The Art Heals Project, Marian Berg

Funding for COLORES was provided in part by: Frederick Hammersley Fund, New Mexico PBS Great Southwestern Arts & Education Endowment Fund, and the Nellita E. Walker Fund for KNME-TV at the Albuquerque Community Foundation... ...New Mexico Arts, a division of the Department of Cultural Affairs, and by the National Endowment for the Arts... and Viewers Like You.

THIS TIME, ON COLORES!

FOUNDER OF THE ART HEALS PROJECT AND A REAL-LIFE WONDER WOMAN, MARIAN BERG, BRINGS JOY AND HEALING TO HOSPITALIZED CHILDREN.

FOR QUIANNA SIMPSON PRACTICING AND TEACHING TRADITIONAL WEST AFRICAN DANCE IS A WAY TO CONNECT TO HER HERITAGE AND LEAD THE NEXT GENERATION INTO ADULTHOOD.

POET LAUREATE FOR RENO, NEVADA, DUSTIN HOWARD, BRIDGES SPACE AND TIME WITH THE POWER OF HIS POETRY.

IT'S ALL AHEAD ON COLORES!

ART IS HEALING >>Marian Berg: Such a traumatic experience to be in the hospital when you're a child.

And they're so scared.

And a lot of kids, they aren't able to express themselves with words, but with art, they can non-verbally get out some of the frustrations and the anxiety they have when being in the hospital.

>>Faith Perez: How did you start Art Heals?

>>Marian Berg: I volunteered in Haiti after the great earthquake of 2010, where it was so devastating.

So I went to volunteer there as a nurse and I brought my art supplies, which I always bring everywhere I go.

And I would be starting IVs, changing dressings, and then in my spare time I'd do art with the kids.

And it was great, you know, because I just saw that it had a really positive effect on them and it helped them calm down and, you know, get engaged in something and get distracted from all the suffering around them.

So when I got back home to the States, I thought I'm, I just wanna do something positive like that.

>>Marian Berg: I, uh, got an art cart together and I go from room to room and see what the children wanna do, and we just make art together and we have a blast.

>>Marian Berg: Sometimes I wear funny hats, you know, clown hats, or I dress up as a clown and, and help them be more comfortable.

And they just always seem to relax.

The kids are amazing.

There's so many wonderful experiences.

I worked with a young girl for years because, uh, she has, uh, cystic fibrosis and she did a self-portrait and it was just so striking.

You know, her in the, in the mountains.

I do a lot of self-portraits with them, and then I have them write positive things about themselves, you know, to encourage positive self- esteem.

This little girl, she's, uh, developmentally delayed.

I worked with her quite a bit throughout her cancer treatment and, um, she just loved to do masks and she'd be in for sometimes weeks, you know, and so she'd wanna do masks, so she had all these masks that we did, <laugh>, you know, we'd hang 'em on the wall, and she just really got a kick out of that.

>>Faith Perez: Tell me about the mural project you did.

>>Marian Berg: Oh yeah.

>>Faith Perez: With the kids at UNM Hospital, the one with the hand prints.

>>Marian Berg: Right.

>>Marian Berg: On the, um, pediatric specialty unit in the Children's Hospital.

They have a conference room and, uh, it was a real kind of depressing room, windowless room.

So they asked me to do a mural and I, uh, made this whole environment of nature and we have the kids' hand prints on the, uh, big tree, and then with the Sharpie, they mark their initials or whatever they wanna write.

And these are kids going through really hard times, really hard times, you know?

Yeah.

So, it's pretty amazing how resilient they are.

>>Marian Berg: It's really magical to watch them express themselves, especially when they're given permission to do whatever they want.

You know, there's no rules and that's one of the few things that they have control over.

Cause in the hospital you don't really have control over anything.

You know, the art making gives them a way of having some kind of control over their environment, you know, choices.

>>Marian Berg: Yeah.

Uh, wonder Woman's, uh, I, one of my favorite superheroes, and I often have the kids draw Wonder Woman, they identify with Wonder Woman, a lot of the girls, you know, and mm- hmm.

<affirmative> and, uh, it, it just, we make a poster size for their room sometimes and it's just fun to do and, and I like to carry her around.

>>Toy Wonder Woman: I'm Wonder Woman!

>>Faith Perez: You are Wonder Woman!

You really are.

You're a superhero.

>>Marian Berg: Well, I'm doing something I really love doing and I'm very grateful to do it.

DRIVE FOR HUMANITY I think I've always loved to move and do rhythm.

My mom said even when I was little, I was clicking my heels to songs and all of those things.

But, really formalized I guess training if you will happened when Susan Bradford, which is my mom's really good friend, I know her as aunt Susan needed dancers And your friends help you out by sending kids to their stuff and It is like a dance troop situation and that is how I really got started in African dance.

At home in my living room, dancing and watching videos before I even joined the troop It was always a sense of happiness and joy.

I loved every second of it.

