Love Like You Mean It: Conversation with April Holder

In this conversation artist April Holder and I talk about motherhood, naming the narrow lens of social media, the accessible art of printmaking, dismantling the myth of loneliness, allowing our community (including cis men) to practice vulnerability as an act of repair, and to never back down from being the complex multi-dimensional people we all are. April reminds us that no matter how much we ‘do it the right way’, haters gonna hate and love will find its way to us, and she asks us to remember that we shape our own reality and gives us the task to LOVE LIKE YOU MEAN IT!

I first met April Holder smoking cigs outside of a warehouse on the southside of Santa Fe, NM in the early 2000’s at the Humble art space. She had purple or blue or green hair, a leather jacket studded up and sharp biting wit that is so rare these tender days, it was everything we could do to not spend the whole evening laughing when there was a show to put on. I was invited there as a DJ to play a set by fellow local DJ the Werewulf Micah Wesley, also an incredible painter. Little did I know that That time would become many times and a lifelong building of friendship and family would result, Including April. Today, we are witnessing our children become best friends, we are growing and inviting changed world views and better behaviours, we are supporting each other's goals and work and hearing the pain and evolution of being in community that can’t always appreciate or understand us or our growth as weird ass boss babe in between spaces human type beings. April is on fire, always reflecting back the idea that love is truly what will move us forward collectively and I am proud to call her a sister. 

April Holder with a painting in progress at the Institute of American Indian Arts AIR program, 2021. Image by Broken Boxes Podcast

April Holder is a Sac and Fox, Wichita and Tonkawa woman, whose ancestral lands run through Oklahoma and was born and raised in Shawnee. April’s artistic practice is a celebration of Indigenous women, an honoring of the land and animals, and the critical connections between. As an Indigenous woman, a mother and an artist, April recognizes the responsibility she has to create a healthy space for women like herself to thrive far into the future. 

April’s  focus is in painting and printmaking, and she carries an understanding that the creative process itself can have an environmental impact. She strives to lessen this by using recycled materials such as fabric, household objects and thread;  all found or sourced from thrift stores. 

April’s work presents a visual interpretation of the vulnerable and strong stories of Indigenous women, such as herself, while creating connection, continuum and a healthy way forward for her communities to reclaim their power.

Follow April Holder on Instagram @aeon_fluxus

Final track on this episode is the song POWERFUL by Am-Mer-Ah-Su

This conversation was hosted by Ginger Dunnill of Broken Boxes Podcast

Trust Yourself: Conversation with Oriana Lee

In this episode we get into conversation with the one and only Oriana Lee. I first engaged with Oriana in Santa Fe, NM while doing sound production for Wise Fool New Mexico several years back. I produced a track for one of Oriana’s live rap performances and ever since then we have continued to support each other's creativity in various ways within our community. For this conversation, Oriana breaks down her love for Hiphop, what it is like to be a life coach, we also decode identity politics a bit and Oriana reminds us that the most important thing you can do in this life is to “trust yourself”.

Oriana Lee identifies as an interdisciplinary artist of African descent, currently living in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Shaped heavily by Black American culture, Lee’s artistic lens is primarily rooted in Hiphop principles - peace, love, unity, and having fun. Artistic activism around human rights gently threads through Lee’s creations with traditional African culture often infused through patterns, symbols, and storytelling. Lee’s contemporary art practice includes music, literature, performance, visual arts, recycled/upcycled art, installation art, and circus arts.

At the end of our conversation we here a track that Oriana recorded with her son for her recent solo exhibition, the song is titled Success by Physique & Olee from the 1010 Freestyle EP (2021).

For more info, visit, www.orianalee.love /IG: @oriana1ee

This conversation was hosted by Ginger Dunnill of Broken Boxes Podcast

By Breath & By Song: Conversation with Dakota Camacho

In this episode we hear from artist Dakota Camacho. They speak to us through song and story about depth in relationship to land, community and in what ways they practice their art. They speak on mindfulness in social media, protocol, witnessing elders and self, of accountability, how to embrace challenges as gifts, and so much more.

About the artist:

Dakota Camacho is a Matao/CHamoru artist born & raised in Coast Salish Territory who creates indigenizing processes by weaving languages of altar-making, movement, film, music, and prayer. Exploring the overlap between integrity, ancestral/indigenous lifeways, true love, and accountability, guiya (they) activates a Matao worldview to make offerings towards inafa’maolek (Balance and harmony with all of life). 

Camacho has presented yo’ña (their) work on five continents and throughout Oceania. Guiya is a Nia Tero Pacific Northwest Artist Fellow, Western Art’s Alliance - Native Launchpad Artist and the recipient of The New England Foundation of the Arts, National Dance Project Award, The National Performance Network’s Creation Fund. Camacho holds a Masters of Arts in Performance Studies from Tisch School of the Arts at New York University, and graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a Bachelor of Arts in Gender & Women's Studies as a First Wave Urban Arts and Hip Hop Scholar. Camacho is a chanter, adjunct instructor, and core researcher for I Fanlalai'an Oral History Project based at the University of Guåhan.

