S1: It's time for Midday Edition on Kpbs. Today , we are talking about San Diego artists and their inspiration. I'm Jade Hindman. Here's to conversations that keep you informed , inspired and make you think. Grammy Award winning actress Eva Noblezada explains the artistry behind her work.
S2: If I'm going to be an artist , I feel like part of my responsibility is is creating an outsource for people to see that they're not alone and then maybe share a laugh and then maybe be inspired by something. And then we go on our merry way.
S1: Plus , Alana Quintana writes romance novels against the backdrop of social justice issues. And we'll talk to Anne Hamilton , who created art to be Walked on. That's ahead on Midday Edition. First , the news. Even Noblezada is an actress , two time Tony Award nominee and Grammy Award winner , first discovered in 2013. She debuted in the first ever revival of Miss Saigon on the West End. She's since been in musicals like La Miz and the highly acclaimed Hades Town , which premiered on Broadway in 2019. And she has a multitude of projects under her belt , including films like Lucky Yellow Rose and Easter Sunday. She's also a San Diego native. Earlier this year , she performed in a three night one woman show called Nostalgia A Love Letter to NYC. The full show is out on Audible and Eva joins us now. Welcome to you. Hi.
S2: Hi. Thank you so much for having me.
S1: Thanks for joining us. So first , I'm curious about your upbringing here.
S2: I almost like I remember more of my childhood in San Diego than I remember anywhere else. I remember we used to go to SeaWorld a lot. We would go to Coronado Beach , get a bucket of KFC and sit by those like big , like fire pit things and just listen to the ocean and have fried chicken. And yeah , I was lucky enough to have both sides of my family living in San Diego , literally right down the street from each other. So I was really surrounded by my entire family for most of my early upbringing. So I was very , very lucky to have that.
S1: Yeah , that is great. You've said before that you came out of your mom singing and your dad was a music teacher.
S2: And I saw , you know , I started to understand , oh , people go on stage and sing for money , and that can be like a career path. So I didn't really understand that until I was like 10 or 11. And then I really , really started to like kind of be obsessed with wanting to be a performer. But I would say from a young age , I was just really always wanting to tell a story or be involved with any type of storytelling , any movie or TV show that would be on TV. I would just kind of sit and just want to be completely immersed in that in that show and that world. So I knew that I was always kind of destined for being in the arts. Yeah.
S1: Yeah.
S2: He was kind of my first , you know , not kind of was absolutely my first big music inspiration. He , you know , would always be playing different genres of music , including Ella. Thank God for Ella and definitely a lot of music like Santana and a lot of jazz , a lot of Louis Armstrong , and it just really filling the house with different sounds. And in order to , you know , really encourage my musicality. And , you know , he was the first person to put me next to piano and work with me on my arpeggio. So my dad is really the reason why I started to get really serious about it when I was a kid.
S1: Great , great. And I want us to take a listen to when you performed Cheek to Cheek in your show. Heaven.
UU: Heaven. I'm In.
S3: And my heart.
UU: Beats so that I can. Hardly speak. Me and I.
S3: Seem to find the happiness I seek when we're out together.
UU: Dancing cheek to cheek.
S1: And I want to talk about your Mexican and Filipino heritage in your show. You talk about growing up in a Mexican and Filipino household. Tell us more about that.
S2: Yeah , I feel very lucky. Like I said , to have been able to live with both sets of my grandparents so it would be as simple and as awesome as like waking up in the morning and having my my Lola cook us like egg fried rice. And my papa would make , you know , fish or whatever , and we'd split a papaya on the table and then walking later in the afternoon , not even two blocks to my house and there'd be fresh tortillas , there'd be , you know , Mexican food there. And just I guess I'm talking about food because I'm hungry , but like , more just like being surrounded , but being surrounded by just both of who I am , like the cultures and , and really feeling completely whole with within my family and within my culture , which which is awesome. It was just a lucky thing to have as a young child. I feel like it created such a strong foundation of like family to me , which is amazing.
UU: Super busy gone Gambian last three months and also more. You might wonder what if else.
S1: So you moved from San Diego to North Carolina. Then in 2013 you were a finalist in the prestigious National High School Musical Theater Awards. A musical fans know it as the Jimmy Awards.
