WEBVTT Kind: captions Language: en 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.759 uh thank you catherine and uh welcome to our latest conversation this 2 00:00:05.759 --> 00:00:10.000 is a series of conversations on the arts and humanities and libraries and 3 00:00:10.000 --> 00:00:13.920 museums uh we've already had a conversation with 4 00:00:13.920 --> 00:00:16.880 andrew roberts for uh from the national churchill 5 00:00:16.880 --> 00:00:20.240 museum on the 75th anniversary of the iron curtain speech and 6 00:00:20.240 --> 00:00:24.240 the great film critic uh david thompson uh and upcoming 7 00:00:24.240 --> 00:00:28.720 uh conversations will be with lonnie bunch the director of the smithsonian 8 00:00:28.720 --> 00:00:33.120 francine pros the great novelist uh john palfrey of the macarthur foundation 9 00:00:33.120 --> 00:00:36.079 julian zuguz zagoidia the director of the 10 00:00:36.079 --> 00:00:40.559 nelson museum in kansas city carol anderson 11 00:00:40.559 --> 00:00:46.800 robert putnam and marianne wolff uh it should be a a great a great lineup but 12 00:00:46.800 --> 00:00:51.120 we have a star with us today jane chu who is 13 00:00:51.120 --> 00:00:56.559 uh i think he was the 11th uh chair of the national endowment for the 14 00:00:56.559 --> 00:01:00.879 for the arts uh long time friend um fellow kansas 15 00:01:00.879 --> 00:01:04.640 city and and i want to start jane uh by asking a 16 00:01:04.640 --> 00:01:09.680 crucial question who is jane choo you you have 17 00:01:09.680 --> 00:01:13.280 you have this remarkable background and i've i've heard you 18 00:01:13.280 --> 00:01:17.680 uh before and watched to watch some of your interviews uh talking about 19 00:01:17.680 --> 00:01:22.880 uh your parents and their journey uh to the united states and where you grew 20 00:01:22.880 --> 00:01:26.000 up what to tell us a little bit about your parents 21 00:01:26.000 --> 00:01:29.520 and uh and their journey to the united states 22 00:01:29.520 --> 00:01:32.799 oh well first of all thank you so much for letting me join you 23 00:01:32.799 --> 00:01:37.119 um if i had to characterize my life it really would be 24 00:01:37.119 --> 00:01:42.079 sort of a jux juxtaposition of two different orbits that don't usually 25 00:01:42.079 --> 00:01:45.119 uh seem like they would interact with each other 26 00:01:45.119 --> 00:01:49.439 but yes my parents were both from china though they met in chicago 27 00:01:49.439 --> 00:01:54.479 and i was born in oklahoma and grew up in arkansas so 28 00:01:54.479 --> 00:01:58.640 uh philadelphia arkansas what a great name 29 00:01:58.640 --> 00:02:02.560 it was named it's about a town of um ten thousand 30 00:02:02.560 --> 00:02:06.320 but it's got two universities and i think it was named after 31 00:02:06.320 --> 00:02:10.479 similar to philadelphia would be the arc of brotherly love 32 00:02:10.479 --> 00:02:14.080 and and the university which is very important in your childhood and 33 00:02:14.080 --> 00:02:17.280 and through on through college what what she did is that 34 00:02:17.280 --> 00:02:22.480 did i pronounce it correctly washita anyway sorry washington 35 00:02:22.480 --> 00:02:27.360 and so my father was a an economics professor there 36 00:02:27.360 --> 00:02:32.319 where i grew up and uh it really was about 37 00:02:32.319 --> 00:02:37.680 my life being a combination of bok choy and corn dog 38 00:02:37.680 --> 00:02:42.400 and so i i love bok choy and and corn dogs bok choy at home and 39 00:02:42.400 --> 00:02:45.680 corn dogs uh in in in school with your friends 40 00:02:45.680 --> 00:02:49.200 no doubt and and and speaking chinese at home 41 00:02:49.200 --> 00:02:53.680 and and my parents i regret that my parents 42 00:02:53.680 --> 00:02:57.840 uh that i wasn't speaking to them actively in chinese because they really 43 00:02:57.840 --> 00:03:02.480 wanted me to assimilate and and when i was growing up nobody was 44 00:03:02.480 --> 00:03:05.200 chinese in arkansas it really felt like i don't 45 00:03:05.200 --> 00:03:10.400 think even they were chinese restaurants so it really was 46 00:03:10.400 --> 00:03:14.000 assimilating but certainly i heard chinese and 47 00:03:14.000 --> 00:03:18.720 uh now regret it but i'm taking lessons again 48 00:03:19.519 --> 00:03:22.480 which is interesting and i'll be interested to talk to you a little bit 49 00:03:22.480 --> 00:03:24.239 later on when we look at some of your own 50 00:03:24.239 --> 00:03:28.159 art um i want to talk to you about about about your immersion 51 00:03:28.159 --> 00:03:34.159 in in chinese language and and culture i and you you're one of the few if not 52 00:03:34.159 --> 00:03:37.920 the only uh uh chinese uh family 53 00:03:37.920 --> 00:03:41.920 and you're of course born in oklahoma so you're a chinese-american but 54 00:03:41.920 --> 00:03:47.920 um uh college and in arkadelphia i assume so 55 00:03:47.920 --> 00:03:52.799 that must have been um alienating or uh 56 00:03:52.799 --> 00:03:56.400 concerning in in any way growing up uh or 57 00:03:56.400 --> 00:04:00.720 were was it easy to make friends i had a lot of friends 58 00:04:00.720 --> 00:04:07.360 and so but i didn't uh see myself in anybody i uh interacted with 59 00:04:07.360 --> 00:04:12.239 and so it really was a combination of it really wasn't until i was an adult 60 00:04:12.239 --> 00:04:16.639 and i visited other cities including washington dc that i saw a more 61 00:04:16.639 --> 00:04:20.239 international flavor by just looking around and i do 62 00:04:20.239 --> 00:04:26.080 remember the first time i saw many a whole group of 63 00:04:26.080 --> 00:04:30.800 chinese uh and almost i almost fainted because i had not 64 00:04:30.800 --> 00:04:35.680 uh grown up by seeing anybody else who looked like me other 65 00:04:35.680 --> 00:04:39.280 than my mom and dad and and your father died when you were 66 00:04:39.280 --> 00:04:44.639 very young uh and and so he was uh 67 00:04:44.639 --> 00:04:51.120 he was uh ill and uh with cancer and then died when i was nine and you 68 00:04:51.120 --> 00:04:54.160 talked about how that your introduction to the arts in a way 69 00:04:54.160 --> 00:04:58.479 at that point the piano was very important uh to you that it was 70 00:04:58.479 --> 00:05:01.280 something you were able to use in uh in those 71 00:05:01.280 --> 00:05:06.080 terrible circumstances it really was uh one of the ways that i have 72 00:05:06.080 --> 00:05:10.160 uh learned the importance of the arts because my parents 73 00:05:10.160 --> 00:05:13.919 spoke another language that was native to them 74 00:05:13.919 --> 00:05:20.479 and i spoke english at a nine-year-old i didn't have enough words for 75 00:05:20.479 --> 00:05:24.639 vocabulary to express my own grief of the loss of my parent and maybe 76 00:05:24.639 --> 00:05:28.400 many nine-year-olds don't but i really didn't because 77 00:05:28.400 --> 00:05:31.440 my parents spoke chinese and i spoke english so 78 00:05:31.440 --> 00:05:35.440 i found out that those piano lessons that i was being forced to take 79 00:05:35.440 --> 00:05:39.199 at eight and nine and i was drawing lessons 80 00:05:39.199 --> 00:05:43.039 they were a vocabulary for me and that i could actually 81 00:05:43.039 --> 00:05:47.440 uh have the arts as a way of expressing myself 82 00:05:47.440 --> 00:05:52.160 way beyond just everyday conversational linear everyday use of words 83 00:05:52.160 --> 00:05:55.759 i could i could feel like i was more holistically 84 00:05:55.759 --> 00:05:59.039 uh expressing myself through my vocabulary 85 00:05:59.039 --> 00:06:06.160 of the arts so i saw a very important uh link of how arts can do that for 86 00:06:06.160 --> 00:06:09.520 people i it seems to me and i think we'll talk 87 00:06:09.520 --> 00:06:12.800 a little bit more about this as we get to the future of uh libraries and 88 00:06:12.800 --> 00:06:16.560 museums in the future of the arts and humanities that the arts really are 89 00:06:16.560 --> 00:06:22.400 a language and and a language that can be a language of self-development uh 90 00:06:22.400 --> 00:06:27.600 for for people coming from many uh or any uh background uh but but i do 91 00:06:27.600 --> 00:06:30.479 wanna i wanna ask you another couple of questions about 92 00:06:30.479 --> 00:06:33.520 about your childhood because i think this is interesting and 93 00:06:33.520 --> 00:06:37.039 uh and important your mother took a job at wachita 94 00:06:37.039 --> 00:06:41.360 uh uh college uh and you lived in a dorm where she was sort of the dorm 95 00:06:41.360 --> 00:06:46.479 mom you know known as mom chew um but you showed your entrepreneurial 96 00:06:46.479 --> 00:06:52.240 instincts which i think defines you uh tell us the the story about how you 97 00:06:52.240 --> 00:06:56.639 made some money uh off uh off mom chew and her position 98 00:06:56.639 --> 00:06:59.840 uh oh i'm trying to think back about ways i've done that 99 00:06:59.840 --> 00:07:04.400 you got a nickel if i just the story i've heard that you've told before is 100 00:07:04.400 --> 00:07:08.720 that you you you've charged a nickel for 101 00:07:08.720 --> 00:07:12.479 oh well one one of the things and uh i probably did that i have 102 00:07:12.479 --> 00:07:16.479 no doubt that i probably did that but one of them your mother did inspections 103 00:07:16.479 --> 00:07:20.720 of the of the dorm right and then i turned around and charged a nickel too 104 00:07:20.720 --> 00:07:24.240 you charged a nickel to let people know in advance that she was coming around 105 00:07:24.240 --> 00:07:28.319 well i would not put that past me yeah and i see having known you as the ceo of 106 00:07:28.319 --> 00:07:30.319 the co the kauffman center for the performing 107 00:07:30.319 --> 00:07:32.960 arts and is the chair of the national endowment 108 00:07:32.960 --> 00:07:37.280 i recognize that entrepreneurial uh instinct 109 00:07:37.280 --> 00:07:41.360 talking about the way i would i had a ready audience by being able to go 110 00:07:41.360 --> 00:07:45.840 around and sell girl scout cookies to every room so that was another option 111 00:07:45.840 --> 00:07:50.639 