Ep #84: Levee Stream Live from New Orleans

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Nikki, Davia, host Cole Williams, Jamal Cyrus from Otabenga Jones & Associates

Levee Stream— a live neighborhood pop-up, Cadillac, radio station installation in New Orleans. Presented by Otabenga Jones & Associates and The Kitchen Sisters in collaboration with Project& as part of Prospect.4 New Orleans, an international exhibit of 73 artists creating artworks and events throughout New Orleans.

Part block party, part soap box—Levee Stream is a lively mix of music, DJs, and conversations with artists, activists, civil rights leaders, neighborhood entrepreneurs and visionaries taking place in the back seat of a cut-in-half 1959 pink Cadillac Coup de Ville with giant speakers in the trunk on Bayou Road, one of the oldest roads in the city.

Hosted by WWOZ DJ Cole Williams the show features interviews with Robert King and Albert Woodfox, members of the Angola 3 who were released from prison after decades of living in solitary confinement. Civil Rights pioneers Leona Tate and A.P. Tureaud Jr. Prospect.4 curator Trevor Schoonmaker and artists Hank Willis Thomas, Maria Berrio, and Jeff Whetstone. With music by legendary Hammond B3 organ player Joe Krown, contemporary jazz luminaries Kidd and Marlon Jordan,The Jones Sisters, DJ RQ Away and DJ Flash Gordon Parks.

DJ RQ Away

Davia with Jeff Whetstone

Davia with Prospect.4 Artistic Director Trevor Schoonmaker

The Jones Sisters

Houston’s DJ Flash Gordon Parks

Joe Krown

Marlon Jordan

Jamal Cyrus from Otabenga Jones & Associates with Hank Willis Thomas

History of Conquest by Hank Willis Thomas

Wildflowers by Maria Berrio

Giving Tuesday / Support the Stories

U.S. Marshals escort Leona Tate, Gail Etienne, and Tessie Prevost from McDonogh #19, Nov 1960.

It’s Giving Tuesday and, as in years past, we’d like to give you a story.

For the past several months we’ve been traveling to New Orleans, gathering stories and sound for “Levee Stream,” a pop-up radio station installation collaboration with Otabenga Jones & Associates and Project& for the citywide exhibit Prospect.4. We’ve woven these interviews and recordings into an epic Sonic Prayer Flag, full of New Orleans voices, shards of sound and archival audio. Today we’d like to share a strand of this prayer flag, the story of Leona Tate…

November 14, 1960 — Four six-year-old girls, flanked by Federal Marshals, walked through screaming crowds and policemen on horseback as they approached their new schools for the first time. Leona thought it must be Mardi Gras. Gail Etienne thought they were going to kill her.

We are committed, now more than ever, to creating documentaries that chronicle untold stories of American culture and tradition, to keeping the nation’s airwaves vibrant, imaginative and accessible, and to building community through storytelling. It is you, our community, that makes these stories possible.

Kitchen Sister Nikki with Leona Tate, Prospect.4: Levee Stream, New Orleans, Nov 2017

Levee Stream: A Pop-Up Radio Station Installation, Nov 19, Opening Weekend, Prospect 4

On Sunday afternoon, November 19th, opening weekend of Prospect.4, the legendary Houston arts collective, Otabenga Jones & Associates, Peabody Award winning NPR producers, The Kitchen Sisters and the acclaimed activist arts organization Project& come together on Bayou Road to present Levee Stream a day-long, street-corner, pop-up, Cadillac radio station-installation.

Part block party, part soapbox, Levee Stream is broadcasting live from noon til five from a 1959 Cadillac Coup de Ville — a lively mix of conversation and interviews with an array of international artists in town for Prospect.4, Bayou Road neighborhood regulars, entrepreneurs and visionaries, New Orleans artists and activists, live music, DJs, and a five hour “sonic prayer flag” that will unfurl across the afternoon and the neighborhood full of New Orleans voices, shards of sound and archival audio.

