By Jess Clarke

Closing reception for I AM SF exhibition and RP&E Release
February 22,2018  7 p.m. SF State

San Francisco State Univerity,
Caeser Chavez Student Center Art Gallery
1600 Holloway in SF.

Housing Justice Groups Align as National Movement Grows

By Jess Clarke

Theater of the Oppressed and Playback Theater

Saturday, October 14 — 2:00-6:00 pm 
(AND dinner 6:30 -8:30 after workshop)

Sunday, October 15 —  2:00-6:00 pm 

(CLAWS) Collaborative Liberation Arts Workshop Series  Spring Session:

Movement Metamorphosis  

a 5-week workshop series using movement and dance to open to change from within.

Biodanza facilitated by Mirjam Krohne
Five Saturdays,  April 22 — May 20, 2017
12-2 pm

Studio FAB 2525 Telegraph Ave
Oakland, CA 94612

CLAWS is a workshop series in Oakland that aims to create a laboratory where we can:

• experiment with new forms of collaboration using writing, theater and movement arts.
• explore how race, class and gender oppression can be resisted and transformed.
• work with one another inside and outside of sessions to create performance, story, and movement that can energize and liberate—personally and socially.
• create a community of reflection, performance and action.

To register by postal mail download the pdf

Community college and low-income residents face big loss of public resource

By Marcy Rein and Christine Hanson

On weekdays the windswept lot next to the main campus of City College of San Francisco (CCSF) can hold close to 1,000 cars belonging to students and teachers. On weekends a motorcycle safety class practices there, as does the marching band from Archbishop Riordan High School. This lot, the Balboa Reservoir, is one of the largest tracts of public land in land-starved San Francisco—and a key arena in the city’s fight to stem displacement of its vulnerable communities and the institutions that serve them.

What inspires you to work for change?
My number one inspiration right now is not an organization or a person or an event, it’s the city of Detroit. I first went there a couple of years ago to do organizational development, and later for direct action trainings with Detroit Summer, which was founded by Grace Lee Boggs and her partner Jimmy Boggs. Their key lesson is, ‘Transform yourself to transform the world. It’s time to grow our soul’s capacity to deal with the world we’re living in.’

The tangible solutions that are now coming out of Detroit blow my mind. It’s not just young folks getting excited about these ideas and trying to implement revolutions. It’s the 30- to 50-year-old black men coming out of prison or unemployed, gardening and farming. It’s not about getting a job and being a cog in someone else’s system. It’s about liberated work, where you are playing a useful role in your community.

Watching “The Greening of Cuba” reminds me of Detroit. Detroit has had an economic crisis for decades. The auto companies have divested, now it’s this urban rural city. Detroit’s population is less than half what it was. Out of necessity, people have had to start community gardens and urban farming. Music and food are being used to organize people. Potlucks provide a communal place to talk about issues and eat together.

Detroit has the highest statistics in terms of crime, unemployment, and drop out rates. Those are the symptoms of an unhealthy society. Those negative aspects can create a real darkness and depression. But that darkness can be the womb from which our new societies are born, where we can create the world we want to see.