there you go exactly my point and and and i do and i do want to reveal this 112 00:07:50.639 --> 00:07:57.120 because it's it's another form of art you know it's a style art art and style 113 00:07:57.120 --> 00:08:02.400 um that you uh you went to college at wachita too and graduated from wichita 114 00:08:02.400 --> 00:08:07.520 um and uh you were the homecoming queen 115 00:08:07.759 --> 00:08:11.039 this is on the website i found this on the website of washington where they 116 00:08:11.039 --> 00:08:14.879 have they do they have a big a big section of the website of washi talk 117 00:08:14.879 --> 00:08:17.919 colleges about you and you were the homecoming queen 118 00:08:17.919 --> 00:08:22.240 so i just want everyone to know that we have the homecoming queen we watch utah 119 00:08:22.240 --> 00:08:26.639 college here um so i'm going to skip over an another 120 00:08:26.639 --> 00:08:32.080 major part of your uh uh your resume your history which is the many degrees 121 00:08:32.080 --> 00:08:35.039 of many uh uh degrees in in the arts and 122 00:08:35.039 --> 00:08:39.360 professions your mbas and phds and whatnot we're just it's a given that 123 00:08:39.360 --> 00:08:42.240 you have these not to mention honorary degrees as well 124 00:08:42.240 --> 00:08:45.600 which are also earned degrees in their in their in their own way 125 00:08:45.600 --> 00:08:49.040 but you became the uh eventually the the ceo 126 00:08:49.040 --> 00:08:52.399 of the kauffman center for the performing arts in kansas city 127 00:08:52.399 --> 00:08:57.279 this is a really important moment in kansas city's cultural history maybe 128 00:08:57.279 --> 00:09:01.279 in many ways maybe the most important moment in kansas city's 129 00:09:01.279 --> 00:09:07.680 cultural history and um is it an extraordinary uh uplifting of 130 00:09:07.680 --> 00:09:11.279 the spirit of of the city and and you were involved in that 131 00:09:11.279 --> 00:09:14.000 but one of the things i want you to talk a little bit about because it's 132 00:09:14.000 --> 00:09:17.279 something that um that i relate to in a very personal 133 00:09:17.279 --> 00:09:21.839 way my mother uh was the founder of the original 134 00:09:21.839 --> 00:09:24.399 performing arts foundation in kansas city and 135 00:09:24.399 --> 00:09:27.920 brought evelyn lehrer in to do handles julius caesar and his celebration of 136 00:09:27.920 --> 00:09:32.240 virgil thompson and whatnot and so i like to think that it's you and 137 00:09:32.240 --> 00:09:36.880 the performing arts center are sort of her millennial descendants 138 00:09:36.880 --> 00:09:39.120 but also we what i really want you to talk 139 00:09:39.120 --> 00:09:44.640 about though is the importance of women as as the creators of this cultural 140 00:09:44.640 --> 00:09:49.519 moment in kansas city so it's you as the ceo of the kauffman center julia 141 00:09:49.519 --> 00:09:54.000 irene kaufman who organized as a tribute to her mother and 142 00:09:54.000 --> 00:09:57.120 her mother's interest in in the arts the funding and the 143 00:09:57.120 --> 00:10:03.040 organization of this uh adele hall hallmark cards uh family 144 00:10:03.040 --> 00:10:07.440 uh and and shirley helzberg who you and i were talking about earlier a friend 145 00:10:07.440 --> 00:10:13.200 um who really uh four women you four women got together and and did 146 00:10:13.200 --> 00:10:17.440 this over uh objections and resistance from 147 00:10:17.440 --> 00:10:20.640 the civic community that was really pretty substantial the 148 00:10:20.640 --> 00:10:24.880 one must say nearly all male nearly all white male 149 00:10:24.880 --> 00:10:29.120 uh civic institution tell us a little bit about how that happened in your view 150 00:10:29.120 --> 00:10:33.279 of women in the arts well i was really proud to be part of 151 00:10:33.279 --> 00:10:37.839 that wonderful project and i there were so many people as you have 152 00:10:37.839 --> 00:10:40.880 named and uh so many women leaders i'd also throw 153 00:10:40.880 --> 00:10:45.200 in jan kramer from the greater foundation but all of 154 00:10:45.200 --> 00:10:48.880 them have played significant roles in creating an 155 00:10:48.880 --> 00:10:51.279 environment where the arts can thrive the arts and 156 00:10:51.279 --> 00:10:56.880 the humanities and so i came on board when there was 157 00:10:56.880 --> 00:11:00.000 ground breaking so i had hard hat hair for five years 158 00:11:00.000 --> 00:11:05.440 before we opened but the ways that all of the people that you've 159 00:11:05.440 --> 00:11:09.519 named contributed to creating that environment they just 160 00:11:09.519 --> 00:11:14.000 they just stood in there and even if there was 161 00:11:14.000 --> 00:11:18.399 some hesitancy of other people wondering if there should even be a 162 00:11:18.399 --> 00:11:20.959 performing arts center this really is something that 163 00:11:20.959 --> 00:11:24.560 muriel kaufman really wanted and so julia 164 00:11:24.560 --> 00:11:27.920 irene kaufman gets the credit for sticking to 165 00:11:27.920 --> 00:11:35.200 her resolve to have this but i was i remember a decade earlier 166 00:11:35.200 --> 00:11:38.399 long before i ever thought i would be the ceo 167 00:11:38.399 --> 00:11:42.079 of the kauffman center i remember reading the market surveys about 168 00:11:42.079 --> 00:11:46.800 how they wanted to plan for this and so all along the way you can see various 169 00:11:46.800 --> 00:11:51.279 phases of how these women contributed to 170 00:11:51.279 --> 00:11:55.680 making it from a dream which was really a drawing on a napkin 171 00:11:55.680 --> 00:12:00.160 all the way to opening in 2011 and it's thriving 172 00:12:00.160 --> 00:12:05.839 and and you know julia irene and you had a devotion to excellence so she she 173 00:12:05.839 --> 00:12:09.360 got mosha softy you got mosha softy to to be the the 174 00:12:09.360 --> 00:12:13.360 architect and it's a stunning design you know what one of the things that's 175 00:12:13.360 --> 00:12:17.760 interesting and that is a tribute to the to the the importance of the arts and 176 00:12:17.760 --> 00:12:20.880 we'll talk a little bit about the arts and the pandemic and post pandemic in a 177 00:12:20.880 --> 00:12:24.480 minute but we keep building these great 178 00:12:24.480 --> 00:12:27.519 monuments to to to the arts this has happened in the 179 00:12:27.519 --> 00:12:30.000 library world as well where we built these great 180 00:12:30.000 --> 00:12:33.279 we're renovating these great central libraries we're building these 181 00:12:33.279 --> 00:12:37.440 performing arts centers the great halls get somebody like moshe soft to design a 182 00:12:37.440 --> 00:12:40.639 signature building and it's almost like these have become 183 00:12:40.639 --> 00:12:46.959 the cathedrals of our our civil religion uh if you will 184 00:12:46.959 --> 00:12:53.920 and sometimes people um in addition to maybe us a cathedral or a 185 00:12:53.920 --> 00:12:57.519 some kind of a monument i know one of the things 186 00:12:57.519 --> 00:13:00.720 julia kaufman wanted is for this building to be 187 00:13:00.720 --> 00:13:07.360 uh so accessible and so comfortable to all walks of life and so that was 188 00:13:07.360 --> 00:13:11.360 the mantra that we followed and so if you think of 189 00:13:11.360 --> 00:13:15.440 a venue like that as being a place for the community 190 00:13:15.440 --> 00:13:21.760 i don't necessarily mean that it is a community center but i do mean 191 00:13:21.760 --> 00:13:25.279 how do you make sure that people from all walks of life 192 00:13:25.279 --> 00:13:28.880 uh feel like they belong in there and there's multiple ways to do it but it 193 00:13:28.880 --> 00:13:32.959 really had to be that way and i think this is one of the best opportunities 194 00:13:32.959 --> 00:13:35.839 for the arts and the humanities museums libraries 195 00:13:35.839 --> 00:13:42.480 to be that place where someone can say uh similar to the author is it ray 196 00:13:42.480 --> 00:13:47.040 oldenburg who wrote that book about the third place where if your 197 00:13:47.040 --> 00:13:51.120 first place my home and your second place might be work where's that third 198 00:13:51.120 --> 00:13:55.199 place where you feel like you belong uh the arts and the humanities have an 199 00:13:55.199 --> 00:13:59.279 opportunity to create those places where all can feel like they 200 00:13:59.279 --> 00:14:04.240 belong each in their own ways right our our friend our mutual friend 201 00:14:04.240 --> 00:14:08.800 julian zugos agueria got lonnie bunch in a conversation a couple of nights ago 202 00:14:08.800 --> 00:14:14.560 uh that i was able to watch and uh and and he this is sort of a theme of their 203 00:14:14.560 --> 00:14:18.480 conversation uh julian asked this question of lonnie 204 00:14:18.480 --> 00:14:22.800 are our art centers museums in particular 205 00:14:22.800 --> 00:14:26.959 are are they uh community centers and lonnie said 206 00:14:26.959 --> 00:14:30.560 no they're not community centers but they should be 207 00:14:30.560 --> 00:14:34.639 centers of the community and it's essentially what you you just said 208 00:14:34.639 --> 00:14:38.800 it's something where everybody's welcome it's it's a it's a place where 209 00:14:38.800 --> 00:14:42.079 people gather from all parts of the community uh 210 00:14:42.079 --> 00:14:45.920 and it's and i think in the case of the kauffman center which is such a good 211 00:14:45.920 --> 00:14:50.320 example of this because softie's design is wonderful it's really 212 00:14:50.320 --> 00:14:53.120 open to the communities wonderful views of 213 00:14:53.120 --> 00:14:58.399 uh the downtown the crossroads and uh you see a lot of kansas city union 214 00:14:58.399 --> 00:15:01.360 station and liberty memorial the world war one 215 00:15:01.360 --> 00:15:07.040 museum etc um and uh it uh it is a focus it's 216 00:15:07.040 --> 00:15:10.480 something to be proud of i mean even if you don't go to the opera 217 00:15:10.480 --> 00:15:13.519 or the ballet or the symphony it's something you'd be proud of for 218 00:15:13.519 --> 