. . . leaves piling and running down the street . . . one of my favourite times . . .

"A New York Philharmonic trumpeter who taught both Wynton Marsalis and Miles Davis died this week. William Vacchiano, who never missed a performance during his 38 years with the New York Philharmonic, was 93. Vacchiano became the philharmonic's principal trumpet player in 1942, seven years after joining. Philharmonic spokesman Eric Latzky called Vachhiano "one of the great trumpet teachers of the 20th century." His teaching career at Julliard spanned nearly seven decades. "(cbc.ca|Teacher of Wynton Marsalis and Miles Davis dies)

:: note :: . . . to all the great teachers of the great . . . more recognition and honor . . . thanks . . .

". . . the first-ever collection of Hiroshi Sugimoto's 'Theater' photographs. To create each image, Sugimoto would take a long-exposure photograph of a cinema screen for the entire duration of a movie, resulting in a blank white screen. 'Different movies give different brightnesses,' he said. 'If it's an optimistic story, I usually end up with a bright screen; if it's a sad story, it's a dark screen. Occult movie? Very dark.' The project was partly the result of wanting to make a simple form visible: 'The simplest forms have authority, like a blank white light. And how do you photograph that? You need a framework to make it visible. But this is not simply white light; it is the result of too much information.'" (eyestorm.com |Hiroshi Sugimoto Theaters, 2000)

"Within the new movement gained through elasticity and plasticity the actor must be a good friend of gravity and know how to play with it. The action in rhythm is to know how to express the inner emotion and psyche externally. Not a reproducing stereotypical gestures but a rigorous study about impulse, gesture and activity in order to transform those into physical actions. An actor's action in rhythm vibrates in the space musically which is in dancing-ness. It is a search for a spatial movement. "(unpublished actors manifesto)

:: note :: . . . more to follow . . .

:: note :: . . . received this e-card from a MoMA exhibit . . . SAFE: Design Takes On Risk | October 16, 2005[^]January 2, 2006 . . . always thought of chains as oppression . . . not as security nor safety . . . hmmm . . .

"'Teachers and students negotiate what counts as knowledge in the classroom, who can have knowledge, and how knowledge can be generated, challenged and evaluated' (p.45). We believe that the context for this negotiation, this social construction of meaning, is always one of power. The teacher and students-teachers inhabit roles that allow them to wield far greater power than their students in the classroom. However, they are also constrained by mandates handed down by the school principal, the school district, and the state. When they step outside of prescribed roles, teachers may be censured by their respective institutions and/or parents. They may be both oppressors and oppressed at the same time (Freire, 1993)."(Teacher Education Quarterly| Behind the Mask and beneath the Story: Enabling Students-Teachers1 To Reflect Critically on the Socially-Constructed Nature of Their "Normal" Practice)

:: note :: . . . masks and power . . .

"First, a disclaimer: the following is a work of non-fiction. As such, it is unlikely to be as vivid, or textured, or as faithful to the author's deepest convictions and emotions as his own fiction, as linguistically adventurous or as revealing about the way it feels to live now as the latest novels by Salman Rushdie or Zadie Smith. I write novels. In fact, I just finished one, which is one reason I was alarmed to hear VS Naipaul declaring recently, in an interview with the New York Times, that the novel was dead. Which would make me, I guess, a necrophiliac. Naipaul essentially argues - stop me if you've heard this one before - that non-fiction is better suited than fiction to dealing with the big issues and capturing the way we live now. "(Guardian | The uses of invention)

:: note :: . . . writing short fiction this summer discovered the same result . . .

"Go get slaughtered and we promise you a long and pleasant life."(ctheory.net | The Rhetorics of Life and Multitude in Michel Foucault and Paolo Virno)

"Constitutions do not create our rights; they recognize and codify the ones we already have, and provide means for their protection. We already possess our rights in two senses: either because our ancestors secured them or because they are inherent in the very idea of being human."(Michael Ignatieff. The Rights Revolution. 28)

:: note :: . . . wondering about the rights revolution . . . the individual and the group . . .

