban renewal project that has transformed the run-down and semi-abandoned heart of Favara into a modern art exhibition and community space. Artists, tourists and locals have come from far and wide and the Farm’s efforts have begun to revitalize Favara. The Farm has several gallery spaces, a bookshop, apartments, and an open mind. They have offered exhibition space, lodging for the visiting artists, as well as logistics and installation support. This collaboration would be the first of its kind with the United States. Additionally, the Farm will choose the 5 emerging Italian artists and facilitate the interactions with the local citizens of Favara.

Lisa Wade, one of the Farm’s member artists, is my Italian co-leader and the liaison with Farm Cultural Park. Lisa is an American-born artist living in Italy for many years. She is a conceptual artist working with socio-political content using video, installation, and painting. She has exhibited all over Europe and the United States. She is an experienced teacher and mentor. As an American woman in Sicily, Lisa shares many of the same perspectives as I do, however, having lived there for so long, she is far more embedded in the culture and more adept in the language. Lisa writes, “As an American living overseas, I am daily switching between English and Italian, American and European perspectives, literal and metaphorical meanings. I often complete sentences in whichever language offers the more descriptive finish. In my art, I use diverse materials as I do different languages. No one material is more significant than the others, I use them all together to express myself to the fullest.” Lisa will as act a mentor for the artistic teams, the artistic director of the gallery installation and my main communication link with the Farm staff. I look forward to working in the months preceding the actual residency with Lisa to prepare the groundwork for July’s visit.
Budget

In addition to this application we are seeking funding from several other sources including a Kickstarter campaign. We plan to approach a Boston-based individual donor with an interest in contemporary art and Italy. I plan to proceed with the project at any level of funding and will make adjustments accordingly. We could work with less artists however the impact will not be the same as it is important that we interview as many Favarians as possible.

About the Artist/
I am defined by my passion as a mother and teacher. I have 2 young daughters (6 and 9) and I have been teaching in the Studio for Interrelated Media at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design for more than 10 years. These two identities flow in and out of each other and both inspire the artwork that I produce. The Studio for Interrelated Media is a unique and groundbreaking undergraduate program that allows for both a highly individualized and an interdisciplinary plan of study. Our students become experts at collaboration, live event production, and articulating their artistic visions. For the last three years, I have been the chair of this department. I teach courses exploring career skills, event planning and production, the intersection of art and science, and multi-media production. I have been a project manager for several large-scale collaborations. During the spring of 2013, my class, Art and Science Immersive Media, produced an original 45 minute full-dome audio/video show at the Boston Museum of Science’s Hayden Planetarium. In 2008, I began a multi-year project in which I gifted 12 Sicilian women gemstone necklaces representing a particular hormone. This project became a website followed by a book. In 2003, I led a team of 5 artists in the first flash-based, GPS-enabled artwalk through the Boston Common as part of the Boston Cyberarts Festival. I speak a fair amount of Italian and have already put in place several organizations and individuals in Sicily ready to begin this project.

Regali will intertwine the fields of fine art, story telling, social practice, education, and community development. It will contribute to the resolve of the Sicilian people to survive in an extremely depressed area during severe recession and continuous corruption. The Farm Cultural Park has already begun to contribute to the livability of Sicily and its revitalization. New hotels and restaurants have emerged and the local medieval castle has been renovated in its wake. This project will further these efforts as well as share the gifts of the Sicilian people with those of us who are seemingly better off. My goal is to trigger conversations about defining the quality of life, the assets of an ancient culture, and how we determine the “best practices” of old and new.

I believe this project will transform the lives of the participating student artists and the citizens of Favara. Because Sicilians are a naturally generous and welcoming people, they will make life-long connections with their interviewers. They will open their homes, invite them in for long meals and conversation. They will form cultural linkages that will extend beyond this project. We will use the gallery space as a way to celebrate their gifts and bring together the town in an action of pride and self-awareness.

This project is symbol of gratitude to my grandfather for his Sicilian heritage, as well as his bravery to seek a better life for himself and his children in America. It is an apology to my father-in -law for taking away his son. It is a promise to my daughters that they will have the power to invent a future for themselves that is the best of both worlds.