00:15:17.360 your city and then what you did for the opera of 219 00:15:17.360 --> 00:15:21.279 the ballet and the symphony raised all of them up i can remember the 220 00:15:21.279 --> 00:15:25.120 new york times reviews of the first performances 221 00:15:25.120 --> 00:15:28.160 which you know bro put kansas city on a cultural 222 00:15:28.160 --> 00:15:31.279 map and and and lifted the aspirations i think 223 00:15:31.279 --> 00:15:34.800 uh of of of all those and of course speak with some 224 00:15:34.800 --> 00:15:39.440 uh prejudice about the opera my wife being the director of the opera but 225 00:15:39.440 --> 00:15:42.560 the general director of the opera but i think they've all reached 226 00:15:42.560 --> 00:15:45.839 an extraordinary level and it's had something to do with the aspiration that 227 00:15:45.839 --> 00:15:49.360 you put into it it also has something to do with 228 00:15:49.360 --> 00:15:53.360 something that i have learned just from my bok choy corn dog lifestyle 229 00:15:53.360 --> 00:15:55.839 and that is 230 00:15:56.000 --> 00:16:01.680 it's not a time to uh force fit everybody to have to like the same thing 231 00:16:01.680 --> 00:16:04.160 this is a night this is a time to celebrate 232 00:16:04.160 --> 00:16:10.480 different identities uh different life different uh perspectives and i 233 00:16:10.480 --> 00:16:13.920 learned a lot of uh practical steps even at the 234 00:16:13.920 --> 00:16:18.480 kauffman center for the performing arts on how do you embrace uh because you 235 00:16:18.480 --> 00:16:21.279 know on the if i put my business hat on i might say 236 00:16:21.279 --> 00:16:24.160 something like let's figure out the one program 237 00:16:24.160 --> 00:16:27.199 that everybody will like and that's just not 238 00:16:27.199 --> 00:16:31.839 uh realistic people like different things it's like different restaurants 239 00:16:31.839 --> 00:16:37.360 people like different kinds of food but if you can find uh a menu of 240 00:16:37.360 --> 00:16:43.440 options uh that reaches out to um a different set of perspectives and 241 00:16:43.440 --> 00:16:47.120 honor the different ways of the different 242 00:16:47.120 --> 00:16:50.800 likes and the different dislikes and the different identities uh 243 00:16:50.800 --> 00:16:55.759 perspectives uh that's the way a venue like that can 244 00:16:55.759 --> 00:17:02.079 uh be there for the community well and and so that that leads me to to my next 245 00:17:02.079 --> 00:17:05.039 question and and the the goblin center's a good 246 00:17:05.039 --> 00:17:08.799 example of that what you did at the nea i think uh 247 00:17:08.799 --> 00:17:12.640 is also uh important in this regard and and so your 248 00:17:12.640 --> 00:17:16.240 your views are uh are important to me on this subject 249 00:17:16.240 --> 00:17:20.000 uh the the former secretary of state our last secretary of state before our 250 00:17:20.000 --> 00:17:24.000 current secretary of state uh on exiting uh the state department 251 00:17:24.000 --> 00:17:26.959 said we are not a multicultural nation and i sort of 252 00:17:26.959 --> 00:17:33.360 fell out out of my chair um uh you know thinking thinking about how i 253 00:17:33.360 --> 00:17:36.720 grew up in kansas city which you know is probably not the most 254 00:17:36.720 --> 00:17:40.960 multicultural place in america or the world uh but where i grew up with 255 00:17:40.960 --> 00:17:44.000 the nelson and you know the great chinese collection 256 00:17:44.000 --> 00:17:46.880 and the chinese exhibit and the great native american 257 00:17:46.880 --> 00:17:51.520 uh uh collection and the great native american exhibit sacred circles that 258 00:17:51.520 --> 00:17:55.360 that they did and um and and and then you know what you've done it 259 00:17:55.360 --> 00:17:59.200 at the at the center for the performing arts but are 260 00:17:59.200 --> 00:18:03.039 are we a multicultural nation or are we not a multicultural nation 261 00:18:03.039 --> 00:18:06.480 there is a wonderful article that uh harvard 262 00:18:06.480 --> 00:18:10.559 sociologist nathan glaser wrote a few years before he passed 263 00:18:10.559 --> 00:18:17.600 and um the subheading was intriguing but pretty much said are 264 00:18:17.600 --> 00:18:21.039 we a melting pot in america or are we a 265 00:18:21.039 --> 00:18:26.080 nation of nations and when i grew up as a little kid 266 00:18:26.080 --> 00:18:32.880 melting pot was a common term used because it did record it represented 267 00:18:32.880 --> 00:18:36.400 say all the ingredients that go into a stew and a lot of the ingredients 268 00:18:36.400 --> 00:18:41.440 will be different from each other but right now we are a nation of nations 269 00:18:41.440 --> 00:18:48.799 and having grown up again in my bok choy corn dog lifestyle it is totally 270 00:18:48.799 --> 00:18:53.039 possible to have both one perspective and the 271 00:18:53.039 --> 00:18:55.840 other uh it doesn't have to be either this 272 00:18:55.840 --> 00:19:00.400 versus that it can be both this and that and i find 273 00:19:00.400 --> 00:19:03.440 that in my own uh creativity and i certainly see that 274 00:19:03.440 --> 00:19:07.360 in the creation and the arts and the humanities that 275 00:19:07.360 --> 00:19:11.120 when you create for at least a moment you have to 276 00:19:11.120 --> 00:19:15.520 suspend uh your uh judgment on what 277 00:19:15.520 --> 00:19:19.679 how things are supposed to be and venture into that world of 278 00:19:19.679 --> 00:19:24.000 uh ambiguity and venture into the world of um 279 00:19:24.000 --> 00:19:29.520 of where you suspend your judgment and you say how do i create 280 00:19:29.520 --> 00:19:33.840 i just i've just been given a blank canvas and it's totally possible 281 00:19:33.840 --> 00:19:37.679 to have both this and that as opposed to you win 282 00:19:37.679 --> 00:19:44.320 and i lose or vice versa so i would say nations yeah you've used that phrase 283 00:19:44.320 --> 00:19:46.880 before that that i win doesn't me have to mean you 284 00:19:46.880 --> 00:19:50.880 lose maybe we both win which i think is a a a great thing 285 00:19:50.880 --> 00:19:56.160 there's a a a larger cultural language that we all 286 00:19:56.160 --> 00:20:00.080 almost all of us speak at some time or another but we need to maybe learn to to 287 00:20:00.080 --> 00:20:03.679 speak it more often which which is about curiosity among other 288 00:20:03.679 --> 00:20:08.960 things that it's about imagination um and and we should be interested it seems 289 00:20:08.960 --> 00:20:11.840 to me in in the various communities that go up 290 00:20:11.840 --> 00:20:16.159 you call them nations and i think that's uh that that's true uh i i think of them 291 00:20:16.159 --> 00:20:20.159 as the communities within the community that go to make up the larger community 292 00:20:20.159 --> 00:20:23.760 and i want to know about you know when i became a librarian in kansas city i 293 00:20:23.760 --> 00:20:26.960 found out we had we had a a reasonably significant 294 00:20:26.960 --> 00:20:30.640 filipino community in kansas city we had the 295 00:20:30.640 --> 00:20:34.080 second largest croatian american community in the united states 296 00:20:34.080 --> 00:20:37.120 neither of which i knew before i became a librarian and which i thought was 297 00:20:37.120 --> 00:20:41.120 wonderful we should celebrate uh and and and we and we did and they 298 00:20:41.120 --> 00:20:43.840 had fun the individual communities the rest of the 299 00:20:43.840 --> 00:20:47.679 community had fun finding out about this you know getting the provitits of bread 300 00:20:47.679 --> 00:20:52.000 or uh learning about the the philippine the philippines 301 00:20:52.000 --> 00:20:55.440 relationship to the united states over the last 150 years 302 00:20:55.440 --> 00:20:59.360 um you know i think it's a uh it seems to me a great thing 303 00:20:59.360 --> 00:21:04.240 and it and it enriches us to be a multi multicultural nation 304 00:21:04.240 --> 00:21:09.440 yes and one of the reasons i think that uh there's never been a better time 305 00:21:09.440 --> 00:21:12.799 for the arts and the humanities to be able to be those 306 00:21:12.799 --> 00:21:19.840 uh centers in the community is because we already live that suspension of 307 00:21:19.840 --> 00:21:24.720 judgment when we're creating we already know what it's like to get 308 00:21:24.720 --> 00:21:28.640 very energized by having somebody give us a blank canvas 309 00:21:28.640 --> 00:21:32.960 when uh other people are saying this has never been done before so we don't know 310 00:21:32.960 --> 00:21:36.480 what to do uh we don't typically uh we're in an 311 00:21:36.480 --> 00:21:39.840 environment where we don't get stuck at that kind of thing so 312 00:21:39.840 --> 00:21:43.280 instead of feeling like there's any kind of a scarcity well i don't want 313 00:21:43.280 --> 00:21:49.039 to give you that because i'll lose this uh it's the opposite more is more is 314 00:21:49.039 --> 00:21:52.880 better and more begets more because when you create you start 315 00:21:52.880 --> 00:21:55.520 expanding your imagination and you start dreaming 316 00:21:55.520 --> 00:22:00.960 and then you can turn it into reality and and so when when you became the 317 00:22:00.960 --> 00:22:04.400 chair of the of the nea obviously this is a a kind of 318 00:22:04.400 --> 00:22:06.480 thing that you needed to be thinking about 319 00:22:06.480 --> 00:22:08.640 it's kind of thing i think about every day 320 00:22:08.640 --> 00:22:12.000 uh the diversity of the country the multicultural nature of the country 321 00:22:12.000 --> 00:22:15.120 and some people whose stories have been left out 322 00:22:15.120 --> 00:22:19.440 uh of our story and you know as a chinese american 323 00:22:19.440 --> 00:22:22.559 to immigrant parents you know something about that that 324 00:22:22.559 --> 00:22:27.120 the chinese and the the the the japanese american stories which are very 325 00:22:27.120 --> 00:22:30.320 important stories going back to the 19th century 326 00:22:30.320 --> 00:22:34.320 um and and before but certainly the 19th