"Ariltotle declares the independence of poetry (lyric, epic, and dramatic) in relation to politics. What I propose to do in this work is to show that, in spite of that, Aristotle constructs the first, extremely powerful poetic-political system for intimidation of the spectator, for elimination of the "bad" or illegal tendencies of the audience. This system is, to this day, fully utilized not only in conventional theater, but in the TV soap operas and in Western films as well: movies, theater, and television united, through a common basis in Aristotelian poetics, for repression of the people."(Theatre of the Oppressed. Augusto Boal.)

:: note :: . . . received this about Boal . . . (Dear Friends, Augusto Boal -- now 74 and in poor health -- has his pension "on hold" in Brazil. He needs emails sent IMMEDIATELY to the authorities in Brasilia so that they will act positively and give Augusto his pension. The pension has been held up for nine years (!). I am attaching a letter that Augsto's lawyer says should be emailed. Because the government will take final action next week, it is urgent that this email letter be sent asap.) . . . the time is past and apparently the email appeal was valuable . . .

"Doesn't it go away as time passes?"

"AS: No. The images of seeing dead people and the physical and visual memories of the terrifying experience are a deeply imbedded neuro-chemical pattern that won't go away. It doesn't work to try to suppress the memories, or to numb one's self with alcohol or drugs, or to relieve symptoms with medications. Some Vietnam veterans still had PTSD twenty years after the war as strong as it was their first year back."

"Is there no hope then?"

"AS: Just the opposite. There is more than hope. The proven way to recover from PTSD is to talk and write about the experience over and over. The goal is not to make the memories go away, but to gain control over them and integrate them into your larger life story."

"An extreme, traumatic experience divides your life into two parts. Life before and life after. Many people never overcome the experience and remain psychological casualties for the rest of their lives. Such folks allow the experience to become their primary identity and they often need help from others to get through daily life."

"The resilient survivors take on the heroic inner journey to get a good life back again. They talk and write about what they went through until they can choose when they will bring up the memories. By choosing to bring the memories back, you gain the ability to not allow them to become active."

"What has fascinated me for many years is that a few people not only fully recover from PTSD, but they discover that the recovery struggle transforms them. They become better than they were before and may start telling others about positive aspects of their experience. For them, life after is better than their life before."(Survivor Guidlines.org|The Psychological and Emotional Effects of Hurricane Katrina On Survivors: From PTSD to Resilient Immunity)

:: note :: . . . lots more in the interview . . . lots of work . . . lots of listening . . . lots of questions . . .

. . . this summer a seris of posts on The Experience Designer Network provoked thought around learning, education, credentialing . . . archived in various Themes they present wonderful personal reflections and broad experiential commentary . . . schooling is often extremely disheartening but the engagement with learners is ultimately immeasuralby enriching . . . to observe the transformative energy of dreams and imagination to release action and creativity can be humbling . . . i treasure this 'job' called 'teacher' returning each term to the state of 'beginning' . . .

. . . there has been mention of Jarry's Ubu Roi lately . . . in my first year university an inspired drama artist/teacher Raymond Clarke, who taught all the acting classes from first to fourth year, staged an unforgettable Ubu . . . it was a class exercise and the actors were placed in boxes . . . the exercise was to give character through box and voice . . . the result was a play full of ubuesque brilliance . . . many times i have sworn to reenact the event . . . years later my enthusiasm was considerably dampened by an equally forgettable attempt . . . a university production of bourgeois triviality . . . Raymond Clarke was one of those rare individuals . . . passionate, challenging and caring . . . his intelligence of feeling needs to be nurtured & sustained . . .

. . . back into full term . . . all classes fully underway . . . the room is hot . . .

. . . on the move . . . pictures to follow . . .

. . . being away was good . . . back to the cycle of beginning . . .