It is a movie into a children's company where there are also people around me who also enjoy to dance, it was definitely a space that opened up for me to Just do really that, self-expression and have a good time and make friends.

It really just felt like a normal - - another part of life That I just really enjoyed being at and doing.

I think that the learning part was definitely fun.

But it felt more like kinship and friendship and being part of something and that connector feeling that was like, ahhh.

I think the performing was the key to me really knowing that I loved it, that I felt a different sense of confidence and excitement and all of those things.

I always grew up shy and timid.

And, people are like you're always so quiet and then I get on stage and I just explode.

So traditionally in African dance we wear what is called a Lappa.

And it is tying around your skirt so it is like putting on a tutu seeing as you have to wrap It around.

But it is traditionally worn and so in Africa a lot of people wear it as traditional dress for dance.

And then really could be very comfortable and on top of bare feet are very important.

In African dance for us, the way That we use that as a connector to the ground, to the earth, right, to give back into us.

And you could feel the vibrations.

The drum is pounding as it sits on the floor and everybody feels the same vibrations that come Back up through your heels.

So, I think it is awesome.

I think that is what fueled my Passion for live music.

I love dancing to live music.

We do focus on traditional west African dance and it is to Preserve the culture through music and dance.

And I think it is important for us to do that because it continues to give African Americans an understanding that we had a whole life before slavery.

That there were and there still are sisters and brothers of ours That have had freedom this entire time and been able to practice in support and in love through these particular cultures and beliefs that really supported the system that they worked in, this communal idea And I think that is where the focus is on presenting and preserving and showing that.

And I think that is why it is Important for us to stay into what we consider a traditional form.

Right.

We want to show the roots of it.

I start hearing about some of the different things that they were doing over here at Ohio State, which is they had African instructors coming in and looking at those celebrating different kind of works.

And, I have to admit and be honest, when I was younger, Ohio State seemed very far away from me.

I didn't see myself there or a lot of people who looked like me.

I didn't have a problem with it.

It just wasn't my path.

I didn't do ballet, when little girls wither going to class on Saturday morning and putting ballet shoes on and tutus, I was taking my socks and shoes off to hit the floor for African dance.

So, for every recital, I was in the community doing a performance and so, yes, I was able to teach African dance over the last couple of semesters and It is a great.

I love it.

I've been able to take what I've been doing in the community and really add the rigor and the study of it on another level and have the students immerse themselves in that sense.

And that is also been really great for me because I've always Just been working in the community.

So also it gave me an opportunity to relook at how I give information and instruction In this form, and what my duties are to pass that on and make sure I give people a good foundation and information about African dance and how to really study African dance.

And that part has been great.

And so being a part of that movement has been awesome.

I've also been able to be under A new set of tutelage, if you will, about my teachings and how I do the things.

It is two-fold.

I'm getting to share what I love to do.

All of this information and love and passion that's already been, you know, building up inside of me, I'm teaching that, and then I'm also learning new ways to, to do that as well with the instructors that are here.

So, I consider myself a community dancer because I understand how much my community has poured into me.

And this is really a strong sense of responsibility and Importance that I reciprocate That and that you now give that back to the community.

As much as they've given me, I want to give right back to them and share my gift and passion in the sense that you really have This space, these people, these Ideas, these beliefs and systems That we stick together, that we hold each other up.

That we, you know, owe each other a sense of true humanity, is where I think kind of like just lives in me.

And the best way I could think about giving that back to those people and to these spaces is to pour is out in my dance and in my passion and what I do.

[drums] Part of my research at Ohio State and my drive is understanding the importance of when children are young, right, And there is a moment in time or space where pouring into them, Having specific leadership and guidance, having an appointed person to usher them through the little moments which are really difficult as you kind of a teenager changes over.

I think those moments are important and we feed to put a little more focus there so when You do get to, for example, my age, that again that understanding that you were once supported by someone so you may Have that feeling or understanding that there is a little responsibility there to carry the next person.

And I think that is where my drive for humanity comes from and that is borne out of my time with someone guiding me and guiding me through the teenager years.

I got suspended from school, and for anybody, a blemish on my record.

But I did, I got in trouble.

I was a follower.

I didn't stand up for myself sometimes and bad decisions were made, and I was -- I cut school, you know.

Like, so I wasn't perfect.

Things happen.

But because there was someone particularly in place that could connect to me through dance, but connect to me on this thing we call life, that when I got older, I realized I made it through because somebody was Holding my hand.

And, so we kind of call that a rite of passage and that is what It turns over to and that is Where my study is.

My study is here, it is about the rite of passage and the Important of rite of passage to assist and help adolescents make that change from being a child into a young adult, right, and the difficulty of that.

But, understanding that if you give them that really good foundation and that really good, you know, understanding of who they are and who they belong to and have that guiding hand to kind of pull them through, nine times out of ten you come out and you make some dumb decisions but you look back and say I know I made it because.