century 327 00:22:34.320 --> 00:22:38.159 haven't been well told until very recently when we were starting to 328 00:22:38.159 --> 00:22:43.520 to uh to hear about them and you know can the nea the neh the imls can we play 329 00:22:43.520 --> 00:22:46.799 a role in in telling those stories and making 330 00:22:46.799 --> 00:22:52.000 them part of the larger story absolutely and uh you already are uh 331 00:22:52.000 --> 00:22:54.000 asking the right questions how do we tell 332 00:22:54.000 --> 00:22:58.000 the stories and stories is at the heart of stories is a really 333 00:22:58.000 --> 00:23:01.840 a wonderful avenue to highlight all the different 334 00:23:01.840 --> 00:23:04.960 perspectives all the different identities and all the different ways to 335 00:23:04.960 --> 00:23:08.240 belong and another way is it's just a very 336 00:23:08.240 --> 00:23:11.919 simple uh one relationship at a time i learned 337 00:23:11.919 --> 00:23:14.559 that when i was at the nea and we traveled to 338 00:23:14.559 --> 00:23:19.039 all the states uh and uh we could see that uh 339 00:23:19.039 --> 00:23:23.120 the arts in this particular that in that particular case in one state 340 00:23:23.120 --> 00:23:28.240 would be different from the arts in another state and so if i had come in 341 00:23:28.240 --> 00:23:33.200 expecting every state to handle and express themselves through 342 00:23:33.200 --> 00:23:37.840 the arts in a certain way uh and i wouldn't 343 00:23:37.840 --> 00:23:40.880 it just wouldn't have worked because that isn't the way 344 00:23:40.880 --> 00:23:46.960 uh it everybody was able to honor uh the arts in each state each in their 345 00:23:46.960 --> 00:23:51.039 own ways and yet everyone was dedicated to making sure that the arts could 346 00:23:51.039 --> 00:23:56.480 thrive each in their own ways that's really uh very key to not 347 00:23:56.480 --> 00:24:00.320 feel like we would have to go to scale and have everybody 348 00:24:00.320 --> 00:24:05.120 force fit into the same mold it is not at all 349 00:24:05.120 --> 00:24:09.600 uh threatening to celebrate the different types of 350 00:24:09.600 --> 00:24:12.640 uh ways of expressing ourselves and creating uh 351 00:24:12.640 --> 00:24:16.799 in fact it's a it's uh both and and uh you can have it all 352 00:24:16.799 --> 00:24:20.880 when it comes to the arts and humanities well i feel that you know in in missouri 353 00:24:20.880 --> 00:24:23.200 we can claim pretty much to be the uh the center 354 00:24:23.200 --> 00:24:28.480 of culture in the world because we we have uh you know of course mark twain 355 00:24:28.480 --> 00:24:32.320 and tsley perhaps our two to greatest poet and greatest writer 356 00:24:32.320 --> 00:24:36.559 generally we have langston hughes uh and aaron douglas who sort of you 357 00:24:36.559 --> 00:24:39.279 know between the two of them they created the harlem renaissance 358 00:24:39.279 --> 00:24:42.559 uh black elk speaks was actually written by john neihart 359 00:24:42.559 --> 00:24:47.360 and at the university of missouri um i i can go i can go on with this 360 00:24:47.360 --> 00:24:50.080 but i was thinking recently i was thinking of a story that relates to 361 00:24:50.080 --> 00:24:54.000 missouri and you might know what one of the two people um guillobad 362 00:24:54.000 --> 00:24:58.159 do you know at all he's the o and h okay um 363 00:24:58.159 --> 00:25:04.400 the great architect um well his father churra obada who was intern during the 364 00:25:04.400 --> 00:25:07.600 second world war was a japanese immigrant in 1903 365 00:25:07.600 --> 00:25:13.279 taught at berkeley from 1933 to 1954 but was interned during the war and and 366 00:25:13.279 --> 00:25:17.279 and gil went to washington university to prevent from 367 00:25:17.279 --> 00:25:21.440 being interned became a a great architect 368 00:25:21.440 --> 00:25:27.039 and recently churro obama's painting he's a wonderful painter uh was shown at 369 00:25:27.039 --> 00:25:30.640 the smithsonian the museum of american art um was the last 370 00:25:30.640 --> 00:25:34.000 exhibit before the pandemic actually and i was thinking about it 371 00:25:34.000 --> 00:25:38.880 guillot designed this air and space museum of the smithsonian 372 00:25:38.880 --> 00:25:42.080 and i was the and you know there is no more american museum 373 00:25:42.080 --> 00:25:46.240 than the the air and space museum and his father who does 374 00:25:46.240 --> 00:25:49.600 these wonderful delicate sort of combinations of 375 00:25:49.600 --> 00:25:52.799 modernist 20s and 30s painting influenced by 376 00:25:52.799 --> 00:25:56.240 by various american and european artists but also 377 00:25:56.240 --> 00:26:00.559 very much related to his japanese heritage these elegant uh 378 00:26:00.559 --> 00:26:04.400 paintings of uh yosemite and the sierra nevadas 379 00:26:04.400 --> 00:26:08.159 that you know could be a 19th century japanese print and i'm thinking the 380 00:26:08.159 --> 00:26:13.360 juxtaposition of of churro obama's beautiful paintings in the air and space 381 00:26:13.360 --> 00:26:17.679 museum a few blocks away uh created by a you know now missouri 382 00:26:17.679 --> 00:26:21.039 native geo obada i thought i thought was a 383 00:26:21.039 --> 00:26:24.960 tremendous example of our multicultural heritage 384 00:26:24.960 --> 00:26:29.520 which is also a very american story in a very american heritage 385 00:26:29.520 --> 00:26:33.760 very much so and your ability to point that out is a very important thing 386 00:26:33.760 --> 00:26:38.640 that's how we will tell those stories yeah yeah yeah so at the na you sort of 387 00:26:38.640 --> 00:26:41.679 mentioned this that uh uh in passing but i think you know i 388 00:26:41.679 --> 00:26:45.440 want to highlight it one of you a signature accomplishment is 389 00:26:45.440 --> 00:26:49.840 you you hit all 50 states um very very few 390 00:26:49.840 --> 00:26:52.559 federal bureaucrats can do what you you did i 391 00:26:52.559 --> 00:26:55.840 know now as being a similar federal bureaucrat of 392 00:26:55.840 --> 00:26:58.320 course i have the pandemic which is a little bit of a 393 00:26:58.320 --> 00:27:04.960 an anchor uh on on travel but um you visited 400 sites is that right 394 00:27:04.960 --> 00:27:08.880 i did now i you know i'm sitting here regretting that i did not get to go to 395 00:27:08.880 --> 00:27:11.440 some of these jurisdictions i so wanted to go to 396 00:27:11.440 --> 00:27:15.039 puerto rico and guam and a few other places but i did hit the 397 00:27:15.039 --> 00:27:18.559 states and uh traveled from one place to the other i'm 398 00:27:18.559 --> 00:27:21.919 pretty confident i know i've been to every major airport and know where all 399 00:27:21.919 --> 00:27:28.640 the vegan sandwiches are since i eat vegan but no it it really was 400 00:27:28.640 --> 00:27:32.320 fly away from one state and fly to the next 401 00:27:32.320 --> 00:27:36.399 and make sure that mindset i was ready to embrace 402 00:27:36.399 --> 00:27:39.520 what i was going to be engaged in going forward 403 00:27:39.520 --> 00:27:42.559 as opposed to trying to compare one state 404 00:27:42.559 --> 00:27:47.039 to the previous state well i think i think it's a very impressive thing if 405 00:27:47.039 --> 00:27:50.480 a federal agency and and and you're making 406 00:27:50.480 --> 00:27:53.600 choices the way the nea the neh and the imls 407 00:27:53.600 --> 00:27:57.840 are are required to do it's what we do we make grants based on 408 00:27:57.840 --> 00:28:04.000 on quality on standards some standards set by congress or the administration 409 00:28:04.000 --> 00:28:07.760 various external uh things uh and to try and be 410 00:28:07.760 --> 00:28:16.159 fair to to to the 330 or 40 million uh american taxpayers and citizens 411 00:28:16.159 --> 00:28:20.159 uh it's very very difficult and the effort that you made i think is 412 00:28:20.159 --> 00:28:24.720 is really pretty extraordinary um yeah yeah 413 00:28:24.720 --> 00:28:27.919 so some some of your your other accomplishments i mean you had some 414 00:28:27.919 --> 00:28:32.559 signature programs the create creativity connects uh program 415 00:28:32.559 --> 00:28:36.159 creativity has been a very important word to you 416 00:28:36.159 --> 00:28:40.559 creative force talk about that a little bit uh well the creativity connects 417 00:28:40.559 --> 00:28:45.279 really stemmed from the fact that we were recognizing that are 418 00:28:45.279 --> 00:28:49.840 noticing that um many people were going through a 419 00:28:49.840 --> 00:28:53.679 transition in the arts and especially because of 420 00:28:53.679 --> 00:28:59.039 the presence of the internet where uh arts different disciplines and 421 00:28:59.039 --> 00:29:02.640 categories would be separate from each other and we're all 422 00:29:02.640 --> 00:29:09.120 starting to have a giant mashup and the same say musicians in one area 423 00:29:09.120 --> 00:29:13.440 might also be doing gigs in another area that seemed like they didn't match up 424 00:29:13.440 --> 00:29:20.000 or sometimes museums would have some type of an exhibition that included 425 00:29:20.000 --> 00:29:23.360 a music portion and it wasn't just a 426 00:29:23.360 --> 00:29:28.960 musical accompaniment to the visual arts it was the type of 427 00:29:28.960 --> 00:29:32.080 integrated exhibition where if someone took 428 00:29:32.080 --> 00:29:36.000 extracted the musical part the whole exhibition would 429 00:29:36.000 --> 00:29:40.880 go away so this giant mashup was coming together and that creativity connects 430 00:29:40.880 --> 00:29:45.440 was a celebration of how we all work together 431 00:29:45.440 --> 00:29:49.840 how we come together in a mashup so we gave a few grants out 432 00:29:49.840 --> 00:29:55.279 related to those who were innovating by bringing arts together either with 433 00:29:55.279 --> 00:29:58.159 other arts or maybe it was arts and science and 434 00:29:58.159 --> 00:30:01.520 maybe it was other things like that in terms of 435 00:30:01.520 --> 00:30:05.760 creative forces that was a recognition of how the arts 436 00:30:05.760 --> 00:30:10.720 played such a key role in our service members who were affected by 437 00:30:10.720 --> 00:30:14.799 combat induced psychological health conditions 438 00:30:14.799 --> 00:30:22.240 tbi pts and the medical professionals were saying 439 00:30:22.240 --> 00:30:29.679 that when arts therapy from visual arts to music and dance and 440 00:30:29.679 --> 00:30:36.080 all kinds of other ways it seemed like our service members who were affected 441 00:30:36.080 --> 00:30:39.279 with those conditions seem to be able to manage their pain 442 00:30:39.279 --> 00:30:43.600 more uh relationships started getting better again with their families 443 00:30:43.600 --> 00:30:46.960 and so the creative forces program is about expanding 444 00:30:46.960 --> 00:30:52.000 to reach all of our veterans as well as military service members who had 445 00:30:52.000 --> 00:30:58.000 uh undergone such uh trauma so so we we hear about the healing arts 446 00:30:58.000 --> 00:31:00.399 but really the arts themselves have become 447 00:31:00.399 --> 00:31:04.880 uh to to a significant stent about healing and i wonder what your feeling 448 00:31:04.880 --> 00:31:09.840 is we've gone through a period where the racial protests last year and of course 449 00:31:09.840 --> 00:31:13.600 they continue uh but the significance is a kind of 450 00:31:13.600 --> 00:31:18.399 racial turning point in american history that and which 451 00:31:18.399 --> 00:31:25.039 which now includes uh asian pacific uh uh members of our community 452 00:31:25.039 --> 00:31:28.240 uh with the outbreak of some violence there 453 00:31:28.240 --> 00:31:34.640 um and and talk a little bit about the the uh the place of the arts in the the 454 00:31:34.640 --> 00:31:38.559 in the in the various uh divides that we have in the country 455 00:31:38.559 --> 00:31:41.919 the racial divides the political divides the economic divides 456 00:31:41.919 --> 00:31:47.440 can can the arts play a a healing role well they absolutely can 457 00:31:47.440 --> 00:31:53.760 um i think uh of a an old fable and i don't know who created this story 458 00:31:53.760 --> 00:31:57.919 uh a long time ago but if you ever find out i'd love to attribute it to 459 00:31:57.919 --> 00:32:01.840 whomever but the uh there's this story about 460 00:32:01.840 --> 00:32:05.200 how somebody's walking alongside the riverbank 461 00:32:05.200 --> 00:32:08.399 and they turn and look at the river and there's a body 462 00:32:08.399 --> 00:32:11.600 floating down the river so the person jumps in the river 463 00:32:11.600 --> 00:32:14.640 and pulls the body out and saves that person 464 00:32:14.640 --> 00:32:19.200 and so the per the person walks continues to walk along the riverbank 465 00:32:19.200 --> 00:32:22.880 and notices another body floating down the river 466 00:32:22.880 --> 00:32:26.399 jumps in saves it pretty soon there's all kinds of bodies floating down the 467 00:32:26.399 --> 00:32:28.960 river and all kinds of people are jumping into the river 468 00:32:28.960 --> 00:32:33.279 to try to save these bodies and then finally somebody asks the question 469 00:32:33.279 --> 00:32:37.279 why are there so many bodies floating down the river well there's upstream 470 00:32:37.279 --> 00:32:40.799 somebody else says there is a bridge that has a hole in it 471 00:32:40.799 --> 00:32:44.880 and people don't recognize that or they don't see the hole and they fall through 472 00:32:44.880 --> 00:32:50.240 and somebody needs to fix the bridge so when you ask these questions about 473 00:32:50.240 --> 00:32:55.120 how can the arts and humanities museums libraries and the like 474 00:32:55.120 --> 00:33:01.120 play a role in uh recognizing different identities what 475 00:33:01.120 --> 00:33:05.360 what they can do so well is they can be there to help create an 476 00:33:05.360 --> 00:33:08.159 environment where not only people can thrive but 477 00:33:08.159 --> 00:33:10.880 they they can notice they they're part of the environment 478 00:33:10.880 --> 00:33:13.440 that can say wait a minute that bridge is broken 479 00:33:13.440 --> 00:33:17.519 and or it's at least rickety and we need to uh be there to help 480 00:33:17.519 --> 00:33:22.080 shore it up uh so that people feel safe by walking across the bridge and know 481 00:33:22.080 --> 00:33:26.000 that they're not going to be harmed and so there's something about the 482 00:33:26.000 --> 00:33:30.559 presence of the arts and the humanities museums and libraries that creates an 483 00:33:30.559 --> 00:33:34.320 environment a presence that says wait a minute i think this place is 484 00:33:34.320 --> 00:33:37.519 thriving because it's recognizing that we're creating 485 00:33:37.519 --> 00:33:41.519 a place where it is not only safe but energizing 486 00:33:41.519 --> 00:33:45.679 i feel like i belong that's where the arts and humanities play 487 00:33:45.679 --> 00:33:50.399 a better role uh right now than probably anybody because they know 488 00:33:50.399 --> 00:33:54.480 that they are not stuck they're in this creativity mode where they can say 489 00:33:54.480 --> 00:33:57.919 uh we can help uh it doesn't have to be stuck in 490 00:33:57.919 --> 00:34:01.600 it's never been done this way before so now we get to uh because we know how to 491 00:34:01.600 --> 00:34:06.159 create something out of nothing well it seems to me the bridge is a is a 492 00:34:06.159 --> 00:34:10.000 great metaphor in and of itself connecting communities 493 00:34:10.000 --> 00:34:12.399 and you know the the the view from the middle of the 494 00:34:12.399 --> 00:34:16.240 bridge if you get a chance to slow down and get out of your car and take a 495 00:34:16.240 --> 00:34:21.679 take take a look you can see both sides of the river and you can see up and down 496 00:34:21.679 --> 00:34:25.520 the river and it's a pretty spectacular view it's a better it's a better view 497 00:34:25.520 --> 00:34:31.040 than the view from just one side well i sure uh as much as we love uh the 498 00:34:31.040 --> 00:34:35.280 arts and humanities or we would not have been involved the way we've been 499 00:34:35.280 --> 00:34:42.000 i sure want to recognize that they play such a huge role 500 00:34:42.000 --> 00:34:45.200 not only in the development of their own heart form 501 00:34:45.200 --> 00:34:50.720 or their own you know writings history not only that that is that in itself is 502 00:34:50.720 --> 00:34:55.280 so important but uh they play a huge role in just the 503 00:34:55.280 --> 00:34:59.200 presence of the community more than they could probably articulate themselves 504 00:34:59.200 --> 00:35:04.160 uh by creating that environment where people feel like they belong 505 00:35:04.160 --> 00:35:07.599 yeah and you know uh horace says in the ours 506 00:35:07.599 --> 00:35:12.000 poetica that that the poet tries to to create something useful 507 00:35:12.000 --> 00:35:18.480 uh and uh also something that delights and uh the the the truth about the the 508 00:35:18.480 --> 00:35:23.760 arts and and and the humanities uh is that there's there's delight uh 509 00:35:23.760 --> 00:35:27.359 in in what we do the the the world of art the world 510 00:35:27.359 --> 00:35:30.880 of music the world of literature is is so 511 00:35:30.880 --> 00:35:34.960 so full of delights that we should all share and we should be so happy to share 512 00:35:34.960 --> 00:35:38.640 what we know about something with someone else and and to invite them 513 00:35:38.640 --> 00:35:42.960 to share uh share uh with us uh as well 514 00:35:42.960 --> 00:35:46.640 um just hearing that seems to be is something we do 515 00:35:46.640 --> 00:35:50.240 in the with the arts and the humanities that we're not doing enough 516 00:35:50.240 --> 00:35:54.640 in this country with each other well i would absolutely agree that 517 00:35:54.640 --> 00:35:58.640 there are so many opportunities for the arts and the humanities 518 00:35:58.640 --> 00:36:04.960 not only to recognize but be that glue uh that can bring us together and 519 00:36:04.960 --> 00:36:08.960 uh so the other thing i wanted to ask you about and 520 00:36:08.960 --> 00:36:14.160 and and this has become a huge uh part of our discussion about the various 521 00:36:14.160 --> 00:36:20.720 uh divides is the question of equity and how we make up for the the uh 522 00:36:20.720 --> 00:36:26.400 uh the lack of uh serving certain parts of our community 523 00:36:26.400 --> 00:36:31.599 through our history the uh uh the uh the under under-resourced 524 00:36:31.599 --> 00:36:34.320 parts of our community if you will in many 525 00:36:34.320 --> 00:36:40.000 cases deliberately uh uh so um what in 526 00:36:40.000 --> 00:36:44.800 grant making institutions like the nea or the imls 527 00:36:44.800 --> 00:36:48.240 can we can we do something about that can we 528 00:36:48.240 --> 00:36:52.079 include socio-economic uh statistics can we 529 00:36:52.079 --> 00:36:57.760 can we think in terms of uh long-term justice i mean equity really means 530 00:36:57.760 --> 00:37:01.359 justice it's it's certainly a focus of the biden administration 531 00:37:01.359 --> 00:37:05.200 um are there ways for us to to to work on that 532 00:37:05.200 --> 00:37:08.720 certainly uh there are and there uh every you've named 533 00:37:08.720 --> 00:37:12.640 uh some good ones because uh just by saying things like 534 00:37:12.640 --> 00:37:17.599 recognizing uh even the data on it is an opportunity you have at your 535 00:37:17.599 --> 00:37:22.079 fingertips so many wonderful uh so many wonderful agencies in the 536 00:37:22.079 --> 00:37:27.920 federal government that do have access to figuring out 537 00:37:27.920 --> 00:37:34.480 where there isn't equity but i think right now uh sharing stories 538 00:37:34.480 --> 00:37:40.000 is a wonderful place to start however uh through your art or humanities form 539 00:37:40.000 --> 00:37:43.359 that you do a story or calling attention to 540 00:37:43.359 --> 00:37:46.720 something uh just like you just did with the air 541 00:37:46.720 --> 00:37:50.320 and space museum that people didn't know before is a 542 00:37:50.320 --> 00:37:53.680 