‣ Hyperallergic Editor-in-Chief Hrag Vartanian was among scholars, artists, and writers who gathered for a symposium on the Artsakh genocide and forms of resistance last weekend. Author Talar Keoseyan recapped the landmark event for the Armenian Weekly:
Swerdlow stated that COP29, which will be hosted in Baku this month, is an opportunity to enlighten the world about Azerbaijan’s greenwashing of its human rights abuses. “We need to use our laws like the Magnitsky sanction on Azerbaijani officials. We need to use all available remedies including Section 907 and sanctions, the release of prisoners,” Swerdlow said.
A profound performance lecture about the Tnjri plane tree, soil, roots and diaspora by Dr. Aroussiak Gabrielian and Hrag Vartanian, with musical accompaniment by Raffi Wartanian and Armen Adamian, called “Roots Across Diaspora Time” concluded the morning session.
‣ This week has been … a lot. But it’s as urgent a time as ever to revisit the work of organizers like Sakinah Ahad Shannon, who started running abortion services geared toward Black women in Chicago before Roe v. Wade. Renee Bracey Sherman and Regina Mahone report in the Nation:
Sakinah was in Jane for a year and a half. She started out as a Call Back Jane, doing intake for the women who wanted abortions, before eventually assisting with the procedures. As she commuted back and forth to The Front, her transportation costs began to add up. She enjoyed counseling women in person, so the other Janes suggested a solution: Her South Side home would become one of the Fronts, and she could counsel women from there.
This change helped alleviate some of the financial strain, but it also brought a whole new set of risks, because women were suddenly coming to her home—a home that she shared with her three kids, her husband, and the young adult daughter of a family friend. Still, when we asked Sakinah whether there were any risks she refused to take, she responded, without missing a beat: “None.”
‣ Another timely feature in the New Yorker sheds light on Florence Mars, a White photographer who documented the Civil Rights Movement and violence against Black people in Mississippi. Reporter Paige Williams writes:
Mars had recoiled from the “furious conformity” that enveloped Neshoba County during the investigation. “Only a tiny handful among white townspeople spoke out, braving social ostracism and threats of violence to denounce the murders and decry the climate of fear and intimidation that had overtaken their community,” Campbell writes. “Few did so more openly and courageously than Florence Mars.” Mars visited the civil-rights workers’ office in Meridian, coöperated with the F.B.I., and agreed to testify before a federal grand jury about past treatment of Black people at the hands of violent local authorities. She launched a fund-raiser to help rebuild Mount Zion, and tried to start a “Philadelphia-to-Philadelphia” youth exchange, which would link her home town to the city in Pennsylvania.
She was labelled a snitch and a spy. Local law-enforcement officers surveilled her; anonymous callers threatened her. The sheriff threw her in the “drunk tank,” which Campbell describes as “an act that scandalized some townspeople more than the murders themselves.” Mars’s church forced her out of her teaching positions—the white congregation disapproved of her “dangerous beliefs.” The Klan organized a boycott of her stockyard, forcing the business to close.
‣ For New York voters, the City produced a color-coded map detailing how your neighbors cast their ballots in the presidential election, giving us an early glimpse into Trump’s improvement in every borough since the 2020 race. Again, it’s a lot.
‣ And in the wake of reignited threats to reproductive justice, South Korea’s 4B Movement has once again drawn attention in the US via TikTok. Vittoria Elliott and Angela Watercutter report on the feminist strategy and its international appeal for Wired:
A floating bit of text on the video reads “Opting out. 4B”—a reference to the feminist movement, started in South Korea, encouraging women to not marry, date, sleep with, or have children with men until all genders have equal rights. As of this writing, it’s gotten more than 3 million views.
Barbieri was just one of several people who posted videos about 4B on Wednesday. Another says, “Doing my part as an American woman by breaking up with my Republican boyfriend last night & officially joining the 4b movement this morning.” It has nearly 9 million views and the poster, @rabbitsandtea, did several follow-up videos to respond to comments about her decision and appearance.
A video from creator @smith.woods with more than 50,000 views joined the movement with this message: “Trans girls, lock it up.”
“There’s no sleeping with men that is worth risking your life and your safety,” says TikTokker Regan, who goes by @ftheniceguy on TikTok, also encouraged women to swear off men (though she herself is gay). “When they have showcased time and time again that they don’t value who you are and they don’t vote for you, they don’t stand up for you. It’s important that you protect yourself when they’re not willing to protect you.”
‣ Look no further for your next unusual art outing: Writer Eric Drysdale is offering Brooklynites a chance to view antique stereostopic images from the 1940s to ’60s. Ryan Kailath reports on the exhibition and the short-lived technology anchoring it for Gothamist:
He draws extensively on his collection of New York-themed slides for shows in the city, including midcentury images of Times Square, Coney Island, Washington Square Park, and images of the Thanksgiving Day parade and floats from 1954.
Drysdale’s shows are limited to around a dozen guests each, as every guest needs a slide viewer, which he provides. He guesses that he has the world’s largest collection of viewers in working condition.
That’s one reason Drysdale calls the show an “intimate salon,” which he sometimes hosts in lofts, art studios and people’s living rooms. People pass around the boxes of curated slides, waiting eagerly to see new ones, or pestering their neighbors to return to favorite images or collections.
At every single show, Drysdale said, first-time guests who are astonished by the vivid quality of the images ask him why the technology isn’t still around.
The answer, he said, is the same reason he’s gone to such great lengths to put together the show: The images are hard to share.
‣ Former (or current, no shame!) Nancy Drew fans, assemble. In the town of Sleepy Hollow, an annual convention dedicated to the long-running book series just hosted its latest iteration. Jadie Stillwell and Nicole Blackwood attended and did not disappoint, writing in LitHub:
“There’s so much to not do with Nancy Drew, because she was such a particular person,” Zimic said during her presentation. But given the wide array of Nancy media, those particulars aren’t exactly well-defined. You know them when you see them—or rather, you know what you can fondly remember. “We grew up, and we’ve seen her in these books and on the covers—we know what she looks like,” Fisher said. “And that’s the Nancy people have in their head: whatever they grew up with.”
But hey, no worries: even if Nancy can’t be defined by her image, surely we can nail down a character logline. Sherlock Holmes is abrasive, Hercule Poirot is vain, Veronica Mars is prickly, and Nancy Drew is… the quintessential teen girl of her time, at all times. Yes, she was lovingly sculpted into being by Carolyn Keenes (Carolyns Keene?) and scores of illustrators, but she’s also one publishing executive’s idea of how an independent young woman might look and act, packaged for the masses and routed straight to a bookshelf near you—and your mom, and your mom’s mom. It’s true that most of Nancy’s iterations share a few traits: cute blue roadster, loyal boyfriend, indulgent dad. But these are things she possesses, privileges she has; there’s still frustratingly little to cement her as more than a concept.
‣ Send this to your corporate and nonprofit bosses pls:
‣ Laughing to keep from crying:
‣ Love that we all became poetry fiends for a day, though!
‣ Finally, a groundbreaking new work of cinema-dog-raphy to kick off the weekend:
Required Reading is published every Thursday afternoon, and it is comprised of a short list of art-related links to long-form articles, videos, blog posts, or photo essays worth a second look.
