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Seemed Like a Good Place to Fill up with Fuel for a Roadtrip by Mark Stevens
Via Flickr:
A setting looking to the east while taking in views across the west Texas landscape present at this fuel station just off I-10. I’d been at this spot about a year prior while heading out to Big Bend National Park. I was enchanted by the skies above that day; this one was no different! In composing this image, I decided to angle my Nikon SLR camera slightly upward, but include some foreground leading up to the nearby trees. Most of the image though would have a focus on the skies above with the cloud formations.
there are nearly 7 million palestinian refugees globally
1.5 million individuals live in the 58 recognized palestine refugee camps around palestine (i.e. in gaza, syria, east jerusalem, etc) recognized by the unrwa
67% of gaza's population are refugees
there are 905,000 registered palestine refugee children: 635,000 in gaza and 269,000 in the west bank
palestinian refugees frequently cannot access public health insurance and are barred from many professions; some areas bar them from education and formal work
in gaza poverty rates are nearly 82% and the unemployment rate is some of the highest in the world at nearl 47% as of august 2022
one recent study showed that 88% of palestinian children show signs of war-related post traumatic stress disorder
37% of adults in the gaza strip qualify for diagnosis for ptsd; however, this number should be approached cautiously, accounting for preconceptions about mental health, access to diagnosis, and hermeneutic injustice: the number is likely far higher
48,000 people in gaza have some form of a disability: more than one fifth of this number are children
palestinians are not allowed, by israeli law, to have citizenship; they have no freedom of movement, and can be subject to forced evictions, detention, and torture.
the per capita gdp of palestine is US$3,678 as of december 2021; this is in comparison to a gdp per capita of USD$52,000 in israel
palestine does not have a formal military. the us stopped aid to palestine, around $60 million, in 2019. palestinian security services receives around $27 million from the national budget.
hamas, a separate entity from the pss, receives around $300 million per year. in comparison, israel spends in excess of USD$23.6 billion annually on their military.
in the midst of disinformation campaigns by global powers, fight facts with facts- and with protests, rallying, donating, elevating the voices of palestinians. keep showing up. keep educating yourself and others. never give up hope. palestine will be free.
Nas & DJ Premier - Define My Name (Official Audio)
Just when the clock ⏰️ strike midnight, Nas & DJ Premier dropped an unexpected exclusive that the Hip Hop masses has been waiting for titled "Define My Name" that is reminiscent of the Nas' 1998 hit "Nas Is Like..." produced by Premo himself
It is self evident once you hear the sing til the end that they are teasing us with a possible long-awaited album with the two but we will see.
Emily Kame Kngwarreye (1910 – 1996) is considered one of Australias most significant artists. Amazingly, she only began painting with acrylics in her late seventies but in a few short years became an artist of national and international standing.
Emily was the first female painter to emerge from an art movement dominated by men and did so in a way that transformed Aboriginal painting. Employing a variety of styles over the course of her eight-year painting career, she painted her Country and sacred Dreamtime stories in a deeply emotional and expressive manner.
She was born around 1910 at Alhalkere (Soakage Bore), on the edge of the Utopia pastoral station, approximately 250km north-east of Alice Springs. Alhalkere was her fathers Country, and her mothers Country was Alhalpere, just to the east.
Despite being married twice, she had no children of her own but raised her relative Lily Sandover Kngwarreye and her niece Barbara Weir. Both becoming famous artists in their own right. Other nieces that also became famous artists include Gloria Petyarre, Kathleen Petyarre, Ada Bird Petyarre, Violet Petyarre and Nancy Petyarre.
Well before she became one of its most senior contemporary artists, Emily held a unique status within her community of Utopia. Her strong personality and past employment as a stock hand on pastoral properties in the area (at a time when women were only employed for domestic duties), reveals her forceful independence and trailblazing character.
Her age and ceremonial status also made her a senior member of the Anmatyerre language group. She was a senior custodian of cultural sites of her fathers country. She was considered the Boss Woman of the Alatyeye (pencil yam dreaming) and Kame (yam seed dreaming).
Emily started as a traditional ceremonial artist, beginning painting as a young woman as part of her cultural education. An important component of this education was learning the womens ceremonies, which are associated with in-depth knowledge of the Dreamtime stories and of womens social structures.