really tangible practical first step there's 543 00:37:53.680 --> 00:37:57.520 something about telling stories and you see plenty of them out there 544 00:37:57.520 --> 00:38:00.960 that need to be highlighted so that the people do understand there's 545 00:38:00.960 --> 00:38:05.280 some great things going on out there and some of them have been marginalized 546 00:38:05.280 --> 00:38:07.839 in the past but now is the time to really 547 00:38:07.839 --> 00:38:12.880 uh point attention to them when i started the library one of the 548 00:38:12.880 --> 00:38:16.960 first stories i i tell this particularly in museum 549 00:38:16.960 --> 00:38:21.280 groups um one of our branch managers said she she 550 00:38:21.280 --> 00:38:24.079 was taking a group to the nelson atkins art museum 551 00:38:24.079 --> 00:38:28.400 and one of one of her patrons in the library came up and said i can't go 552 00:38:28.400 --> 00:38:32.000 and she said why can't you go and he said i don't own a tie 553 00:38:32.000 --> 00:38:36.880 and uh you know that represents one of our the problems with high culture in 554 00:38:36.880 --> 00:38:41.040 in in this country uh is that there is a sense that it's 555 00:38:41.040 --> 00:38:45.040 for the elite and and it doesn't include everybody 556 00:38:45.040 --> 00:38:48.960 and you know i know i know that your view is is the opposite of that but how 557 00:38:48.960 --> 00:38:52.400 do we work on that how do we make sure that we invite everybody 558 00:38:52.400 --> 00:38:58.800 in well you uh you can do it probably in several ways and one of them is to 559 00:38:58.800 --> 00:39:01.839 stay in communication with the communities 560 00:39:01.839 --> 00:39:06.079 all along the way some of this wearing a tie stuff 561 00:39:06.079 --> 00:39:09.680 also has something to do with not having an 562 00:39:09.680 --> 00:39:13.520 ongoing community relationship with each other 563 00:39:13.520 --> 00:39:17.119 and bringing people along and helping them to know that they belong 564 00:39:17.119 --> 00:39:21.680 so i'd certainly start there it's an ongoing relationship not a one-time 565 00:39:21.680 --> 00:39:28.079 uh one-trick pony yeah i i took a group of kids from gladstone 566 00:39:28.079 --> 00:39:30.400 elementary school in the kansas city school district to 567 00:39:30.400 --> 00:39:34.880 the kemper museum and there was this fabulous docent there and 568 00:39:34.880 --> 00:39:39.520 the museum had a a portrait exhibit from the 569 00:39:39.520 --> 00:39:42.400 national portrait gallery from the smithsonian um 570 00:39:42.400 --> 00:39:46.720 included amy sherrold and various very well-known artists 571 00:39:46.720 --> 00:39:52.240 um and she did this great job she said she told the kids after explaining what 572 00:39:52.240 --> 00:39:54.640 what the exhibit was about and showing them around 573 00:39:54.640 --> 00:39:58.240 she said pick your your favorite painting and your least favorite 574 00:39:58.240 --> 00:40:01.280 painting so they all went around and did that and then 575 00:40:01.280 --> 00:40:06.000 she said now explain why and she took all them seriously and 576 00:40:06.000 --> 00:40:10.400 at the end of this a little exercise they all felt some 577 00:40:10.400 --> 00:40:14.240 ownership of the exhibit uh which i thought was it was really it 578 00:40:14.240 --> 00:40:17.520 was really fascinating and and those kids will come back to a 579 00:40:17.520 --> 00:40:21.520 museum feeling some sense of ownership of the of the 580 00:40:21.520 --> 00:40:25.920 museum they'll feel that they're they belong there that's right that's 581 00:40:25.920 --> 00:40:28.880 exactly right and not only because the museum had 582 00:40:28.880 --> 00:40:32.160 wonderful objects to offer but because they were 583 00:40:32.160 --> 00:40:35.280 recognized uh without judgment you know you 584 00:40:35.280 --> 00:40:40.400 reminded me uh when you said that of a comment that julia irene kaufman 585 00:40:40.400 --> 00:40:42.960 the chair of the kauffman center for the performing arts 586 00:40:42.960 --> 00:40:46.319 was saying as we were all getting ramped up and opening and 587 00:40:46.319 --> 00:40:49.440 she she really felt like the building was a 588 00:40:49.440 --> 00:40:55.599 place for the next generation and so we would bring in thousands of kids but 589 00:40:55.599 --> 00:40:58.880 she kept saying you know i really don't care if they 590 00:40:58.880 --> 00:41:03.599 even fall asleep if they're engaged in some performance 591 00:41:03.599 --> 00:41:05.839 that they're watching i just want them to 592 00:41:05.839 --> 00:41:11.200 feel like they belong in this building because this will be available for them 593 00:41:11.200 --> 00:41:15.119 sometimes it's the expectation of are we you know are you sitting up straight no 594 00:41:15.119 --> 00:41:18.720 i just want you to feel like you belong here that's a great first step 595 00:41:18.720 --> 00:41:22.800 that is you're so right so and now i want to shift gears a little bit and i 596 00:41:22.800 --> 00:41:26.000 want i i think we have some of your own art 597 00:41:26.000 --> 00:41:29.839 you as after segwaying out of the the nea 598 00:41:29.839 --> 00:41:33.440 and and uh some consulting work you did for pbs 599 00:41:33.440 --> 00:41:37.280 on this idea of collaborations at the local level you're doing your own 600 00:41:37.280 --> 00:41:41.359 artwork and we're showing some of it uh now and i want you to talk a little 601 00:41:41.359 --> 00:41:44.720 bit about about it and and i'm particularly 602 00:41:44.720 --> 00:41:46.960 interested in the fact that this seems to be 603 00:41:46.960 --> 00:41:52.720 uh um part of the same kind of culinary stew that you grow up with grew 604 00:41:52.720 --> 00:41:58.400 up with the bok choy plus corn dog idea there seems to be some very chinese 605 00:41:58.400 --> 00:42:03.599 aspects to this the dim sum uh the snake which is of course the 606 00:42:03.599 --> 00:42:09.760 shape shifter in chinese mythology so what's your shape shifting to here well 607 00:42:09.760 --> 00:42:13.599 in the big picture i just love drawing i've drawn since i was 15 608 00:42:13.599 --> 00:42:16.480 and i really felt like this is an opportunity 609 00:42:16.480 --> 00:42:20.400 to dive into what i so love and what time stands 610 00:42:20.400 --> 00:42:23.680 still for me when i draw so pen and ink drawings are a lot of fun 611 00:42:23.680 --> 00:42:27.440 for me but these objects so i've drawn that you can 612 00:42:27.440 --> 00:42:32.160 see the black and white areas or places that i've drawn and the 613 00:42:32.160 --> 00:42:36.079 ones you're looking at for the most part at least on the top line are from 614 00:42:36.079 --> 00:42:40.400 kowloon and i take pictures wherever i go so 615 00:42:40.400 --> 00:42:43.760 it is i mean i'm using my own reference photos 616 00:42:43.760 --> 00:42:48.319 but also picking out objects to draw on top of them and it really is exactly 617 00:42:48.319 --> 00:42:52.560 what you just said crosby it's a juxtaposition of dropping at one 618 00:42:52.560 --> 00:42:55.599 object on top of one object which i've drawn on top of 619 00:42:55.599 --> 00:42:59.920 another place that i've drawn because that's 620 00:42:59.920 --> 00:43:05.680 sort of how i feel like i have grown up juxtaposing two 621 00:43:05.680 --> 00:43:09.359 types of ways of looking at things in one 622 00:43:09.359 --> 00:43:13.440 package so you see these um i showed i went to 623 00:43:13.440 --> 00:43:16.640 chinatowns and i bought various objects and you see them 624 00:43:16.640 --> 00:43:22.079 how i've drawn them on top of places in kowloon at the bottom you can see 625 00:43:22.079 --> 00:43:26.400 a couple of flags and those are ones where i had 626 00:43:26.400 --> 00:43:29.920 i think the flag in the next to last to the right 627 00:43:29.920 --> 00:43:33.599 is actually inside the white house and the flag 628 00:43:33.599 --> 00:43:37.040 at the end with the i voted yo vote sticker 629 00:43:37.040 --> 00:43:42.640 is out just outside the white house i snapped that shot when i walked out one 630 00:43:42.640 --> 00:43:46.560 day in a ceremony so um it really is about can you 631 00:43:46.560 --> 00:43:50.160 juxtapose can i juxtapose me in several different 632 00:43:50.160 --> 00:43:53.839 ways if i am feeling like i'm uh several different 633 00:43:53.839 --> 00:43:56.960 perspectives all in one package yeah it's so 634 00:43:56.960 --> 00:44:01.359 interesting you know the the beautiful uh slippers 635 00:44:01.359 --> 00:44:06.880 uh and uh and and and and and then the sort of kowloon background that 636 00:44:06.880 --> 00:44:10.560 you've got or i i like to to say you've gone from uh 637 00:44:10.560 --> 00:44:14.240 bok choy and corn dogs to uh to uh dim sum and 638 00:44:14.240 --> 00:44:17.200 there's a mcdonald's 639 00:44:17.520 --> 00:44:20.640 the you know those lotus flippers that you see the third 640 00:44:20.640 --> 00:44:24.560 uh on the bottom row with the third drawing in the middle 641 00:44:24.560 --> 00:44:29.119 is really representative of my mother because she grew up 642 00:44:29.119 --> 00:44:33.520 at first as a in a conventional chinese life before she came to america 643 00:44:33.520 --> 00:44:38.079 and her father took a bold step instead of having 644 00:44:38.079 --> 00:44:41.359 his wife had bound feet his mother had bound feet 645 00:44:41.359 --> 00:44:44.560 and he had four daughters but and bound feet 646 00:44:44.560 --> 00:44:50.319 came with in china a tradition of you know breaking bones in your foot and 647 00:44:50.319 --> 00:44:52.480 bending it backwards so that they would grow 648 00:44:52.480 --> 00:44:59.359 to be very tiny stubs oh god little lotus shoes so the purpose of it 649 00:44:59.359 --> 00:45:04.480 on one hand was to make sure that tiny feet for some reason that was 650 00:45:04.480 --> 00:45:09.280 the culture thought it was beautiful and then on another level it was so that 651 00:45:09.280 --> 00:45:12.160 women could not run away and become independent 652 00:45:12.160 --> 00:45:16.880 and so those lotus shoes when my mother's father