Artists Invited to The Daydreamers Club

A young friend of mine, Hawwaa Ibrahim, who was a finalist on the "Project Runway, Jr." television show, is inviting artists working in any medium (fashion, art, dance, music, drama, writing, photography...) to share their stories in a social media "Daydreamers Club."

     Ms. Ibrahim believes art is not a waste of time. In fact, she is of the opinion that the stories artists can tell about their refusal to give up, when they encounter obstacles and setbacks in their artistic endeavors, might provide the inspiration people in all fields need to make the world a better place. She thinks there is a lot to learn from the creative minds that know how to put their imaginations to work overcoming adversity.

     Those artists willing to share stories about how their artistic life began and how they have maintained focus despite difficulties, can go to hellohawwaa@gmail.com. In the subject line, write "I Dream in Daytime, and provide your name, email address, and a description of your artistic work, so Hawwaa can contact you.

   

   

Oscar Nominations Enlighten the World

This year's Oscar nominations for live action short films provide a view of France, Denmark, Hungary, Spain, and Switzerland that is both particular to those countries and inspiring to countries throughout the world.

In Ennemis Interieurs (Enemies Within) and Silent Nights we see French concern for residents from Algeria who might be terrorists and a man from Ghana who finds in Denmark abuse from local and Arab neighbors rather than the income he expected to send to his family back in Africa. In both cases disillusioned men do things they never intended, and we wonder if their new countries could have acted differently to prevent these outcomes.

Sing from Hungary won the Oscar in this category on February 26, 2017. This film tells the story of a friendly elementary school girl with a heart and a new girl who is told by the chorus director to just mime the words to songs because she doesn't have a good voice. By convincing all the children in the chorus to mime the words to every song at a competition, the two clever girls undermine the director who they consider unfair. Children everywhere in the world could benefit from seeing how to treat new kids in their schools and how they can work together to right an injustice.          

Spain's Timecode gives hope to everyone who has ever had a boring job. After his shift as a security guard who watches the cameras that keep an eye on a garage parking lot, he uses the whole garage as a dance floor to practice his moves. The woman who takes over after him sees his performance and decides to do her own routine for the cameras. After the male security guard sees her dancing, they join up for a duet that the manager sees when he is introducing a new guard to the job. The film ends with the new employee telling the manager, "I don't know how to dance."

A woman's daily gesture of waving a Swiss flag at a passing TGV train before she rides her bicycle to her pastry shop leads to an exchange of messages and gifts of cheese between the woman and the train's engineer in  La Femme et le TGV. You never know where simple gestures might lead. 

Back to School with a New Perspective

Preparing for a new school year probably doesn't require the purchase of a harmonica, paint brush, and Thesaurus. Yet Einstein played the violin, Samuel Morse painted portraits, and Galileo wrote poems.

     Study after study shows the value of the arts. Playing music asks the brain to coordinate the notes eyes see and two hands play, to listen, and to recognize rhythms. Add dance and the whole body gets involved. In the process of drawing, painting, sculpturing, and writing stories, essays, and poems, students tap into their creative juices, express emotions, and discover their individual identities. Mistakes are made and corrected just as they are in every subject and life.

     Music, art, and literature connect students to each other, their communities, and the world. One study, for example, found that children who participated in a dance group for eight weeks were less prone to anxiety and aggression compared to a control group. At the same time, the arts promote the creativity and innovation needed to deal with a rapidly changing global economy.

     Consider how one kindergartner used an art project to discover there were two ways to find the total five. While one student had shown five by taking a photo of two red scissors and three blue scissors, another saw five, because the direction of four scissors pointed left and one pointed right. Math and science thrive on the same unexpected discoveries and strategies celebrated in the arts. Is there another way to do something is a question that has produced a Salvador Dali and a Thomas Edison.

Break into a Happy Dance

What do festivals and weddings include? Dancing. Whether dancers are doing a Mexican Hat Dance or Horah to the tune of Hava Nagila at a Jewish wedding, there's a smile on everyone's face. Through the years, the same happy attitude has accompanied the slow graceful French minuet, spirited Italian tarantella, Virginia Reel from Scotland, Irish step dancing, Poland's mazurka and polka, the Sailor's hornpipe, clogging, square dancing, and break dancing by b-boys on the street. Colorful costumes often add to the joy.

  When Michaela DePrince was a hungry little girl living in an orphanage in Sierra Leone, Africa, she saw a magazine picture of a happy ballerina standing on her toes and wearing a pink dress. To be happy, she thought, I want to be like that girl. Defying all expectations, she was adopted and, carrying the picture of the happy ballerina with her, she came to the United States. As soon as her new momma saw the picture, she said, "You will dance." Ballet classes followed, and Ms. DePrince, now one of the few black ballerinas in the world, dances with the Dutch National Ballet. She tells her story in Ballerina Dreams.

     Misty Copeland, who just became the first female African-American principal dancer in the American Ballet Theater's 75-year history, is another happy ballerina. Her memoir, Life in Motion: An Unlikely Ballerina, tells how she pursued her career despite beginning ballet lessons at, for a ballerina, the advanced age of 13.

     Dancing is for the very young and very old. Multicultural Kids (multiculturalkids.com) offers children All Time Favorite Dances on DVD and CD formats and international tunes for dancing on Ella Jenkins Multicultural Children's Songs and I Have a Dream World Music for Children by Daria. Making conversation with two elderly women at a party, I asked how they met. "At folk dancing," one said, and, on the spot, she did a few steps to show me one of their dances. At the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, the Ko-Thi Dance Company (ko-thi.org) gives children and adults lessons in traditional dances from Africa and the Caribbean on Saturday mornings. For world travelers, trips can include learning a few steps after watching hula dancers in Hawaii or girls performing the classic Khmer apsara in Cambodia. Trip planners at AAA.com/TravelAgent promise travelers to Argentina will never forget their private dance lessons at an authentic tango house in Buenos Aires.