Come join this live five-hour afternoon event with NPR’s Kitchen Sisters and Otabenga Jones hosted by singer, bandleader, WWOZ DJ and arts activist, Cole Williams. Three DJs will be spinning across the day — New Orleans’ DJ RqAway (the people’s DJ), Matt Knowles of Domino Sound Record Shack, and Houston DJ, collector and ethnomusicologist, DJ Flash Gordon Parks. A few of the Prospect artists coming to be interviewed at the Cadillac include Hank Willis Thomas, John Akomfrah, Xaviera Simmons, Kiluanji Kia Henda, Monique Verdin, Donna Conlon & Jonathan Harker, Cauleen Smith, Jeff Whetstone, Penny Siopis, and Odili Donald Odita. Gia Hamilton and artists from The Joan Mitchell Center will also be heard “on air” at the Caddy.

A stunning array of New Orleans artists, activists, chefs, bakers, architects appearing live in conversation at Levee Stream include: social justice activists, Robert King and Albert Woodfox of the Angola 3, Keith Plessy and Phoebe Ferguson of the Plessy & Ferguson Foundation, the legendary DJ Soul Sister from WWOZ and beyond, Skylar Fein and skaters from Parisite Skate Park, Leona Tate of the McDonogh 3, Vera Warren-Williams from Community Book Center, Alon Shaya and many more.

Live music will fill the day from long-standing free jazz duo, Alvin Fielder & Kidd Jordan, The Jones Sisters with their deep gospel sound, Cole Williams, “Chicken Violins” from The Homer Plessy School led by Rebecca Crenshaw, Zion Trinity and Joe Krown on Hammond B3.

Levee Stream is a day of close listening, unusual encounters, neighborhood revelation and food. Of course food.

All kinds of cooking, food and drink will be part of the day from Pagoda Cafe, Coco Hut, The Half Shell, Alon Shaya & Pomegranate Hospitality, Graison Gill & Bellegarde Bakery, Cal Peternell formerly of Chez Panisse, Charlie Hallowell of Pizzaiolo and Boot & Shoe Service, Uncorked and the New Orleans Ice Cream Company.

Meet us on the corner. Hear the stories, voices, visions, issues and music live at the “station.” And record your own story in the tiny shotgun shack on wheels recording booth on the street next to Caddy (built by six high school students from unCommon Construction). Issues of culture, climate, arts, infrastructure, food, family, education and entertainment unfold across the day in an inventive, imaginative, collaborative way.

“Levee Stream” is made possible in part by The Ruth U. Fertel Foundation, Project& and McKenna Properties.

For more information and a complete list of participants visit kitchensisters.org/prospect

Prospect.4: The Lotus in Spite of the Swamp
November 18, 2017 – February 25, 2018
prospectneworleans.org

What: Prospect.4: Levee Stream — Part block party, part soapbox, a live, one-day, pop-up neighborhood Cadillac radio station-installation

Who: Produced by The Kitchen Sisters, Otabenga Jones & Associates, Project&

When: Sunday, November 19, 2017, Noon – 5:00pm

Where: 2500 Bayou Rd, New Orleans (the confluence of Bayou Road, Desoto & No. Dorgenois)

Episode #81 – Sonic Prayer Flags – New Orleans

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Photo by Nikki Silva. Mural by Langston Allston, André Cailloux & Fr. Maistre: The Life, Death of a Black Patriot, 2017, on the former St. Rose De Lima Church, 2541 Bayou Road, produced in partnership with Broad Community Connections.

A string of sonic prayer flags — voices and sounds from New Orleans and Bayou Road, the oldest street in the city. Local visionaries, neighborhood entrepreneurs, artists, skateboarders, civil rights activists, musicians, teachers, and more. Listening to the sounds and moods of the City.

We’ve been recording in New Orleans lately for a project we’re doing as part of Prospect.4 – an exhibit of works by artists from around the world who’ve been invited to create events and artworks throughout the city. The first Prospect New Orleans was created in the aftermath of Katrina – exploring the role of art and artists in the rebuilding of the city. The theme of this fourth Prospect is “The Lotus in Spite of the Swamp.”