S2: That was kind of the first time in my life where I was like , okay , when we work hard , when we put our body and we put our hearts and minds to focus on on a goal , we're going to make it. Because I saw my first Broadway show when I was 9 or 10. It was The Lion King , which just so happens to be the Minskoff Theater , where the National High School Musical Theater Awards take place. And I remember that , you know , as the animals walk down the aisle , I was bawling my eyes out. And I just remember thinking like , I'm going to do this one day. I'm going to be in a Broadway show. I'm going to be on Broadway. And that was the stage that I ended up making my Broadway stage debut on because of the Jimmy Award. So it really was a full circle moment.
S1:
S2: My my theater teacher , Bonnie Fraker , was in the audience supporting me. And the other fellow Emmy nominee , Ariana and her lifelong friend happened to be Tara Rubin , who's , you know , prestigious casting director here in New York City. And after the Jimmys that night , Tara and my theater teacher got to talking and she was like , Eva Haas audition for Miss Saigon. And because of that connection , we were able to put two and two together and set me up with an audition about I think it was like 3 or 4 months later in New York , which just was kind of insane because I was a senior in high school and we were choosing like what colleges to go to , and then all of a sudden I'm auditioning for Kim and Miss Saigon that's going to be premiering in London. Like it just it was kind of kind of crazy , actually , looking back at just , you know , how quickly everything happened.
S1: I mean. Right. I mean , how difficult was it being catapulted into the spotlight so suddenly.
S2: The catapult wasn't that difficult ? I think that was more exciting. I think the adjustment period of like understanding , okay , I'm a 17 year old , I'm very green , I'm very passionate , and I'm very I have a lot to learn. I think the hardest part for me was adjusting to the show schedule , also adjusting to the demands that it would require of my body and of my just of , you know , my spirit. I think when when you're really passionate about something and you don't put up certain boundaries that are really healthy for yourself , you tend to , I guess , over give. And I definitely was being asked way more than I should have been asked at such a young age. Being asked to change like my my weight and my skin and a lot of things that I wasn't expecting to be needed of me to change. I thought that I thought that I was hired because of my performance. But , you know , I think the hardest part was just adjusting to like what the industry was going to be like. I didn't really know much about the industry. I just knew about how much I wanted to perform. So that was kind of a definitely an awakening and maybe harsh at times , but I definitely benefited from all of those important lessons from when I was younger.
S1: Hmm , indeed. You're also in Haiti's Town , which follows the love story between the mythological couple , Orpheus and Eurydice. It's been on Broadway for about four years now.
S2: I believe Nina Simone made this quote is that an artist's duty is to reflect the times. And I feel like after we came back from the pandemic , you know , many of us , including myself , I didn't think that theater was really ever going to come back at a point that was a definite fear of mine because , you know , 18 months without a job and it didn't look like people were going to feel comfortable going back to a theater without masks on. And then it felt like , oh , we're going to be packed like sardines with our masks on , just like riddled with fear. How are we going to be able to enjoy live and live experience again ? And thankfully , the world was able to overcome that fear. And and I'm so grateful to still be in this incredible show. But it definitely changed my relationship with not just my character , but also how I approach the arts , how I approach my job , you know , definitely with a lot more gratitude than before , considering , you know , now we know how it feels to be completely separated from having a job. But I just felt like I grew as a person. So if the actor is growing and the you know , if the vessel is changing , then the than the connection to anything else is going to change as well. And if anything , it made it better. I think. I hope it made it. Better. But I'm so lucky to still be in this show.
S1: You're listening to Kpbs Midday Edition. I'm Jade Hindman. I'm speaking with Eva Noblezada about her personal journey in theater and her solo show , Nostalgia A Love Letter to NYC. You know , you've also opened up about your mental health and the trauma you faced and continue to face in the industry.
