Because there's always more to the story.
Black Scotians by iZrEAL Jones, performed at Posh Tatoes open mic in Brixton, London, England on Aug. 18, 2013.
Event hosted by Adelaide Mackenzie. Filmed by Aqa Asusa Maak Ra.
www.Blessedsouluk.co.uk
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The founder and president of a new union for Black artists that launched this week says its mandate is to support Black talent and fight for fair wages, unlike local unions from the past that she says were “flawed from the beginning.”
Tara Taylor said the Union of Black Artists Society (UBAS) will have collective agreements for artists in theater, film, television, music, and fashion.
“It’s for anyone that is interested in the industry. So, either you join with an interest and we train you to do what you want, or you join with credits and then we put you to work. It should be as simple as that,” Taylor said.
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An artist and Black historian says he hopes an exhibit of African Nova Scotian quilts inspires a new generation to take up “a dying craft in the Black community.”
David Woods is the curator of the exhibit titled The Secret Codes, which is currently on display at the Dalhousie Art Gallery in Halifax. The exhibit features works from over two dozen predominately African Nova Scotian painters and quilters.
While the exhibit runs until Aug. 6, the gallery will host other events for Emancipation Day on Aug. 1 and Aug. 2. Those events will include a curator’s talk, a guided tour with Heather Cromwell of the Vale Quilters Association whose work is featured in the exhibit, and a “family quilts gathering” where people are invited to bring in their quilts to share stories about them.
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Vivian Cain’s daughter, Latoya, died in 2020, but it’s her daughter’s memory that keeps Cain motivated to continue planning and organizing the annual North Preston Day Celebration. The event took place last Saturday, the 16th year for the celebration.
“It was so hard when she passed,” Cain said in an interview. “It’s still hard.”
“I worked hard because I didn’t want to think about her, and I just kept busy, busy, busy. That kept my mind so that I wouldn’t have to, you know, be crying and… It helped me.”
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The longest-running Black music radio show in Atlantic Canada recently celebrated its 25th year anniversary on the airwaves.
Ryan Somers, aka DJ R$ $mooth, has been hosting $mooth Groove$ on CKDU 88.1 FM since 1998. The show, which airs every Sunday from 5pm to 8pm, broadcasts out of the Student Union Building on the campus of Dalhousie University.
“I always think of the show as like a home base, like no matter what’s going on… most people can hear me that Sunday,”
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Seven months after holding its largest Africa Festival of Arts and Culture on the Halifax waterfront, the Africa Festival of Arts
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A film festival created for Black Nova Scotian filmmakers is now open for submissions and its organizer hopes the event will go ahead without COVID restrictions for the first time since 2019.
The Emerging Lens Film Festival is now in its 13th year. Co-founder Shelley Fashan said the idea for the festival first came about in 2010 when she attended the screening of a documentary by East Preston filmmaker Tara Taylor, who eventually became Emerging Lens’ other co-founder.
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“All of these stories had a consistent theme of an individual or an event of significance that had been ignored by history and by an accident had been brought to my attention, and through my passion and commitment to create an excellent work I was allowed to become a conduit for their public recognition to give them a second life.”
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