This knowledge is known as Awelye in Anmatyerre language. Awelye also refers to the intricate designs and symbols associated with womens rituals. These are applied to the womens upper chest, breasts and arms using fingers or brushes dipped into rich desert ochres.
Aboriginal art outside of ceremonial painting began in Utopia in 1977, when batik-making was introduced to women as part of an extended government-funded education program. In 1978, Emily was a founding member of the Utopia Womens Batik Group. In 1988, the Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association (CAAMA) completed its first project with the Utopia Womens Batik Group. This became an exhibition called Utopia - A Picture Story.
From the beginning, Emilys art stood out from the others. Rather than filling her batiks with Aboriginal symbols, she preferred patterns of layered lines and dots that revealed plant, figurative forms and cell like structures. The 88 silk batiks from this first project were acquired by the Holmes a Court Collection in Perth.
In the same year the CAAMA shop initiated The Summer Project, introducing the Utopia womens batik group to the use of acrylic paints on canvas. Among the 81 paintings completed was Emilys first artwork on canvas, Emu Woman.
Inspired by the many Dreamtime stories of which she was a custodian, Emily employed an extraordinary array of styles over the course of her eight-year painting career.
In her early works, Emily preferred the use of an earthy ochre colour palette, reflecting her experience of using natural ochres during ceremonies. Over time she expanded her repertoire to include a dazzling array of colours found in the desert landscape. Colours are significant in her paintings. Yellow, for example, often symbolises the season when the desert earth begins to dry up and the Kame (yam seeds) are ripe.
Her shifting styles also reveal her self-confidence and willingness to experiment with form, pictorial space and artistic conventions. She drew creatively from the geographic landmarks that traverse her Country and the Dreaming stories that define it. Whenever she was asked to explain her paintings, her answer was always the same:
Whole lot, that's the whole lot. Awelye (my Dreamings), Alatyeye (pencil yam), Arkerrthe (mountain devil lizard), Ntange (grass seed), Tingu (a Dreamtime pup), Ankerre (emu), Intekwe (a favorite food of emus, a small plant), Atnwerle (green bean), and Kame (yam seed). That's what I paint; the whole lot.
This is because she chose to present a very broad picture of the land and how it supports the Anmatyerre way of life. Her artworks embrace the whole life story of the Dreamtime, seeds, flowers, wind, sand and everything. Although her works relate to the modern art tradition, this resemblance is purely visual. The emphasis in Emilys paintings is on the spiritual meaning, based in the tradition of her people.
The evolving styles of Emily Kame Kngwarreyes paintings
Emily started to paint in 1988. Her early style featured visible linear tracings following the tracks of the Kame (Yam Dreaming) and animal prints associated with the Emu Dreaming. Fields of fine dots partially obscured symbolic elements.
By 1992 her paintings were so densely packed with layers of dots that her symbolic underpainting was no longer visible.
Another evolution in her painting style occurred when she began to use large brushes. She worked faster, more loosely and on a larger scale. Sometimes dragging the brush while she dotted, producing lines from the sequential dots.
By the mid 1990s she had pioneered a style of Aboriginal painting referred to as dub dub works. They were created by using large brushes which were laden with paint and then pushed into the canvas in such a way that the bristles part and the paint is mixed on the canvas.
Using this technique, she created wildly colourful artworks and her paintings became progressively more abstract. Different artists from Utopia including Polly Ngale and Freddy Purla have subsequently adopted this style.
During the last two years of her life, she used the linear patterns found on womens ceremonial body designs as the primary inspiration for her paintings. The abstracted sequential dots of colour gave way to parallel lines which were much more formally arranged. She had used lines earlier before gradually submerging them under layers of dots. This time, she created simple, bold compositions of parallel lines in strong dark colours.
The above style in turn evolved to looser meandering lines which appear to trace the shapes of the grasses and the roots of the pencil yam as they forge their way through the desert sands.
In 1996 she produced a body of work in which she depicted pencil yam dreaming using a rich ochre colour palette. In this final burst of creative energy, Emily produced a beautiful body of work known as her scribble phase. In these atmospheric paintings, lines and dots were replaced by flowing fields of colour.
A Road Leading off to Adventure in Capitol Reef National Park by Mark Stevens
Via Flickr:
From an overlook at Panorama Point in Capitol Reef National Park with a view looking to the east. Here I used the overlook I was standing on to create a layered look to this setting and then the road that goes to Sunset Point and the Goosenecks as a leading line. I later worked with control points in DxO PhotoLab 5 and then made some adjustments to bring out the contrast, saturation and brightness I wanted for the final image.