S2: I would say I've learned in my almost ten years of professional experience that I really enjoy being a person who feels very deeply , however , setting the boundaries in my life that keep me protected at all times are very important. So just because I love a show so much , if my voice isn't feeling 100% , it's very important that I learned the lesson of being able to call out without any shame or without any guilt. Another example would be just understanding that the industry is on a living entity. If I feel like the industry is requiring something of me that is false to me or that will leave me in a state where I'm over exhausted , I just I've learned how to say no or not. Right now , just being able to take in stock of how my body feels , which is just super important because we use our bodies every single day. I mean , not just when we're on stage like it takes us throughout our whole life. So being able to really take care of it and take care of my brain and understand that everything's very interconnected was was a long life lesson for me. And I'm very grateful that I'm starting to finally understand what that takes because I feel like much like my feet are on solid ground now rather than how I kind of felt before. But I think , you know , it's just always important to just be yourself. I talk about mental health because , like , that's something that I feel like a lot of people just feel. Not everyone feels great all the time , and I can absolutely relate to that. So if I'm going to be an artist , I feel like part of my responsibility is , is creating an outsource for people to see that they're not alone and then maybe share a laugh and then maybe be inspired by something. And then we go on our merry way. For me , that's like the best part about being an artist.
S1: So yeah , no , that's great perspective. And tell us more about putting together this one woman show.
S2: Nostalgia was the first time I it was in a freaking actual theater and it was being recorded for Audible , which I'm a huge fan of Audible and I love audiobooks. This that was the first time that happened in that context and I had never done one before where I needed a script and where I was going to do it three times in a row. I'm definitely more of a one night only kind of girl , definitely a live type of theater gal. That was an amazing learning experience and I was definitely riddled with nerves for most of it , but I was. It's an experience that I'll never , ever forget.
S3: Start spreading the new.
UU: So I'm leaving today. Hey , I wanna be a part of it. New York. New York. Mark these vagabond shoes.
S2: It really felt monumental to me. And I can. I still can't believe that people bought tickets to that. I don't know. Just for me. I can't believe that happened. Still , I'm still a little bit in shock.
S1:
S2: And then I would probably say try thinking of life as not as hard. I feel like I read this quote on Instagram the other day. That kind of broke me in the best way. It was like people who feel people who feel through life end up thinking of it as a tragedy like and I thought that was so romantic. That's just how I feel , unfortunately. But I do think that , you know , people who feel deeply and go through life feeling it sometimes can feel so just like tragic and just dramatic. And if you can find a way to like source that out to like transform that tragedy into something beautiful for yourself , that is the ultimate superpower. That's the ultimate magic that you can create for yourself. And that evening was those three evenings of doing nostalgia was like the perfect way to do that for me. And it really kind of I was able to like stamp that moment in my life and be like , You did that. You were nervous and you were so afraid of being judged and you were a little harsh on yourself. But you did that and we did it well. We did the best we could. So yeah , I would say to younger Eva , enjoy. Be kinder to yourself and love yourself as much as possible. And I would also say in moments where anxiety starts to like make you second guess yourself and doubt yourself , choose a thought that you can really put all of your feelings behind. So if it's like. I love performing. I love theater. You know , you can put all your feeling behind that and really at least focus on that. Focus on something that makes you feel very good , even if it's one small thing. Yeah.
S4: Yeah.
S1: I've been speaking with Eva Noblezada. Eva's solo show , Nostalgia. A Love Letter to NYC is out on Audible now. Eva , thank you so much for taking the time.
S2: Of course. Thank you so much for having me.
S1: Coming up , we'll talk to a writer who's retelling Shakespeare with social justice as a backdrop for romance in her new book.
S5: It's always been one that I've absolutely hated. So if you had asked me in college when I was studying Shakespeare or if I would write A Taming of the Shrew retelling , I would have been like , Absolutely not.
S1: You're listening to Kpbs Midday Edition. You're listening to Kpbs Midday Edition. I'm Jade Hindman. Last year , local author Alana Quintana Albertson published Ramona and Julietta , a Latin X spin on Romeo and Juliet , set in Barrio Logan. NPR named it one of the best books of 2022. Now she is back with a new book , Kiss Me Mi Amor , the second installment in her Love and Tacos series. It follows Enrique , the smooth talking heir , and Karolina , one of the few Latina farm owners in California's Central Valley. It's a reset of The Taming of the Shrew , complete with fake dating shenanigans , a love for Mexican cuisine , and an exploration of California's farming communities. Alana joins us now to talk more about the book. Alana , welcome to Midday Edition.
S5: Thank you so much for having me.
S1: So first , you drew on some of your own family history as inspiration for this story. Tell us more about that.
