Studio8 - Uniting the Arts

Hello Ambassador Moustapha,
I was impressed by your congenial and humanist attitude during your call-in appearance on C-SPAN

and that you have a blog, so I searched and found your web page, with postings of Syrian art. I am so impressed and heartened.
[url=http://imad_moustapha.blogs.com/]The journal of Imad Moustapha, Syria's envoy to the US[/url]

If I have anything to say about it, I will offer you support, firstly, to have America stop demonising Syria and Iran. I will compose a letter, informed by your postings, and send it to my unfortunately "conservative" congressman and senators, but also to the St Petersburg times newspaper, etc. I fully believe that the USA should respect all the peoples of the middle-east, and stop seperating into allies and enemies, save for the common enemy, fratricide, loss of life, suffering, loss of diplomacy and constructive process.

I have posted this letter and your web site on my on-line arts and progressive community,
studio eight/tv!
Sincerely,
Jim Willingham
Veterans for Peace
St Pete, Florida


Kevork Mourad entrance to a covered market
One of his favorite works by a distinguished Syrian artist
http://imad_moustapha.blogs.com/my_weblog/artists_from_syria/index.html

Very fine painting, Jim.

--Z

it reminds me a reproduction that is the living room of my old house since I had memory... but it's more beautiful!. No idea of the painter though, I'll search the name in some corner of the poster next time.

From: "Imad Moustapha" im@imadmoustapha.net
To: "Jim Willingham" opusmaximus2050@yahoo.com
Subject: Re: saw you on C-SPAN, from Florida
Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 11:33:49 -0500
Thank you. I checked your site and was impressed. I appreciate all
those who support what I advocate: a peaceful solution to the ME
conflict.
All the best,
Imad Moustapha, Ph.D.
Ambassador of Syria to the USA
Embassy of Syria
2215 Wyoming Avenue NW
Washington DC 20008
Tel: (202) 588 70 13
Fax: (202) 234 95 48

Maybe if we had stopped to contemplate the art treasures inside the historic museos we would have seen the tragic futility of this war, the peoples who made these things being sentient beings wanting life. Certainly Syria is not the terrorist state that some American pundits claim it to be.
neither is Iran.

Iran is a very youthful state, full of contemporary ideas and energy, particularly in the arts.

The glum theocracy doesn't have as much of a grip on things as is propagandized here in the west. Publicly, yes, but its grip is a little like the old Soviets-- a joke in private where women wear sexy clothes, smoke and drink and natter away on their cell phones. Ditto the guys. So what else is new for people under 30? They're people first, after all, as you point out, Jim.

70 percent of its population is under 30 years of age.

I just heard a little article on Iranian culture on NPR yesterday, and I have myself known several Iranians, two of them poets and translators.

More art by Kevork Mourad:

http://www.kevorkmourad.com/

SPEAKING OF UNITING THE ARTS!

(paste from Kevork Mourad's website)

Kevork Mourad, an artist of Armenian origin, was born in 1970 in Aleppo, Syria. After his education in Syria, he was accepted to the Yerevan Institute of Fine Arts in Armenia, where he received his MFA in 1996. He has exhibited widely in Armenia and the United States. Early on, he developed a technique of spontaneous painting, in which he shares the stage with musicians, his art created in counterpoint to their music. His first performance of live drawing was at the Gyumri Biennial in 1997 with trombonist David Minassian. Since then his collaborations have included a live performance with Djivan Gasparyan at Cooper Union in April 2001, and a benefit show for the Coalition to Ban Land mines at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, in tandem with George Winston. He performed at Juilliard at the “Machine and Beyond” Festival with Kinan Azmeh, in a project based on the epic of Gilgamesh. The same piece was also performed at the Chelsea Museum of Art in New York. In 2004 he performed with the Latin Jazz Band SYOTOS at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. He appeared at the Tenri Cultural Center and at Angel Orensantz with members of the Silk Road Ensemble. In the spring of 2005, he joined Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble, with which he has performed at the Rhode Island School of Design, Harvard University, and most recently, the Nara Museum, in Nara, Japan. In March 2006, he performed with the percussion group Tambuco in Morelia, Mexico, where he was the featured artist at the Morelia Chess Festival, and is currently collaborating with composer Ken Ueno and violist Kim Kashkashian.

( end paste)


--Z

from his web page, full of art and literary talk:

The last two weeks were full of events and meetings with friends and interesting people. Rafif and I had the famous American journalist Seymour Hirsh and his wife Lizzie for dinner. Seymour is known for being the first to reveal to the world the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam war, Israel’s nuclear program, and the Abu Gharib scandal in Iraq. We also had with them Robert Malley who used to work at President Clinton’s National Security Council, and was the first to write and tell the truth about what happened in Camp David and the lies concerning Arafat’s refusal to accept the ‘generous’ offer of Barak, thus, according to myth, forfeiting the only real chance the Palestinians have ever had for a free independent state. The dinner included other friends like Peter and Ann Tanous, David and Lois Kheirallah, Bob and Farida Wozniak and the indefatigable Safa Rifka. Most of the conversation normally focused on the political scene both domestically and in the Middle East.

Rafif, Imad, and friend in NYC, from the ambassador's blog, the full version at http://imad_moustapha.blogs.com/imad_moustapha_the_blog/

Thanks Z-man Norman, for reading and posting the bio on Kevork Mourad

He has exhibited widely in Armenia and the United States. Early on, he developed a technique of spontaneous painting, in which he shares the stage with musicians, his art created in counterpoint to their music. His first performance of live drawing was at the Gyumri Biennial in 1997 with trombonist David Minassian.

http://www.kevorkmourad.com/performances.htm
here is a web page with a quicktime video of an art performance with misica! OLÉ!
I actualy have fantasized about doing just that at a studio eight cabadadaorio

[url=http://imad_moustapha.blogs.com/imad_moustapha_the_blog/2006/10/blogs_the_new_d.html]Blogs - The New Diplomacy[/url]