Our project is called “Levee Stream” a five-hour live, street-corner pop-up Cadillac radio station installation on Bayou Road. We’re collaborating with the Houston based artists collective Otabenga Jones & Associates – Jamal Cyrus, Jabari Anderson – who have created a cut-in-half pink Cadillac, with giant speakers in the trunk, and a white plush leather upholstered back seat where guests can sit and converse and be interviewed live on the air. It’s a roving radio station that’s toured to neighborhoods in Houston and Brooklyn – and now New Orleans. The event will take place on Bayou Road and the stories, prayer flags, videos and images will be online at kitchensisters.org and prospectneworleans.org.

Voices heard in this episode include: David Waggoner, Quintron, Skylar Fein, “Mama” Vera Warren Williams at the Community Book Center, Tootie Montana, Andaiye Alimayu of Zion Trinity and King & Queen Emporium, Carla Williams at Material Life, Keith Plessy, and Aaron Frumin from unCommon Construction.

Prospect New Orleans: Levee Stream

PROSPECT 4: “Levee Stream,” Prospect New Orleans. The legendary Houston arts collective, Otabenga Jones and Associates, and Peabody Award-winning NPR producers, The Kitchen Sisters, and the acclaimed international arts organization, Project& come together on Bayou Road in New Orleans on November 19th. “Levee Stream” is a day of close listening, unusual encounters, neighborhood revelation and food. Of course food.

On Sunday, November 19th, opening weekend of Prospect.4, the legendary Houston arts collective, Otabenga Jones and Associates, Peabody Award-winning NPR producers, The Kitchen Sisters, and the acclaimed arts organization, Project& come together on Bayou Road in New Orleans to present “Levee Stream,” a site specific-street corner-pop-up Cadillac radio station-installation.  

Part block party, part soapbox, “Levee Stream” is live from noon til five, broadcasting at the confluence of Bayou Road, Desoto and N.Dorgenois — a mix of live conversation and interviews with an array of international artists in town for Prospect.4, Bayou Road neighborhood regulars, entrepreneurs and visionaries, New Orleans artists and activists, DJs, live music, and a five hour “sonic prayer flag” that will unfurl across the afternoon and the neighborhood full of New Orleans voices, shards of sound and archival audio. Levee Stream is a day of close listening, unusual encounters, neighborhood revelation and food. Of course food. Meet us on the corner. Hear the stories, voices, visions, issues and music coming live at the “station.” Record your own story in the tiny shotgun shack on wheels (built by six high school students from UnCommon Construction) on the street next to Caddy.

A few of the people and performances appearing live on Sunday afternoon include: Chicken Violins — Rebecca Crenshaw came to New Orleans right after Katrina. A musician and music teacher she signed up with ArtistCorp who were bringing music teachers back in to New Orleans public school after the flood. Robert King and Albert Woodfox of the Angola Three — Robert King spent 29 years in solitary confinement in Angola Penitentiary. Since his release, after being found not guilty, he has worked ceaselessly, on behalf of prisoners rights and for justice and for political prisoners around the world.

A multitude of artists from Prospect.4 will talk of their new works at the corner cadillac station including Hank Willis Thomas, Monique Verdin, John Akomfrah, Xaviera Simmons and more. Gia Hamilton from the Joan Mitchell Center will also be part of the mix. DJ Flash Gordon Parks — Ethnomusicologist, collector, documentarian and DJ. Like Otabenga Jones & Associates, Flash comes from Houston with his crates and his big mind and mouth to spin some music and the stories behind it. Plessy & Ferguson — On June 7,1892 Homer Plessy, a shoemaker and light-skinned, free man of color bought a first class ticket, boarded a train and sat in the whites-only railway car of a New Orleans train in an effort to challenge the segregation laws of the era. Judge John H. Ferguson did the ruling that held in place the Jim Crow “separate but equal” laws that stood in the south, and went to the Supreme Court under the name Plessy vs Ferguson, til the Brown vs Board of Education decision upended it in 1954.