said you know my 653 00:45:16.880 --> 00:45:21.040 daughters are not going to do that he really went against the traditional 654 00:45:21.040 --> 00:45:25.680 custom so my mother escaped having bound feet but at the same time the 655 00:45:25.680 --> 00:45:28.400 neighbors said across the street i'm told by my mother 656 00:45:28.400 --> 00:45:32.720 uh in china oh my goodness uh that family's daughters they're never going 657 00:45:32.720 --> 00:45:37.040 to find a man to marry because their feet are so big 658 00:45:37.040 --> 00:45:41.200 the system sometimes comes with uh comments from the neighbors 659 00:45:41.200 --> 00:45:44.640 right exactly but you know how extraordinary what she did and how 660 00:45:44.640 --> 00:45:48.079 extraordinary what you've you've done uh with her 661 00:45:48.079 --> 00:45:51.359 inspiration um yeah are kathryn are there some 662 00:45:51.359 --> 00:45:56.960 questions from our audience uh that we might have 663 00:45:56.960 --> 00:46:00.400 yes there are i want to make sure i know there's another slide do we 664 00:46:00.400 --> 00:46:08.000 do you want to keep oh sure yeah yeah please yeah please please 665 00:46:10.319 --> 00:46:16.800 oh yeah good morning various places the one on the top left 666 00:46:16.800 --> 00:46:23.119 is a wonderful alaska native totem pole in juneau and it just goes 667 00:46:23.119 --> 00:46:27.280 from place to place uh there's next to it is a looking outside of the 668 00:46:27.280 --> 00:46:30.880 opera house in dallas uh the ebenezer baptist church in 669 00:46:30.880 --> 00:46:33.920 atlanta georgia where dr martin luther king 670 00:46:33.920 --> 00:46:36.960 i believe john lewis had his service there 671 00:46:36.960 --> 00:46:40.400 yale rep is the kauffman center for the performing arts 672 00:46:40.400 --> 00:46:44.160 these are just drawings that are snapshots of locations 673 00:46:44.160 --> 00:46:53.440 recognized seattle yep oh yeah markets uh there right yeah 674 00:46:53.920 --> 00:46:58.319 uh dancing in uh california i believe it's in sacramento and i just 675 00:46:58.319 --> 00:47:01.839 loved the ruffles on their costumes so that's uh why i drew it 676 00:47:01.839 --> 00:47:06.000 and then there's the woolworth lunch counter in greensboro north carolina 677 00:47:06.000 --> 00:47:12.319 uh so very snappy famous in in in our our history uh but but also could 678 00:47:12.319 --> 00:47:15.599 could represent the great american art form too the art 679 00:47:15.599 --> 00:47:20.559 of shopping that's a you that's a good point i did 680 00:47:20.559 --> 00:47:25.040 grow up bad joke uh bad joke but um 681 00:47:25.040 --> 00:47:28.640 well not not for all of us uh but yeah uh 682 00:47:28.640 --> 00:47:34.079 yeah so uh catherine any uh can we go to questions now if there are 683 00:47:34.079 --> 00:47:38.559 some questions from the audience yes all right let me read this first one 684 00:47:38.559 --> 00:47:41.920 out um question for both of you i guess can 685 00:47:41.920 --> 00:47:45.760 you talk a bit about statues this is about um tearing down 686 00:47:45.760 --> 00:47:49.040 statues due to political unrest considering that this is 687 00:47:49.040 --> 00:47:52.960 these are artistic works right that by people some of them potentially 688 00:47:52.960 --> 00:47:56.480 um you know women and people of color that are being removed and then sort of 689 00:47:56.480 --> 00:48:00.160 on the flip side about putting up statues as a jumping off point to 690 00:48:00.160 --> 00:48:04.480 start conversation so jane you want to take first crack at 691 00:48:04.480 --> 00:48:08.160 that let's see um 692 00:48:08.400 --> 00:48:14.960 i wish there were more statues of people who were emotional who's 693 00:48:14.960 --> 00:48:19.119 who we recognize as being emotionally intelligent because today we need 694 00:48:19.119 --> 00:48:22.000 leaders who can synthesize and have the emotional 695 00:48:22.000 --> 00:48:24.720 intelligence to be able to bring together the different 696 00:48:24.720 --> 00:48:28.160 perspectives without shrinking back in the middle of 697 00:48:28.160 --> 00:48:33.200 ambiguity and so i dream of statues if we're going to 698 00:48:33.200 --> 00:48:36.640 have statues i dream of having ones that are recognized 699 00:48:36.640 --> 00:48:41.839 uh for bringing people together and having a level of emotional 700 00:48:41.839 --> 00:48:44.400 intelligence that sometimes is very difficult to 701 00:48:44.400 --> 00:48:48.800 see in a tangible way but it is so present 702 00:48:48.800 --> 00:48:52.000 and those are the leaders i want to pay attention to 703 00:48:52.000 --> 00:48:55.839 uh in terms of crosby i was just going to say i 704 00:48:55.839 --> 00:48:59.680 i agree i think what we ought to focus on is is who we really 705 00:48:59.680 --> 00:49:06.160 would like to build uh statues too and who represents who we are today um i 706 00:49:06.160 --> 00:49:09.119 think tearing things down without conversation in the 707 00:49:09.119 --> 00:49:14.480 community is not a good idea some you know anybody wants to enlist me in 708 00:49:14.480 --> 00:49:18.160 tearing down a statue of nathan bedford forest i i'll i'll do it but 709 00:49:18.160 --> 00:49:21.599 i think there ought to be conversation about it and uh 710 00:49:21.599 --> 00:49:25.119 lonnie bunch is really good on on on this subject and 711 00:49:25.119 --> 00:49:29.040 elizabeth alexander had a great conversation with david blight and 712 00:49:29.040 --> 00:49:32.319 natasha truthway about about this as well 713 00:49:32.319 --> 00:49:36.559 recently uh interpretation is really important there's some things that we 714 00:49:36.559 --> 00:49:40.559 shouldn't turn tear down we should interpret or add to 715 00:49:40.559 --> 00:49:46.000 uh the statue of lincoln uh with kneeling uh formerly enslaved man 716 00:49:46.000 --> 00:49:51.440 uh in uh in washington dc as as an example it needs to be interpreted and 717 00:49:51.440 --> 00:49:54.480 uh it was interpreted by frederick douglass when it was at when it actually 718 00:49:54.480 --> 00:49:57.280 was was was put up and then the other thing 719 00:49:57.280 --> 00:49:59.839 i want to say is i think the imls has a role and maybe 720 00:49:59.839 --> 00:50:03.280 the neh would would join with us in this and the 721 00:50:03.280 --> 00:50:05.680 melon foundation has been working on this 722 00:50:05.680 --> 00:50:10.160 in creating some movement as we go towards america 250 the 250th 723 00:50:10.160 --> 00:50:14.079 anniversary of the declaration that we'll be celebrating in a national 724 00:50:14.079 --> 00:50:17.839 level uh in uh in five years uh as we move 725 00:50:17.839 --> 00:50:20.640 towards that maybe we can bring people together in 726 00:50:20.640 --> 00:50:23.839 individual communities to to do exactly what jane's talking 727 00:50:23.839 --> 00:50:28.400 about which is to build monuments to people who bring us together people 728 00:50:28.400 --> 00:50:34.400 who who who create empathy in in the in the community and who represent i i 729 00:50:34.400 --> 00:50:36.960 think also represent people who've been left out 730 00:50:36.960 --> 00:50:40.319 i mean why are there no more statues to harriet tubman 731 00:50:40.319 --> 00:50:43.599 i mean there ought to be a lot of statues to frederick douglass and to 732 00:50:43.599 --> 00:50:47.520 harriet tubman whose lives are incredible lives incredible 733 00:50:47.520 --> 00:50:50.880 lives uh and are about liberation liberation 734 00:50:50.880 --> 00:50:55.040 of an entire uh people uh and and uh and there and 735 00:50:55.040 --> 00:50:58.160 there are lots more and and more statues to people in the arts who 736 00:50:58.160 --> 00:51:01.760 did things that are as jane points out there that are 737 00:51:01.760 --> 00:51:05.440 healing to the to the community 738 00:51:07.119 --> 00:51:12.640 some good questions for jane here so um one uh your beautiful art is evocative 739 00:51:12.640 --> 00:51:16.400 and has many embedded symbols and you talk more about the process of 740 00:51:16.400 --> 00:51:20.640 making your art and intellectual process behind it 741 00:51:20.640 --> 00:51:28.319 um sure um in terms of the main piece as i mentioned before it's 742 00:51:28.319 --> 00:51:31.359 really a juxtaposition of several different ways to look all in 743 00:51:31.359 --> 00:51:35.839 one package the joy that i get of being doing pen 744 00:51:35.839 --> 00:51:40.480 and ink art is highly detailed i'm trained in 745 00:51:40.480 --> 00:51:45.599 uh you know drawing people and painting and things like that but 746 00:51:45.599 --> 00:51:51.839 for me it seems like the pen and ink medium is the most fun for me um 747 00:51:51.839 --> 00:51:56.640 so i do a lot of looking at my own reference photos i would never 748 00:51:56.640 --> 00:52:00.640 pull any photos from any place else certainly not the internet but i 749 00:52:00.640 --> 00:52:06.880 i only take reference photos of places icons so everything's very direct but 750 00:52:06.880 --> 00:52:12.400 then from there it may be kind of intuitive one of the 751 00:52:12.400 --> 00:52:15.920 things that i really love even though i have drawn 752 00:52:15.920 --> 00:52:19.359 people before and was trying to draw all kinds of you know 753 00:52:19.359 --> 00:52:22.880 nudes in school and things like that but there's something to me that is so 754 00:52:22.880 --> 00:52:28.480 energizing about drawing objects and the reason is it's not 755 00:52:28.480 --> 00:52:34.240 um a person and yet you uh an object can evoke a story of humanity 756 00:52:34.240 --> 00:52:37.839 just uh you know we could we may all have keepsakes that we like and they may 757 00:52:37.839 --> 00:52:40.480 be even if we compare them we they may be 758 00:52:40.480 --> 00:52:44.319 even the same keepsake but we have different stories that 759 00:52:44.319 --> 00:52:47.760 emanate out of the object so you'll see my drawing a lot of 760 00:52:47.760 --> 00:52:51.440 objects certainly the ones you see today are 761 00:52:51.440 --> 00:52:57.200 placed in a context of various places and settings 762 00:52:57.200 --> 00:53:01.760 