WOMEN WARRIORS
These past few weeks have offered me the opportunity to be in companionship with women warriors – not the kind of warriors who shoot to shed blood, but the kind who shoot to shed light, who walk the walk, talk the talk, play the sax, speak truth, and bless the water.
They have crossed my path in various ways and have touched my spirit this past New Moon season. In birth order:
About the Collage
Josephine Mandamin on one of her many WaterWalks. The joyful Joy Harjo. Diane Nash marching to Nashville City Hall with other activists, where she skilfully maneuvered the mayor into publicly supporting integration, which resulted in the merchants in downtown Nashville agreeing to the movement’s demands. Kara Walker in her studio. Julie Dash. The Stonewall Jackson monument that Kara Walker took apart and reconfigured.
Diane Nash
Diane Nash, born in 1938 and still with us, began her lifetime as an activist during the Nashville Sit-In movement of 1960. My friend Sasha Couch and I recently facilitated a roundtable discussion on that movement, the first in what we intend to be a series on successful nonviolent social justice campaigns in the United States. As we researched to prepare for our gathering, Diane Nash stood out, her voice and her eyes so clear.
Josephine Mandamin
Josephine Mandamin was born on February 21, 1942 and left this realm on February 22. I think of her often, but I take extra time to remember her on both those days. I had the privilege and honor to share bits of space with her over time. She changed my life. She is the original WaterWalker, and speaks of walking around the Great Lakes here. Here’s a wonderful children’s book about her by her friend Joanne Robertson. And Canada made a stamp in her honor!
Barbara McCullough
Barbara McCullough, born in 1945, is a wondrous filmmaker. When we were colleagues in the visual effects industry way back when, she often spoke of her film in progress, a poetic meditation on the life of jazz genius Horace Tapscott. Her devotion, persistence, and creative vision resulted in the film Horace Tapscott: Musical Griot, which was screened recently at the Getty Museum to a sold-out crowd. I’ve been dancing on clouds ever since, transported by Tapscott’s music and McCullough’s artistry.
Joy Harjo
Joy Harjo, born in 1951, is a poet, activist, and sax player whose memoir, Poet Warrior, I recently gobbled down. She is literally a national treasure! She was the United States Poet Laureate for three terms! Her book spoke to me, as we both came up surrounded by activist artists in ye olde 1960s, plus she has a lot to say and tell and does it so very well.
Monuments Exhibit in Los Angeles
The beautiful, creative, diverse city of Los Angeles, where I’ve spent most of my time for almost half a century now, always has so much art to offer in every discipline that many opportunities pass me by or I can’t get to them. But there was no way I was going to miss the Monuments exhibit at MOCA. Some of the women warriors whose pieces are included in this vast collection include:
Julie Dash, born in 1952, worked with and alongside Barbara McCullough at the UCLA Rebellion film program. Her film Homegoing is a healing soundbath created in the wake of the murders at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina in 2015. The sounds and the shafts of light in the film burrowed deep for me.
Kara Walker, born in 1969, co-curated the Monuments show. Her piece “Unmanned Drone” is a disassembled and reconfigured Stonewall Jackson monument that takes up a magnificent amount of space. Stills or even videos of it don’t do it justice. If you have a chance to see it at The Brick Gallery in Los Angeles, do.
Nona Faustine, born in 1977, is known for her self-portraits taken at sites imbued with the history of enslavement. Several of these are included in the exhibit. Beautiful, bold, and brave.
Each of these goddesses bravely walks her own unique route as she speaks of or shows us liberation in its many facets. I’m grateful to witness their teachings, offerings, hearts. What a month it has been of opening to receive glory and sorrow, mending with the balm of truth, and tending the fire.