The Sonic Prayer Flag — Voices, stories and shards of sound and music from The Kitchen Sisters haunting and evocative New Orleans sound and storyscape will be part of the live mix of the day. The Jones Sisters — Four New Orleans sisters, age 12-18 who have been singing together for nine years and sing knock-out gospel and organ, and won the Rhythm of Gospel Award for Youth/ Young Adult Artist of the year, will power the station-installation on air at noon on Sunday. Solitary Gardens — Artist and social activist, Jackie Sumell, who with Herman Wallace of the Angola Three created the powerful project, “Herman’s House” has ignited a new vision “Solitary Gardens” a project at the intersection of public art, alternative land-use and social sculpture, planting gardens designed after 6×9 solitary confinement cells throughout the city of New Orleans to make graphic the issues of justice, incarceration and solitary confinement and propel and provoke a dialogue with the community and with prisoners. Floating Cities — David Waggoner, water visionary and architect with the firm Waggoner & Ball has been at the forefront of designing innovative, sustainable stormwater management plan systems in post-Katrina New Orleans. He speaks his vision, floating streets and water gardens. We’ll also hear from Julia Kumar Drapkin from ISeeChange and Rachel Bruenlin from the Neighborhood Story Project.

Voices and stories from the neighborhood including Dr. Dwight McKenna & Beverly Stanton McKenna, founders of the New Orleans Tribune; creators of Le Musée de Free People of Color; Mama Vera from the Community Book Center, one of the hubs of black culture on Bayou Road in the 7th Ward; and neighborhood stalwart, healer, soapmaker and singer, Sister Andaiye Alimaya of The King and Queen Emporium, whose corner will host the Cadillac. Domino Sound, the mighty vintage record store in the neighborhood will also DJ the day.

Skylar Fein & Skaters from the Parisite Skateboard Park — In the wake of Katrina, after their illegal, unofficial DIY skateboard park was torn down by the city, a group of skateboarders, spearheaded by P.1 artist Skylar Fein, created a nonprofit called Transitional Spaces. In partnership with a construction firm, the city, and Tulane they created Parisite Skate Park, an 18,000 square foot space under Interstate 610 Overpass in Gentilly, the first public skatepark in the New Orleans history

Food will come from the neighborhood and beyond — and will change with the day.  

For more information about Prospect.4: The Lotus in Spite of the Swamp visit prospectneworleans.org

We won! A Webby and a James Beard Award

Martha and The Sisters

Yesterday was a banner day at The Kitchen Sisters. In the morning, we learned that we won a Webby Award for our Radiotopia podcast The Kitchen Sisters Present. In the evening, we were honored with a James Beard Foundation Award (the Oscars of food) for our NPR series Hidden Kitchens: War and Peace and Food, heard on Morning Edition.

We want to thank everyone at Morning Edition, NPR’s The Salt, and Radiotopia for supporting our work. And all the people we collaborated with across the globe on these stories. None of these projects would be possible without support from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts. We thank the staff of these important American institutions for all they do.

Notes from The Kitchen Sisterhood – Spring 2017

Dear Friends,

The last time we sent you Notes From The Kitchen Sisterhood we were urging you to vote. It’s a whole new ballgame now with arts, culture, climate, healthcare, immigrants all threatened and the mother of all bombs bursting in air. All around us storytellers, artists, organizers, teachers, librarians, athletes, scientists are stepping up, rising to this moment. We wanted to share a few things from our world and the world of those we admire.

On the homefront, The Kitchen Sisters have a bit of a Trifecta at the moment and now we need to ask for your vote.

Our podcast, The Kitchen Sisters Present (until recently known as Fugitive Waves), was just nominated for a Webby Award for best documentary podcast. Please help us claim the title. Vote here, vote now!

We are also thrilled to say that we have been nominated for a 2017 James Beard Award for our latest season of NPR stories, Hidden Kitchens: Kimchi Diplomacy: War and Peace and Food.

And our TED Talk about Wall Street, the self-schooled San Quentin inmate and stock market savant is now online. Take a look.