Zachary Foster, Ph.d, historian of Palestine, has made a thread of a brief history of Israel's ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from 1890 to present. [His newsletter: Palestine, in Your Inbox] Pasted below:
Yesterday, on October 24, 2023, Israel's plans to expel Gaza's Palestinian population to Sinai, Egypt were leaked. Not surprisingly, this plan has a decades long history and dates to at least 2004, if not earlier. (Source)
Between Oct 7, 2023-present, Israel has displaced ~1.4 million Palestinians in Gaza through its campaign of indiscriminate bombing. (Source)
In May 2023, 178 Palestinian Bedouins were forced out of Ein Samiya (West Bank) after Israel repeatedly demolished their homes, threatened to destroy their only school & after their grazing land was taken by settlement expansion & b/c of settler violence: [Link]
In July 2022, the 100-person community in Ras a-Tin (WB) was pushed after a Jewish settler outpost was established 2km away. Since then, members of the Palestinian community have suffered from verbal abuse, harassment, theft & vandalism of property. [Link]
Between Aug 2022- August 2023, the 88-person community in al-Qabun was pushed out by Israeli Jewish settler violence & assaults by the Israeli army. [Link]
In July 2020, Israel made 70 Palestinians homeless in Khirbet Humsa for the 6th time. Israeli forces loaded the residents' personal belongings and dropped them off 7 miles away. [Link]
In 2019, 2 groups of Palestinian families near the Taybeh junction were pushed out:
Between June 1967 - 2016, Israel revoked the residency status--and thus the right to live in Jerusalem (or anywhere else in Israel) -- of at least 14,595 Palestinians from East Jerusalem in what amounts to "forcible transfers," according to @hrw. (Source)
Between 1968 -1971, Israel expelled 615 Gazan residents. Between, 1971-1988, Israel expelled another 90 Palestinains from Gaza. Source: Sara Roy, The Gaza Strip: The Political Economy of De-development, p.110
In 1967, Israel expelled 250K-325K Palestinians, including from Imwas, Yalo, Bayt Nuba, Surit, Beit Awwa, Beit Mirsem, Shuyukh, Jiftlik, Agarith & Huseirat. (Source: one, two)
In 1948, Zionist forces expelled hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes. They also refused to allow ~750,000 Palestinians who were made refugees during the war back to their homes.
Source:
B/w 1891-1948, most Zionist leaders, inc. Theodor Herzl, Ahad Ha'am, Israel Zangwill, Arthur Rupin, M. Smilansky, L. Motzkin, Yoseph Weitz, Chaim Weizmann, M. Usshishkin, D. Ben Gurion, Moshe Shertok, thought it would be required to expel the Palestinians: [Quote Tweet]
Here are some additional screenshots if the statements of Zionist leaders from 1890-1948. And you wonder why so many people think Zionism was such a problematic, dare I say, racist idea?
Signups have been open for roughly 29 hours. In that time, 223 creators have signed up to offer 312 auctions in 88 listed fandoms, and 76 write-in fandoms.
And? 42 creators are willing to work in ANY fandom!
Our creators are once again tending to leave the choice for where to donate up to their bidders. Among those who selected specific nonprofits to support, the top spots went to:
77 Middle East Children's Alliance
65 Sherlock's Homes Foundation
54 Never Again Action
51 In Our Own Voice
49 National Network to End Domestic Violence
48 Civil Rights Education and Enforcement Center
We so far have 34 offers for fan labor, including 6 folks offering translation (in various combinations of English/French/German/Spanish/Vietnamese, and limited help in Russian)
Top of the rankings for listed fandoms:
41 K-Pop *
28 Good Omens
22 Red, White, & Royal Blue
18 Sherlock Holmes *
16 Marvel *
And over in the unlisted fandoms? The leaderboard looks like this …
5 Yu Yu Hakusho
3 Ace Attorney
3 Bungou Stray Dogs
3 Dragon Ball
3 For All Mankind
3 Realm of the Elderlings - Robin Hobb
3 The Goblin Emperor Series - Katherine Addison
... so far.
Stay tuned for a more in-depth dive into the listed and unlisted fandoms in a post coming soon to a screen near you!
And jsyk, I've had to revise this post 3 times during the drafting as new signups come in. It's a good problem to have :)