The We in Me: House of RESILIENCE, 2022
November 19, 2022
House of RESILIENCE, a celebration of foster youth voices in the arts.
House of RESILIENCE is a creative platform by MoFundamentals, showcasing perspectives on houselessness and resilience through art from foster youth through dance, films, music, and dialogue from and by current and former foster youth artists and advocates. The festival-style event will include: a panel, dance and spoken word performance, short film screenings, and a rap performance along-side booths by food and coffee vendors, entrepreneurs, support organizations, plus free sportswear giveaways for attending foster youth.
House of RESILIENCE commenced with a blessing by Lupita & Luz Rodriguez from Kalpulli Teocalli Ollin, to share ancestral medicine in community. Audiences were welcomed to enjoy music while they explore community partner booths by Project Q, a non-profit organization that provides services and uses hair and self-empowerment as a form of social justice for at-risk and unhoused LGBTQIA+ youth; Rosebud Coffee, a non-profit organization providing career opportunities and support for foster youth; Feed The People, former foster-operated vegan purveyors; The Eleven Shop by Diamond Evans, a former-foster operated candle-maker, prints for sale, and free live screen printing by Orphan Tongue, a quarterly Zine focused on highlighting the work of foster youth and former foster youth; Free sportswear giveaways will be provided to attending foster youth courtesy of Brown Bag Lady and Young LA.
Programming began with a panel of foster-led leaders to explore the importance of foster youth voices in the arts. The panel included Tige Charity, Founder and Executive Director of Kids In The Spotlight; Jacob “Blacctrophy” Jackson, rap artist and foster youth advocate for the Youth Justice Coalition and LA County Youth Commission; and Gabriel Gutierriez, Founder and Director of adoptee-led arts program, MoFundamentals. The conversation was facilitated by Bernard Brown, dance artist, choreographer, educator and founder of bbmoves.
Four film shorts were screened by students working with Kids In The Spotlight (KITS), a Los Angeles-based foster-led film program that provides a platform for young people in foster care to write, cast and star in their own short films, telling their stories their way. Films include “Rite of Passage” by Grant Housley and presented by Daniel Williams (writer/actor) and London Jones (actor); “The Good Life” by David Mahmoudieh and presented by Kion Gozi (writer/actor) and London Jones (writer); “Run” by Brandon Broady presented by Kyshawna Johnson (writer); and “The Inheritance” by Julia Verdin.
MoFundamentals presented a performance choreographed by Gutierrez in collaboration with three foster youth dancers and one poet: Remeuel Dupri, Victor Pinzon Gonzalez, Tauheedah Shakur, and Timothy Story.
The evening closed with a performance of “A Lil Louder” and “Showem” by the talented rap artist, Blacctrophy .
HIGHLIGHTS VIDEO
This event is a part of The We in Me, homeLA’s public education program that considers homelessness through the lens of empathy and civic engagement, offering a variety of opportunities for support, public engagement, learning, awareness, and action around homelessness. The We in Me furthers homeLA’s mission to promote intersectionality and cultivate inclusivity through the embodied exchange of ideas around varied contextual imaginings of “home.”
The We in Me: House of RESILIENCE was created in part by MoFundamentals and is produced in partnership with The Box gallery.
House of RESILIENCE centers the talents and creativity of those impacted by the foster care system and provides foster youth with mentorship, creative professional art opportunities and pathways, and support through a foster-youth centered approach to healing through the arts.
This activity is supported in part by an Impact Grant by the California Arts Council, a state agency. Learn more at www.arts.ca.gov. homeLA is fiscally sponsored by Fulcrum Arts.