Forward ever,

The Kitchen Sisters
Davia & Nikki

Events we are going to / wish we were going to:

The Unplugged Soul: A Conference on the Podcast. The Kitchen Sisters, Benjamen Walker, Christopher Lydon, Jeff Emtman and a slew of other podcasters. April 14-15, Heyman Center, Columbia University.

Here and Home: A retrospective of the work of California photographer Larry Sultan. April 15-July 23, SFMOMA

Erik Weihenmayer, the first blind person to summit of Mount Everest and kayak the Grand Canyon, in conversation with Davia about his book, No Barriers, May 2, Lighthouse for the Blind, SF

Fake News Room: A response to Larry Sultan and Mike Mandel’s 1983 exhibition “Newsroom.” Artists include Jason Fulford, Jim Goldberg and Dru Donovan, as well as The Kitchen Sisters. Open now through April 29 at the Minnesota Street Project in San Francisco

What we’re watching:

Mifune, directed by Stephen Okazaki

I Called Him Morgan, directed by Kasper Collin. The jazz tragedy of Lee Morgan, exquisitely rendered.

An Inconvenient Sequel. Al Gore’s climate change sequel. Truth to Power.

Century of Self, Adam Curtis’ 2002 BBC documentary.

Dave Chappelle’s Block Party

What we’re making:

This year, we are embarking on a new NPR/podcast series called The Keepers–activist archivists, rogue librarians, collectors, curators, historians–keepers of the culture and the cultures and collections that they keep. Guardians of history, large and small. Protectors of the free flow of ideas and information. People afflicted with what French philosopher Jacques Derrida called “Archive Fever.”

We welcome your tips and suggestions for who and what needs chronicling.

What we’re reading:

Black Panther by Ta-Nehisi Coates

A Really Good Day by Ayelet Waldman

True South by Jon Else

Scratch: Writers, Money, and the Art of Making a Living, edited by Manjula Martin

Sapiens and Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari

What we’re cooking:

Potlikker Papers by John T. Edge. A people’s history of the modern South set on farms, in kitchens and at tables.

King Solomon’s Table by Joan Nathan.

The President’s Kitchen Cabinet by Adrian Miller. African Americans who fed the First Families, from Washington to Obama.

Tartine All Day: Modern Recipes for the Home Cook by Elisabeth Prueitt

Music we’re spinning:

Save the Country by Laura Nyro.

We recently attended the SF Symphony Pride concert, a staggering night of LGBTQ music from Henry Cowell, Lou Harrison, Stephen Sondheim and more. What got us most was was when conductor Michael Tilson Thomas accompanied Audra McDonald singing Laura Nyro’s barnburner Save the Country. It is our new national anthem.

Podcasts we’re pumping:

RadioPublic podcast app. Free podcasts!

S-Town from Serial and This American Life. You know you wanna hear it.

The many splendored podcasts from the Radiotopia collective

Citizens we’re admiring:

Russ Kick, investigative archivist from Arizona and founder of the Memory Hole. Russ finds and preserves documents the government tries to keep hidden. A keeper.

Magnus Toren runs the Henry Miller Library in Big Sur that has been closed since mid-February after Pfeiffer Canyon Bridge into Big Sur was damaged due to relentless winter rains. They’re now raising funds to open The Henry Miller Library in the Barnyard in Carmel, bringing Big Sur to “town.” They could use your support.

Years ago we recorded Brian Eno talking about the weekly Tuesday “Sing” he holds with his friends–not professional musicians, just pals, gathered standing around a table, singing a capella for a few hours. Times like these call for communal singing. As Brian says, “Singing aloud leaves you with a sense of levity and contentedness. And then there are what I would call ‘civilizational benefits.’ When you sing with a group of people, you learn how to subsume yourself into a group consciousness because a capella singing is all about the immersion of the self into the community.”

Graffiti artists in Ho Chi Minh City Pushing Back Against Official Censorship. “For many in Vietnam, the spray can is a tool of rebellion—illicit spray-painting is a way of defying restrictions in an authoritarian country where artists must have their work approved before exhibitions, shows are routinely shut down, and works deemed controversial are replaced by a black ‘X’ on gallery walls.”