but those objects could unfold a whole person's life 763 00:53:01.760 --> 00:53:05.359 so that's why i'm energized by drawing objects instead of the person 764 00:53:05.359 --> 00:53:08.640 you'd think that if i was this interested in drawing in humanity which 765 00:53:08.640 --> 00:53:11.280 i ain't drawing people and the humanity of 766 00:53:11.280 --> 00:53:14.000 us all you'd think i'd be drawing people but 767 00:53:14.000 --> 00:53:17.760 it's instead it's objects um that's probably where i'm focused 768 00:53:17.760 --> 00:53:20.160 right now 769 00:53:21.520 --> 00:53:27.760 very very cool um one more for you specifically how has place 770 00:53:27.760 --> 00:53:31.680 influenced your sense of culture 771 00:53:32.559 --> 00:53:38.800 for me that's for you well it absolutely um i learned 772 00:53:38.800 --> 00:53:42.480 especially growing up in oklahoma and arkansas where there were 773 00:53:42.480 --> 00:53:48.400 no chinese at the time that did influence me 774 00:53:48.400 --> 00:53:52.319 but one of the one thing i noticed as an adult 775 00:53:52.319 --> 00:53:58.960 is i did not realize how much it had how comfortable i was because i am 776 00:53:58.960 --> 00:54:03.119 multiple cultures at the same time uh i didn't realize how 777 00:54:03.119 --> 00:54:05.920 comfortable i was standing in the middle of that kind of 778 00:54:05.920 --> 00:54:09.440 ambiguity until i saw other people who were not comfortable 779 00:54:09.440 --> 00:54:15.200 and so there's something about my message that i wish i could say even 780 00:54:15.200 --> 00:54:20.079 just through my own actions which would be it's totally possible 781 00:54:20.079 --> 00:54:25.280 to be in multiple perspectives at the same time 782 00:54:25.280 --> 00:54:29.520 without shrinking back it's totally possible to have both this 783 00:54:29.520 --> 00:54:33.040 and that instead of you when i lose or either 784 00:54:33.040 --> 00:54:37.359 this or that and because i have grown up and lived it 785 00:54:37.359 --> 00:54:42.559 that is and i've seen different places and i've seen people respond in 786 00:54:42.559 --> 00:54:45.920 different ways i just want to send out the message it 787 00:54:45.920 --> 00:54:50.079 is totally possible to embrace it all 788 00:54:50.839 --> 00:54:57.040 without one question about your art and it's relationship to your musical 789 00:54:57.040 --> 00:54:59.040 training do you do you still play the piano 790 00:54:59.040 --> 00:55:05.280 and do you feel any relationship between your your your drawing your your art 791 00:55:05.280 --> 00:55:08.400 your plastic art and and your musical art 792 00:55:08.400 --> 00:55:15.440 i uh i don't play the piano anymore i uh loved it and i think uh it was my 793 00:55:15.440 --> 00:55:19.680 social life and you know my band life in high school 794 00:55:19.680 --> 00:55:21.839 and i just loved all of it and i majored in 795 00:55:21.839 --> 00:55:27.200 music in college but um i i love so i don't discount it 796 00:55:27.200 --> 00:55:30.640 at all but there's something about expressing myself through visual arts 797 00:55:30.640 --> 00:55:34.400 that is at least where i'm focused right now 798 00:55:34.400 --> 00:55:38.000 different different things at different moments in your life that's right um 799 00:55:38.000 --> 00:55:41.280 everybody has different phases the drawings you saw 800 00:55:41.280 --> 00:55:45.680 you know like picasso has his rose period and his blue period and i had my 801 00:55:45.680 --> 00:55:49.839 those are the drawings from my pandemic period 802 00:55:50.000 --> 00:55:53.920 but no that is what i'm focused on in the moment 803 00:55:55.119 --> 00:55:59.280 catherine another question um yeah we've got a couple more minutes this is sort 804 00:55:59.280 --> 00:56:02.400 of a biggie but i think you guys might want to dig into this a little bit 805 00:56:02.400 --> 00:56:07.839 um how do you think the museum world will forever be changed by this pandemic 806 00:56:07.839 --> 00:56:12.319 i know crosby thinks about this a lot so 807 00:56:12.720 --> 00:56:17.680 have at it well i i'll say a couple of things 808 00:56:17.680 --> 00:56:20.880 about it and i'd love to hear jane's view of this uh it's really 809 00:56:20.880 --> 00:56:23.920 one of the points of the this conversation but um 810 00:56:23.920 --> 00:56:27.040 i i think a couple of things are true obviously true 811 00:56:27.040 --> 00:56:31.440 the virtual um is is going to continue to be a big part of 812 00:56:31.440 --> 00:56:34.799 the life of museums and libraries it's going to be a big part of 813 00:56:34.799 --> 00:56:38.400 education it's going to be a big part of health care workforce development et 814 00:56:38.400 --> 00:56:40.319 cetera all of that's going to be true it will 815 00:56:40.319 --> 00:56:44.640 affect libraries and museums they need to be digitally enabled if they're not 816 00:56:44.640 --> 00:56:48.720 you need to expand and be more creative and imaginative about doing that 817 00:56:48.720 --> 00:56:54.559 the second thing that's true um post pandemic and this is still a question 818 00:56:54.559 --> 00:56:58.480 but i'll say this is a question that that everybody's going to want to answer 819 00:56:58.480 --> 00:57:04.160 and that is the thing we we know that museums and libraries are so 820 00:57:04.160 --> 00:57:07.520 important and the arts the performing arts are so important in our lives 821 00:57:07.520 --> 00:57:11.920 because that's what we miss the most during the pandemic and so how are we 822 00:57:11.920 --> 00:57:15.200 going to get that back and it's going to be a little different 823 00:57:15.200 --> 00:57:18.559 because not everybody's going to feel as comfortable as they did before about 824 00:57:18.559 --> 00:57:21.359 mixing in big crowds and that sort of thing 825 00:57:21.359 --> 00:57:26.799 but museums will figure it out and performing arts we'll figure it out 826 00:57:26.799 --> 00:57:30.480 uh and and and we are going to come back 827 00:57:30.480 --> 00:57:32.559 together because we that's what we miss the most 828 00:57:32.559 --> 00:57:38.480 we need that i'd build on your comments crosby because uh 829 00:57:38.480 --> 00:57:40.799 and one of them actually as you talked about 830 00:57:40.799 --> 00:57:45.280 digital is not only connecting uh digital with each other where museums 831 00:57:45.280 --> 00:57:50.720 can do that and are doing that but uh we're in this world now where 832 00:57:50.720 --> 00:57:54.079 instead of digitizing an object in the museum 833 00:57:54.079 --> 00:58:00.960 the digitized object is the artwork itself uh how do you make sure 834 00:58:00.960 --> 00:58:06.160 you've put in storage uh how do you conserve those new types 835 00:58:06.160 --> 00:58:10.640 of objects and artifacts that are 836 00:58:10.640 --> 00:58:14.720 they start digitally um that will be something that i'm 837 00:58:14.720 --> 00:58:18.240 confident everybody's been thinking about already but probably even more so 838 00:58:18.240 --> 00:58:20.559 now with the pandemic people are paying millions 839 00:58:20.559 --> 00:58:24.160 of dollars for for digital artworks i guarantee you there 840 00:58:24.160 --> 00:58:26.000 are a lot of people thinking about that now 841 00:58:26.000 --> 00:58:30.799 that's right another one is uh that i am seeing museums doing more and more and 842 00:58:30.799 --> 00:58:35.280 uh so uh heartening and is really paying attention to 843 00:58:35.280 --> 00:58:41.760 when we create the context of an exhibition are we 844 00:58:41.760 --> 00:58:46.160 are we telling everybody's story who needs to or are we just telling one 845 00:58:46.160 --> 00:58:49.599 person one side of it and not paying attention 846 00:58:49.599 --> 00:58:53.920 to all the other ways that has that have affected people so museums are 847 00:58:53.920 --> 00:58:57.839 uh uh getting better and better at many of 848 00:58:57.839 --> 00:59:01.760 them are really paying attention to well we can't just tell one story uh 849 00:59:01.760 --> 00:59:05.200 without telling how many other people were either harmed 850 00:59:05.200 --> 00:59:09.680 or included in the big story but we didn't 851 00:59:09.680 --> 00:59:14.160 include them before so i'm really heartened by that 852 00:59:14.160 --> 00:59:17.280 and then again the presence of the community really be so 853 00:59:17.280 --> 00:59:23.280 proud that you can be one of those um entities that brings people together 854 00:59:23.280 --> 00:59:26.319 each in their own ways without force fitting everybody to be 855 00:59:26.319 --> 00:59:30.720 exactly alike like you said crosby they'll figure it out and the reason 856 00:59:30.720 --> 00:59:34.880 they can figure it out is because you know how to suspend and 857 00:59:34.880 --> 00:59:38.880 create you know how to suspend judgment and create something out of nothing 858 00:59:38.880 --> 00:59:42.880 and uh that's what's missing in so many other settings where people don't know 859 00:59:42.880 --> 00:59:46.559 how to do that and they're stuck you know how to do it so i'm excited 860 00:59:46.559 --> 00:59:52.079 about what can be done and the nea and the neh and the imls 861 00:59:52.079 --> 00:59:55.520 will will help them that's our determination 862 00:59:55.520 --> 00:59:59.680 as i know jane had that determination when she was 863 00:59:59.680 --> 01:00:02.720 at the helm of the of the national endowment for the for 864 01:00:02.720 --> 01:00:06.559 the arts it's been a great conversation jane i i really 865 01:00:06.559 --> 01:00:10.640 really appreciate it catherine can we go on with questions or i know we've we've 866 01:00:10.640 --> 01:00:12.960 reached i think yeah we are out of time i'm 867 01:00:12.960 --> 01:00:17.359 afraid so thank you to everyone who sent in um sent in uh 868 01:00:17.359 --> 01:00:20.160 questions and thank you to jane for joining us 869 01:00:20.160 --> 01:00:24.480 today and for everybody for joining us um so this is going to conclude our 870 01:00:24.480 --> 01:00:28.079 broadcast and this recording is going to be made available on our website 871 01:00:28.079 --> 01:00:32.400 at imls.gov great