Yo'ña (their) work enacts spaces for multiple worlds, ways of knowing, being, and doing to speak to each other while unearthing embodied pathways towards collective liberation

https://www.dakotacamacho.com

Music Featured: Following our conversation we will hear a very special unreleased song by Dakota Camacho titled Fangoggue, exclusively presented for this Broken Boxes episode.

This conversation was hosted by Ginger Dunnill of Broken Boxes Podcast

I Am The River: Conversation with Amber Morning Star Byars

In this podcast we feature a timely and pointed conversation with dear friend, water protector, artist and current law school student Amber Morning Star Byars. The topics we discuss in this episode range from healing ancestral trauma, survival, the Resist Line3 camps, Land Back initiatives, tribal law, art, wellness, mental health and self care; all of which need continued attention as we work towards a healthy relationship to our planet. 

Amber Morning Star Byars is an artist, advocate, storyteller, and law student from Santa Fe, New Mexico. Amber is an enrolled member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma and a descendant of the Chickasaw Nation. She received a BA in Indigenous Liberal Studies and an AFA in Studio Art from the Institute of American Indian Arts in 2018 and is a current student at the University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law. After graduating law school in the spring of 2022, Amber will continue to advocate for the rights of Indigenous peoples, specifically in the areas of Land Back, Missing and Murdered Indigenous People, and environmental protection.

In the middle of our conversation we shared an audio reading of an article Amber wrote about her reflections from the Line3 pipeline resistance at Red Lake River in Northern Minnesota, while she was on the frontlines this year. The article titled I Am The River, was first published via AllCreation.org as part of their Fall Equinox 2021 collection, Sacred Relationship. At the end of my conversation with Amber, we here the song “Silt and Clay” by singer/songwriter Adam Horowitz. 

Land Back, Front Line and Tribal Law Resources:
Rebecah Nagle work and her podcast, This Land
Nick Estes and the Red Nation podcast
Winona LaDuke and Honor The Earth
Stopline3.org For info and then donate to legal fund
Water Protectors Legal collective
IG @resist_line_3 

Well Being, Spiritual and Mental Health Books:
THE EXTENDED MIND: The Power of Thinking Outside the Brain by Annie Murphy Paul
The Body Keeps the Score by Vessel Vanderclock
The Gift: 12 Lessons to Save Your Life by Edith Eger
Breath by James Nester
We Are the Luckiest: The Surprising Magic of a Sober Life by  Laura McKowen
Happiness Becomes You: A Guide to Changing Your Life for Good by Tina Turner
The Book of Secrets by Depak Chopra

Leadership Books:
Think Again by Adam grant
Dare To Lead by Brene Brown
Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown

This conversation was hosted by Ginger Dunnill of Broken Boxes Podcast

Bonus episode: Ku'e - Who I am/ What I stand for - CCA series launch for Radio Coyote

This is a special Bonus Episode, presented as a poem stitched together with music and memory, story and reflection. I am a sound artist and this is how I feel most comfortable to share a bit of my own story, who I am on this planet, how I maintain community, connection to land and assert ally-ship to the various communities who I love and who love me.

This episode was the first broadcast to open a series of 18 episodes presented by Broken Boxes for Radio Coyote and aired March, 2021. You can hear the full series archive at Radiocoyote.org.

Ku`e loosely translates from Hawaiian language to mean, “To Oppose, Resist: Stand Different”. My life I have always been different, it used to feel like a point of trauma, not belonging, but now as I grow older, I feel like this understanding of relationship to self and land is what makes me so strong. I am proud of who I am and where I come from. This broadcast is the memory of home. The land I was born in/with/for and the people and locations and songs that informed my being on the planet. In the middle of the pacific ocean, the water and the land of Hana on the island of Maui, Hawai’i. This broadcast is my memory of that place, it is a vulnerable love story. Kumu Kama, a teacher of mine from my youth used to say “You have to honor the land, songs and dance of where you are from in order to honor the that of others you may want to support and be in community with.” Thank you to my family and friends for sharing your memories of home transmitted here in a mixtape format to set up this series.

Thank you to my dad, my hanai sister Pamakani Pico and my dear friends Christy Werner and Angelica Belmont who contributed to this episode by sharing stories from home!

Music featured in this episode:
Artist: Olomana 
Song: Ku'u Home O Kahalu'u 

Artist: Hapa
Song: Lei Pikake

Artist: Paula Fuga
Song: Loloiwi

Audio recording from the late Kanaka Maoli activist Haunani Kay Trask. This excerpt is from a speech Trask gave On the 100th anniversary of the illegal overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom, in 1993, where Trask famously spoke in front of Iolani Palace.

Artist: Composed by Hinaleimoana Wong
Song: Kū Haʻaheo E Kuʻu Hawaiʻi

This conversation was hosted by Ginger Dunnill of Broken Boxes Podcast