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So Many Stories in Store

In 2017 we all move into unknown territory. It’s times like these that call for strong stories. Bruce Springsteen said it best, “People need stories in hard times. People go to storytellers when times are like that.” People go to storytellers when it’s hard to decipher the world, when they need to feel hope and possibilities, when they just want a good tale. Here at The Kitchen Sisters we are getting ready to tell some of the deepest stories we’ve done yet. Stories that keep the spirit moving and light the path. Stories that reveal new ideas and new community leaders.

Today we ask for your support, and for your ongoing collaboration. It is our community that makes these stories possible. Our stories, our internship and mentoring program, and our many community visions. To those of you who have supported and collaborated with us over the years, thank you. To those of you who have recently discovered us, welcome to The Kitchen Sisterhood.

In 2016 your contribution helped spawn so much new work. Our series, Hidden Kitchens: War and Peace and Food aired to much acclaim on NPR’s Morning Edition. Some 14 million people around the world heard these stories of the transformative power of food. There are more in store in 2017.

2017 also has many other projects in store — our new series about archivists as activists — about librarians and historical society curators who are keepers of the history and embroiled in battles and deeply committed to preservation, a free press and the truth. We’re also deep in the weeds on our second book, Show the Girls the Snakes, and working still on our Broadway musical and more. And we are gearing up for a new year of interns, mentoring and workshops.

We have also been asked to create an installation for Prospect.4,the International New Orleans Triennial (sort of the Venice Biennale of New Orleans that was created in the wake of Katrina to help revive the city through culture) where we’ll be collaborating with the Houston-based art collective, Otabenga Jones and Associates. Prospect.4 opens at the end of 2017 and goes for three months. Perhaps we’ll see you there.

Deep thanks for your support, your ideas, your music, your stories, all the things you share with us.

Keep the faith,
Davia & Nikki

Kitchen Sisters Interviewing, Recording & Podcasting Workshop, Dec 8 in SF

Time again for The Kitchen Sisters Recording, Interviewing & Podcasting Workshop. Davia Nelson is holding a new one on Thursday, December 8 at Francis Coppola’s historic Zoetrope building in San Francisco. This three-hour session is designed for those who want to acquire and hone their skills for radio, podcasts, film, documentaries, storytelling, oral histories, family histories, news, and other multimedia platforms.

The Workshop covers interviewing and mic’ing techniques, sound gathering, use of archival audio, field recording techniques, recording equipment, how to make interviewees comfortable, how to frame evocative questions that make for compelling storytelling, how to build a story, how to pitch a story, how to create a podcast, how to listen.

The session is customized to fit the projects you are working on. So come ready to talk about your stories and ideas too. People who have attended in the past have come from radio, film, multimedia, detective agencies, farms, music, newspapers, journalism, photography, oral history, historical societies, ophthalmology, writing, libraries, archives, web design, restaurants, health care organizations, cheese-making and beyond.

The groups are always lively and surprising and good contacts are made.

Morning Workshop: 10:00 – 1:00pm / Afternoon Workshop: 2:00 – 5:00 pm.

Cost: $150

Come in the morning or come in the afternoon, just sign up for one.

The workshop is in North Beach at 916 Kearny St. on the 6th floor. Of course snacks from Cafe Zoetrope will be served.

Expand your skills, meet new people, support the work of The Kitchen Sisters.

REGISTER NOW.

Notes from The Kitchen Sisterhood / Fall 2016

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Dear Friends,

There is so much going on. But really only one thing going on. Vote. Everything else is noise.

Except it’s not. Not at all, but you know what we mean.

Here is some of what else matters to us in the coming months, in our world and your’s.

