Margot Mifflin: Ink Sessions
When a tattoo marks a personal transformation, or the reclaiming of an abused body, the tattoo artist becomes a healer.
Michael Simms: Re-reading Christina Rossetti’s ‘In an Artist’s Studio’
The value of Rossetti’s poem lies in both the expert use of the Petrarchan sonnet, a particularly challenging form to master in English, and in the poet’s complex stance on the role of art in creating and re-enforcing images of women.
Emma Parker: This young woman created 784 paintings while hiding from the Nazis
Together these sequential images tell a family history, focussing on a central character called Charlotte Kann, a semi-autobiographical version of Salomon herself. They document Charlotte’s development as an artist, her struggles against madness and her first love affair, all painted against a backdrop of increasingly violent Nazi rule.
Video: The Moon’s Milk
Narrated by Tom Waits, the film chronicles the last expedition of Captain Millipede and his crew to harvest the milk seeping from the moon’s craters. (13 minutes)
Chris Hedges: The Miracle of Kindness
Take a brief journey through the eyes of American Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges to Jerusalem, Gaza, and Iraq, and discover the sacred bonds that make us human.
Video: A Worthy Man
Night after night Erik works alone in his bakery. His only company is the late-night radio show host whom he persistently attempts to get through to and be honored with “Joker of the Week”. He has gradually become more and more distant to his family, and all his efforts to re-establish the connection seem in vain. A growing depression hurls Erik into a tailspin that in the end culminates in a bizarre cry for help.
Dorothea Lange: The Photographer as Activist
Dorothea Lange not only created a number of iconic images, but she also was a pioneer in the use of photography as a tool in addressing social injustice.
Joan E. Bauer: Brilliant Modernist, Armored Life
Afraid of heights, she stood on ledges.
To onlookers, she’d say:
Buddy, I’m not a nice girl. I’m a photographer.
I go anywhere.
Video: Why we create music
“Music is the highest form of human communication.”
Video: Three dances to welcome the New Year
Here are three of my favorite electro swing performances.
Video: I Quit The Black Eyed Peas. Then They Became Famous.
Kim Hill was a rising singer. She met a young rapper named will.i.am. As their group became famous, she had to make a decision about what kind of performer she wanted to be and how she wanted to be perceived as a woman among men.
Michael Simms: Here are the most popular Vox Populi posts of 2019
In 2019 Vox Populi published 751 posts, usually two per day, resulting in over 8 million views. Here is a list of our most popular posts in 2019 listed by category: poetry, personal essays, political articles, and art/music/cinema.
Video: The Scroll of the Prophet Isaiah
“I work after his voice and do exactly what he says to do… He put up what colors he want. I don’t know about them.”
Video: Pioneer Axe
Filmed in 1964 by the Maine-based photographer and filmmaker Peter Vogt, Pioneer Axe documents the forging of fine axes at Oakland’s last operating workshop, Emerson & Stevens, just months before it, too, was forced out of business.
