How To Get November’s Culture Fix While Being Safe

By Chloe Robinson

Despite the disadvantages that have come along with the Covid-19 pandemic, there are still ways to enjoy culture and engage in festivities whilst staying safe and healthy. 

Primarily, the The Museum at FIT’s Fashion Culture Talk, which aired live on November 5th, and is still available via Youtube, allows viewers to immerse themselves into a conversation about where fashion meets ethics. Puyallup fashion designer Korina Emmerich and Mississippi Choctaw Cherokee artist Jeffrey Gibson, in honor of National Native American Heritage Month, discussed not only ethical consumption within the fashion industry, yet also the impact their heritage had on their work. They also touch upon the correlation between their creativity in fashion and activism.

The virtual public conference held by Fondazione Prada addressed some of the most crucial intellectual questions, as it merged various professional geniuses including neuroscientists, cognitive psychologists, anthropologists, and philosophers. The conference is a segment of the Milan contemporary art museum and cultural institutions project, “Human Brains, and contemplates the definition of consciousness and its relationship with culture. 

Painter Jenny Saville’s project Elpis, which opened November 12th, beautifully depicted the not-so-beautiful hardships that the world is currently facing, as she painted “Virtual”, a composition featuring shapes that resembled Zoom squares. 

Nina Chanel Abney’s “The Great Escape” compiles her paintings that aim to address difficult topics including race, politics, homophobia, and even pop culture. Her paintings serve as a symbol of our world’s contemporary culture. Her most recent work, which was displayed initially on November 12th, steers off her usual track. “The Great Escape” is a representation of utopia from the perspective of a Black commune and opens up discussion regarding the creation of community and the accessibility to nature and its resources.

Since May, Broadway’s Best Shows has been showing virtual performances of just that: Broadway’s most memorable plays. Starring theater’s biggest celebrities, including John Malkovich and Morgan Freeman, this streaming series only costs 5 dollars, and benefits the Actors Fund. November 12th showed Patti LuPone and Rebecca Pidgeon perform the infamous, Boston Marriage. More plays were virtually performed throughout the span of November, and if you’d like to take part, tickets can be purchased via Today Tix.

Caroline Kent, a Chicago-based painter, displayed her first solo show, “A Sudden appearance of the sun”, beginning November 13th. Her use of various mediums such as symbols, color, lines and patterns communicate various themes that exemplify the relationship between language, translation and abstraction. As she takes inspiration from her Mexican roots, Kent incorporates the vivid hues and rich textures of sculptor and painter Pedro Coronel and architect Luis Barragán. 

Esa-Pekka Salonen commissioned composer Nico Muhly to write a piece solely for a virtual audience. San Francisco’s symphony performed Throughline in San Francisco’s Davies Hall, and fellow soloists throughout the world recorded remotely. These pieces were compiled to create a beautiful work of art that can be streamed on San Francisco Symphony’s website. 

In honor of the opening of its new Nancy and Rich Kinder Building, The Museum of Fine Arts in Houston commissioned new installations and art from many different artists, such as Ai Weiwei, Ólafur Elíasson, Yayoi Kusama, and James Turrell. These artists use their work to display larger concepts of culture within contemporary art. 

The American ballet Theatre, in honor of its 80th anniversary, presented an all-virtual take of its fall gala. New choreography from Gemma Bond, Christopher Rudd, Pam Tanowitz, and more all helped to make this premiere exciting and special. You can find recordings of this virtual, yet beautiful, performance on ABT’s website and Youtube channel. 

On November 23rd, Bloomingdale’s began their virtual holiday benefit, hosted by comedian and actor Ali Wentworth. Featuring performances by singer Andra Day and ABT dancers Misty Copeland, Skylar Brandt, and Gabe Stone Shayer, as well as the holiday window reveal, this is not one to miss. In order to register for the event, a donation to the Child Mind Institute is required. 

NYPD No Longer Forcing Women to Remove Hijabs for Mugshots  

By Avery Smith, Hadley Hart, and Jordyn Roskind 

New York’s Police Department agreed to alter its policies and allow Muslim women to wear religious head coverings while being photographed for mugshots, as long as their faces remain unobstructed. 

Prior to this change of policy, Jamilla Clark and Arwa Aziz,  two Muslim women, sued the police department after their arrest, explaining that when an Islamic woman has to remove their hijab, it leaves them feeling more than ashamed. This new policy applies not only to hijabs, but also to other religious headwear, including skullcaps, wigs, and turbans worn by Orthodox Jews and Sikhs respectively. 

Previously, the NYPD was betraying the values of religious inclusion since, as Alan Feuer states, “Most observant Muslim women wear a head covering when in the presence of men who are not their husbands or members of their family”. Albert Fox Cahn, an attorney, argued that  “A person can have their driver’s license or other ID photo taken with a religious head covering on, so “there’s no reason why the NYPD should require them to remove these same head coverings”. 

This policy is a step forward in the police force’s religious inclusion efforts, promoting acceptance and understanding of varying religions and their symbols. 

Black Women Have Been Speaking for Years and Maybe Now America Will Listen

By Haley Brettschneider

From protests to debates, Black women all over the world have stood up for the prevalent racial injustice in our society and stood up to make history and to take back the nation that has always taken people of color for granted.

Black women specifically helped put President-elect Joe Biden on the road to victory and the road to the White House this upcoming January. A mind boggling 91% of black women voted for Biden and Harris, finally electing a black woman to fill a powerful government position. Kamala Harris, a Howard University alumna, will be a central figure for female power and inspiration.

Surprisingly, only 45% of white women in 2016 voted for Hillary Clinton while a staggering 98% of black women voted for her. Black women have been trying to place women in power for years and it’s time for us to all come together to ensure more and more women get elected into major positions.