Zahida Pirani

Stepping Up in the Silence: An Emerging Artist Leader’s Reflections about the AFTA Convention

Posted by Zahida Pirani, Oct 09, 2015 0 comments


Zahida Pirani

 

I attended this year’s AFTA convention for the first time as an emerging artist leader thanks to the Queens Council on the Arts (QCA) and a grant from the NEA. When QCA’s Executive Director, Hoong Yee Lee Krakauer, invited me to the convention (the NEA grant allows QCA to bring an individual artist every year), I was so thrilled, yet didn’t really know what to expect.

I knew the convention would give me an opportunity to meet interesting people in the field and make connections that would lead to collaboration. As a filmmaker who creates social issue documentaries, I capture the stories and lives of people most marginalized by our society in hopes that it will promote change. So I was interested in connecting with others at the convention with a similar vision.

What I didn’t expect is that the experience would be truly transformative by helping me realize what kind of artist I strive to be and the type of community I hope to build.

It wasn’t until I attended the Arts Leadership Preconference (held at Chicago’s stunning Shakespeare Theater on Navy Pier) that I began to grasp my role in building my own artistic community in Queens. As Ximena Varela, our preconference moderator said: “Leadership is about listening to the silences and saying something when you want someone else to speak up.”

In response to Ximena’s comment, I thought to myself: “Or taking action when you want someone else to do something.” How many times had I sat back, waiting for others to speak up or take initiative to develop a local community of like-minded artists? How many of my peers back home have waited in the silence, doing the same?

As the preconference went on, I knew I had to do more to bring together those artists in Queens who are dedicated to empowering communities and making change.  Artists play important roles in cultural and social movements, but only when we come together and understand our contribution within a larger context. Learning about AFTA’s Emerging Leaders Network at the preconference gave me a model that I could take back home and experiment with to encourage local artists to come together as emerging leaders.

During Ramona Baker’s rousing Meet-and-Greet session, a long-time convention attendee gave me a good piece of advice: “This is your place to figure out where you fit in as an artist on the broader, national level. Then build on that locally.”

At first I was totally confused – how was I going to figure out my place among an overwhelming sea of 1500 convention attendees? So I went up to Ramona after the session, told her who I was, what my interests were and asked her for recommendations of people I should meet. She told me that I needed to find Barbara Schaffer Bacon, Co-Director of Animating Democracy. After searching for what felt like days, Hoong Yee spotted Barbara during our last night in Chicago and introduced me to her. I finally felt like I had found my people!  As a program of AFTA, Animating Democracy inspires, informs, promotes, and connects arts and culture as potent contributors to community, civic, and social change. I look forward to learning more about Animating Democracy and how artists like myself can plug into the program.

Another convention highlight included participating in Friday’s session debate between Ann Markusen and Roberto Bedoya on gentrification. The session drew my attention because I’m currently planning to do a documentary about the gentrification of my neighborhood - Jackson Heights, Queens - one of the most diverse neighborhoods in the country.  The discussion between Ann and Roberto really got me thinking about how I will approach my new project.  My understanding of “Creative Placemaking” or “Placekeeping” was deepened in a conversation over dinner in one of Chicago’s pizzerias with, among others, San San Wong of the Barr Foundation. I asked San San several questions about the history of Creative Placemaking and we talked about Roberto’s explanation of Rasquachification. I’ve been thinking ever since about how to capture my own neighborhood’s creative resilience through film. When I asked Roberto after the session if he knew of any documentaries that effectively captured this, he said: “No, not that I can think of right now. You’ll have to be the first one.” There it was again – stepping up in the silence.

As I begin to embark on the journey to start a local Emerging Artist Leaders Network, I envision a pipeline of artists from Queens who are contributing to the national conversation about promoting cultural and social equity. AFTA will be that place of exchange and engagement for us.

Before attending, I didn’t realize that a national conference on the arts would ignite a fire in me to create community locally. In the process of creating, who knows what it will bring me and my peers and what we will experience? I’m reminded of the poet Antonio Machado’s words that for me capture so well the experience of stepping up in the silence: “Caminante, no hay camino,
se hace camino al andar.” “Traveler, there is no path, paths are made by walking.”

 

Please login to post comments.