S5: Yeah , absolutely. I always really was fascinated by my mom's huge family. And growing up , it was assumed everyone had really big families. My mom is nine of ten and there were nine sisters and a brother. And so I have so many cousins , I can't even count that. And , you know , I would meet people who would have one or their families would have 1 or 2 siblings. And so I was just always fascinated with that family dynamic. And so it was really something that I wanted to play with. And when I was thinking of the framework of Shakespeare and with taming the true of a big family and a kind of traditional values , I just thought , Oh , this is the perfect thing to kind of tell the story of my mom's big Mexican family.
S1: And , you know , The Taming of the Shrew has been the subject of feminist critique because of its portrayal of gender roles. But it's since been adapted plenty of times.
S5: And it's so problematic that I was like , Oh , do I do this ? And , you know , and I actually saw every time I write a retelling , I actually go and see see a live production of it. I mean , obviously I read it as well , but I like to see it. And so the Old Globe did an amazing version of it. And so , you know , I really wanted to , I mean , not fix it , you know , and kind of change it and give the power back to her and not have her being a shrew , but at the same time play with the fact I have a line in there that she's a shrewd businesswoman. And so , you know , kind of how women that are successful are know sometimes are then considered problematic. But you know but but if a man does something very similar , it's powerful. So I did enjoy , you know , trying to play with this play. But yeah , it's always been one that I've absolutely hated. So if you had asked me in college when I was studying Shakespeare or if I would write A Taming of the Shrew retelling , I would have been like , absolutely not. Yeah. Hard ? No.
S1: Yeah , hard. No. There you go. And so the main leads come from different worlds here. Karolina is a family farm owner , and Enrique is heir to this huge taco chain.
S5: And you know , it was so interesting because some of the criticism I've received in the book , they'll be like , Oh , well , that's not realistic and people aren't really like that. Well , you know , there are some , you know , people and cultures who are definitely still very traditional , even though they live in America , you know. And so I thought it was so interesting to have Enrique , who is third generation and , you know , very laid back , very modern , very progressive. I actually love him as a hero. And to kind of try to interact in this world where it's completely unfathomable to him that her father has these very specific gender roles and concepts of them even being alone together and what dating is and , you know , asking her to come and , you know , court the family and it's just like kind of shell shock fish out of water for him to interact with that. But I really kind of wanted to show that even though , you know , cultures , I think a lot of times when you're an author where you write about a culture and there isn't a lot of representation , you know , you know , people kind of want to see themselves representative of it. And , you know , just for like , we're not a monolith , like , not all Mexicans are the same. And there's , you know , a big difference. And I know that like with my own perspective , it's like , you know , I don't represent everybody. So I really kind of wanted to show kind of different parts of the culture and , you know , different ways it is today and kind of , you know , have people see that in a book. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. And you hit on something so fascinating. And I want to know more about it.
S5: It was really a struggle , you know , because again , you know , a criticism or I'll see something reviews like , you know , I hated her father. Other or I , you know , couldn't relate to that or , you know , people aren't still still like that. But I wanted first off to show a little bit of empathy from where he's coming from because he was raised actually in Mexico. And , you know , he's trying to adapt into the society. And it's just hard for him to , you know , try to see his daughter as this woman with kind of her own agency. One of the most painful scenes. You know , he's so disgusted that she can't cook. And he warns Enrique that , you know , he should not date her because she can't cook. She'd make a horrible housewife. And so , you know , again , this you know , it's writing someone that you're like , totally don't agree with anything. And then I had Enrique as a foil going like , what's wrong ? And trying to educate him , you know , but with empathy , because I think that , you know , a lot of the things in the culture is it's , you know , it's very easy for us to say , oh , you know , how can you think this way or whatever. And so I think it's very interesting to kind of see how people are coming from and then yet still kind of say , hey , that's not okay. Or , you know , like maybe you can think of it this way. So it was very hard to write and it was , I'd say , almost painful to write. And these are things that I've experienced in my family. So , you know , yeah , it's a book , but yeah.
S1: Therapy , right ? Well , therapy. I got you.
S4: I understand. Yeah.
S1: I mean , you mentioned Karolina is the eldest of ten daughters. Do you think there's greater pressure on the eldest daughter to be the most responsible in their families ? Absolutely.