And that will have that person, One, really want to be a contributing member to their community, to their society.

But also feel the need to return and come back and do the same thing for the next person or the next youth or next child or whoever that is.

A MESSAGE FOR THE FUTURE >>Dustin: Relic.

The last of her kind, she's patches on a rock, half submerged in a saliferous sea, far reaching tides roll freely, unbroken by owe and bow, blown by ocean breeze.

Adults at Siren who wants sang temptation to sailors, she cantillate a closed mouth tune for a theater of forsaken ships.

She wonders why they don't come anymore.

No white sails like clouds on the horizon.

No wooden ships faring the swarthy sea.

In the narrative of every mariner, she is a relic of antiquity.

Singing on a rock until a fog falls and she fades from memory.

My name is Dustin Howard and I am the current City of Reno Poet Laureate.

Poet Laureate is an honorary representative for poetry and the arts in a community.

Usually appointed by a governing body, in my case, the City of Reno.

My role as poet laureate is to be an ambassador for poetry and the arts in our community.

I got into poetry when I was in high school.

My freshman and sophomore English teachers, both did units on poetry and it was something I took to immediately.

Poetry was something that I used to kind of explore myself and kind of the world around me, especially in my first collection of poems.

That was the running theme.

It was deliberately an exploration of memories, starting with the earliest memory that I had, going way back to when I was like three or four years old.

And then it charts, the progression of my growth kind of into adulthood and sort of that journey hitting specific beats and kind of important memories.

That was a very sort of cathartic experience, getting to kind of relive and work back through some of those emotional traumas.

And some of those moments of really pure joy.

Poetry is one of the few mediums that allows an artist like that to connect on a very deep, personal sort of reflective level.

Summer, 1997.

Seven years old and not a care in the passenger seat of mom's red sedan, a Ford I think or maybe a Chevy.

In the backseat, my siblings, three and five.

"Where are we going?"

"Nowhere."

On the radio, the sounds of Summer.

"Mabo Number Five" seems to play on repeat.

It's catchy and we sing along.

Around town running errands, we visit the grocery store at the gas station and the bank.

We stop for lunch, then run some more.

"Where are we going?"

"Somewhere."

On the radio, the Sounds of summer.

I don't know what a scrub is, but I know TLC don't want one.

I sit in the car with my siblings, a coloring book of the "Phantom Menace" in my lap and charge our fruit snacks.

I think I want to be a Jedi.

"Where are we going?"

"Anywhere."

On the radio the sounds of summer, the Latin flare of Carlos Santana is smooth, hotter than that summer sun.

It's time to go back to our father.

She drops us off and says goodbye.

It's dusk and cool and I miss the car, going nowhere, somewhere, anywhere.

On the radio, the Sounds of summer, the auto tuned techno pop of share, trying to believe in life after love.

Grown up now and too many cares to list, I wonder about her that summer, all alone in her red sedan, driving to one of three jobs to make ends meet, to fight for us, as the struggle for custody continued.

On the radio, the sounds of summer.

Did they cut through the quiet in the car?

Does she remember them as fondly as me?

You can find poetry really all around you, not just in poetry books.

Poetry is music.

Poetry is in art.

Poetry I think most importantly is in all of the little moments that you experience in life.

It's those small things that bring you joy.

It's the quiet stillness by the lake.

It's the rush of traffic as you're standing on the street corner.

Poetry is everywhere.

Poetry is really just capturing those very human moments where we are reflective and kind of contemplating ourselves and our place.

It's really kind of all around us.

I always think of John Keats poem, "Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou art," in which the speaker of the poem has his head rested on the chest of his lover and he just wants to stay kind of in that moment for forever.

Here we have somebody writing 200 years ago, about what is a very like real and human emotion that we as readers still connect with.

The power of poetry really is the ability to bridge that gap between space and time.

And to know that someone somewhere hundreds of years ago, felt exactly the same way I might feel now.

There's an opportunity for readers to connect in some big or small way with the words you've put on the page.

And to know that my work, might be making some small difference in a person's life is immensely rewarding for me.

It's kind of like an open letter to the reader.

It's a letter not for me, but for someone, somewhere, someday to open and find themselves in the words and on the page.

"The Table."

I've longed and acquired some time ago, it is the hearth of the family home.

Silent witness to every high and low to gathered relatives who had far roamed.

Its scarred top, keeping record like a tone of cherished occasions and holidays, which in finite detail recounts the way that we like billowed embers with a light, around the old table to set ablaze conversations that burned long through the night.

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"UNTIL NEXT WEEK, THANK YOU FOR WATCHING."

Funding for COLORES was provided in part by: Frederick Hammersley Fund, New Mexico PBS Great Southwestern Arts & Education Endowment Fund, and the Nellita E. Walker Fund for KNME-TV at the Albuquerque Community Foundation... ...New Mexico Arts, a division of the Department of Cultural Affairs, and by the National Endowment for the Arts... and Viewers Like You.