The Kitchen Sisters
Davia & Nikki

Books we’re reading:

We’re working on a new book calledShow the Girls the Snakes, a mix of stories, how to tell stories and memoir, so we’re reading every memoir we can get our hands on. Any suggestions? Here’s what we’re reading now:

Speak, Memory – Vladimir Nabokov

My Life on the Road – Gloria Steinem

Born to Run – Bruce Springsteen

And on other fronts:

Lives Like Loaded Guns: Emily Dickinson and Her Family’s Feuds – Lyndall Gordon

Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America – Gilbert King

Dated Emcees – Chinaka Hodge

Events we are going to / hosting / wish we were going to:

Notes From the Field – Master storyteller, Anna Deavere Smith with musician Marcus Shelby. Her new play looks at education, crime, and the Baltimore she left behind. 2econdStageTheatre, New York. (Now playing)

An Evening with Terry Tempest Williams – A Benefit for Point Reyes National Seashore Association, Pt. Reyes, CA. (Oct 22)

Smithsonian Food History Weekend – The Kitchen Sisters talking Hidden Political Kitchens, National Museum of American History, Washington, D.C. (Oct 27-29)

Letter to a Man – Mikhail Baryshnikov in a staging of Vaslav Nijinsky’s diaries, BAM, New York. (Oct 15-30)

City Arts and Lectures – Joel Coen in conversation with Davia Nelson. One Coen Brother, one Kitchen Sister, San Francisco, CA. (Nov 29)

Kitchen Sisters Interviewing, Recording & Podcasting Workshop, San Francisco (Dec 8) – sign up here.

Films we’re watching:

Moonlight – Saw this remarkable, hypnotic film at the Telluride Film Festival. Barry Jenkins’ haunting story of a boy coming of age in South Florida. The cast includes Mahershala Ali, Trevante Rhodes and Janelle Monáe.

Fuocoammare (Fire at Sea) – Situated off Italy’s southern coast, Lampedusa has been the first port of call for hundreds of thousands of African and Middle Eastern migrants hoping to make a new life in Europe. Director Gianfranco Rosi spent months living on the Mediterranean island, capturing its history, culture and the current, desperate everyday reality. His film is gut-wrenching and stunning.

Command and Control – A collaboration between Robert Kenner (Food, Inc) & Eric Schlosser (Fast Food Nation). How do you manage weapons of mass destruction without being destroyed by them?

Cameraperson – Over the past 25 years, Kirsten Johnson has worked as a camera operator or cinematographer on more than 50 documentary films, including Citizenfour, The Invisible War, and Fahrenheit 9/11. Now she’s directed Cameraperson, which she calls a visual “memoir.” It incorporates footage she shot for various documentaries over that quarter century. –Boston Globe

Threads we’re pulling:

Scraps: Fashion, Textiles and Creative Reuse – Dosa at Cooper Hewitt in NYC

Works on Paper from Permanent Collection – a new collaboration between Fanny Singer and Mariah Nielson.

Lenny – Feminism, style, health, politics, friendship and everything else from Lena Dunham and Jenni Konner.

Podcasts we’re pumping:

Radiotopia Fall Fundraiser – Our mighty podcast collective is having it’s annual Fundraiser. If you love podcasts, and we know you do, Radiotopia is the network to support. 15 podcasts and growing — 99% Invisible, Criminal, Radio Diaries, Love + Radio, Millennial, Mortified, Song Exploder, The Allusionist, The Heart, West Wing Weekly, Theory of Everything, the Memory Palace, Strangers, The Truth and ours, Fugitive Waves.

Music we’re spinning:

Anything/everything by Nobel Laureate, Bob Dylan

Ibrahim Maalouf, Lebanese born trumpeter

Hip-hop of old from Jonathan Lethem’s list.

Nintendo themes of old from Michael Chabon’s list.

Angel Olsen

Compared to What – Les McCann & Eddie Harris (listen here)

Projects we’re supporting:

The American Project – Vote
Tuesday, November 8

Can’t Talk, Gotta Run: 10 Women Who Could Flip the Senate
(in case you missed it)

The Edible Schoolyard programs in Berkeley, New York, New Orleans and the Charlottesville Food Justice Network

Rock the Vote

—

Main graphic: “My Eyes In The Time Of Apparition” by August Natterer, 1913
Photo of Dylan: AP Photo/Pierre Godot