S5: And especially in immigrant families. You'll see a lot of stuff. And I've seen a lot of stuff on TikTok where , you know , the eldest is also the translator and , you know , kind of navigates the world for them. And in this family , you know , he wanted a son. He's a farm worker. And he just always thought that he would have the son that would carry on. They have ten children. They're all girls. And so , you know , he he kind of reluctantly when she takes over the farm , allows to see her in that role of being powerful eldest daughter and everything. But at the same time , he still sees her as a woman and he still has that expectation. And so she has all this pressure on her from all these sides. And , you know , one of the things that , you know , her journey is Enrique is always like , you know , you can do this alone. And it's unfathomable for her to kind of break away from her family and trying to have her own own life. But I think the eldest and I'm not the eldest , I'm a little spoiled youngest , but I definitely think that the eldest has so much pressure , especially in family families like Carolinas.
S1: You're listening to Kpbs Midday Edition. I'm speaking with Alana Quintana Albertson about her latest book , Kiss Me , Mi Amor. So Alana , I'm curious about the role that place plays in your books. I mean , you've said that your stories and your series , rather , is a love letter to California and San Diego. So tell us more about that.
S5: Yeah , obviously , I'm obsessed with with California. I lived here my entire life. Will never leave. I used to call myself real California chica , so I just I love California. I'm from northern California. But , you know , I just am in love with the state. So all of this series , half of it takes place in San Diego because the brothers live in San Diego. So you will see scenes in Bird Rock , La Jolla , Barrio Logan again , like with the first book. But in the second book , I really wanted to show Central California and farm workers areas where my family's lived. And then the third book in the series , which isn't out , will be in Northern California , where I'm actually from , and also San Diego. But you know what's so incredible about California , You know , they always have that joke. I think it was in Jerry Maguire is like , you know , you can ski and surf. You know , I mean , we have you know , it's not just San Diego and the beautiful beaches. You know , we've got all the forests in northern California , all the farm , and it's just so wonderful. So , yeah , each each book kind of explores an area that I love.
S1: That's great. I mean , and this is the Love in Tacos series. So food is a major focus.
S5: And one of my favorite things about this book is that I love to eat mom like all the time , but that , you know , Catalina doesn't cook. And that's kind of a thing. And he cooks. He says that , you know , it doesn't matter. I will cook. So , yes , I'm an absolute foodie. Again , I'm from Northern California. So I would go to the wine country and all the restaurants. And then San Diego scene has been so incredible. So , yes , I'm an absolute I'm an eater. Yeah. Not not a chef.
S1: Well , hey , the Mexican food here in Southern California is amazing right now.
S5: Best every time I think I say , oh , I'm going to move back up north. And I'm like , but where would I eat my tacos ? Like , it's just not the same. It's so incredible.
S1: So I want to talk about the themes in your books. You explored gentrification and Barrio Logan through Ramona and Julietta. Now in Kiss Me Mi Amor , you're writing about workers rights and small family owned farms. Ethical farming.
S5: Cute little beach read , have fun and enjoy it. And you've got the romance and all that kind of fun , frothy fun. But all of my books , you know , have a deeper issue. So , you know , the first one is about gentrification or specifically gentrification when a member of their own community gentrifying the community. And this one is about farm workers rights. And the reason I think it is , is I don't think people , you know , in these communities like we can't turn it off. We can't just be like , oh , well , I'm just going to have this fun , frothy romance and kind of not think about issues that that affect us every single solitary day and affect our community every day. So I want them to have this beautiful love story. But I also kind of want you to think when you've read finished the book about what's what's okay. And Enrique , he's trying to do the right thing , but he's kind of clueless. Like he's just like , Oh , partner with an ethical farm and everything will be right , you know , And people , you know , Oh , I'll buy some organic berries and it's fine. And all the sewage , my guilt , you know. But I wanted him to kind of really understand not just a Band-Aid and kind of what is really happening with the farms that he currently is contracting with and what his responsibility in that is versus just like , oh , I'll just fire them and move on. So it's important for me , in all my books and in my third book , I tackle cultural appropriation and other issues. So so that's kind of the point of all my fiction.
S1: I mean , do you think there's a misconception about the kinds of stories or issues that can be explored in romance ? Absolutely.
S5: It's a misconception by the people outside of romance , inside romance. I mean , the women and romance and the people who write romance are so incredible and the books are so depth. And you can see how much , you know , it changed the world. But , you know , I've heard things in circles. I went to Stanford , Harvard. They'll be like , oh , when do you want to ? Are you ever going to write a real book ? It's like I've written a real book like and I don't know if that's because it's for women and it focuses on women and pleasure and joy , you know ? But I find romance so incredibly powerful. And , you know , I didn't grow up reading romance. In fact , I'd never read a romance. I wrote a chick lit and my editor said , Oh , you should write a romance. And I also had these perceived notions about it. So I'm not immune to this. Like I was a literary snob. I read , I read literature. My was actually Arthurian lit and literature of passing because I related to that , even though I'm Mexican , not black. The literature of African Americans passing and since I'm light skinned and people kind of didn't consider me Mexican and I consider myself Mexican , that literature called me. So I really believed in like all this , like , amazing literature. And I never saw myself kind of as a writer and I'd never even read any popular fiction , let alone romance. And so that was kind of my journey later in life. And now of course , I love it because I feel like you can reach so many people and then still kind of talk about social issues and you see so much great stuff like this going on right now with stuff on women's rights and whatever , and it's kind of subtly layered and I think it's just beautiful. Yeah.
S1:
S5: It's like almost done. My editor's Listening I Love You. The third book in the series , which is called My Fair Senor , and it's about the third brother. His name is Jaime , and he's kind of a Playboy prince. And so he he's a social media influencer , and he is asked to be the Mexican face of a Caucasian tequila brand owned by celebrities. And it kind of bothers him know that he's always done this. So he decided to start his own tequila company , and he partners with his ex , who is a female sommelier up in northern California , but she's also a tequila master , Tequila Dora. And so he's kind of learning all this stuff about it. And prior to that , he didn't do it. And so I talk about a lot of issues there. It's set in my hometown. But I , you know , talk about other things like that. You know , he's the kind of the bad boy of the three brothers. The first one was kind of the eldest and most responsible. Enrique is really cool , laid back middle child and high is a bit of a problem. But but we we work on him in the book , so.
S4: All right. All right.
S1: Looking forward to that. I've been speaking with Alana Quintana Albertson about her new book , Kiss Me Mia More. She will celebrate with a book launch at Meet Cute Romance Bookshop tomorrow at 7 p.m.. Alana , thank you so much for joining us.
S5: Thank you so much for having me. It was so great to talk to you.
S1: Coming up , we'll talk to an artist whose new installment is meant to be walked on.
S6: When work is placed in public in different contexts , whether that's inside or outside in many cases. I think what it does is it invites a kind of what I might call an active finding.
S1: That's ahead on Kpbs Midday Edition. Welcome back to Kpbs Midday Edition. I'm Jade Hindman. You know , most people probably think of art as something hanging in a gallery not to be touched , but an Hamilton designed her public art installation canopy to tell a story as art to be walked on every day by hundreds of students entering the UC San Diego campus. Kpbs arts reporter Beth Accomando explores this latest addition to the Stewart collection and speaks with the artist who created it.
S7:
S6: For me , perhaps I'm less interested in the definition of it as a term that maybe has limited use , but more what is the expression of those things that we encounter in public space ? You know that so many people's experiences of art might be more destination specific , You know , going to a gallery or going into a museum or going with the intention of or the expectation of seeing art. And when work is placed in public in different contexts , whether that's inside or outside in many cases , I think what it does is it invites a kind of what I might call an act of finding something that you didn't expect , that you find. And in that finding a whole experience. And I think that often works in public , too. They're just there to be recognized , to be found , and in some ways also are anonymous. They're not necessarily tethered or attached to a particular artist or person. You know , from my own really rather limited experience doing works in public art , I'm very interested in what is the way it invites your experience into it. And that's had a lot to do with then how I think about structuring the projects.
S7: So I went to UC San Diego and got to experience the Stewart collection firsthand. It commissions artist to do site specific art. So it's not about just buying a piece of art and dropping it onto the campus.
S6: So , so many years ago. And it was an invitation to come to campus to see the collection , to think about what I might want to respond to and to bring form to and in response. And I'm not a person who has worked very much outside and mostly at that point and for many years was doing only really ephemeral installations. So I would say it took me a really long time to come to form , but that really the thing that catalyzed that is that was when I think the opportunity of the huge construction project with the tram started and , and Matthew understood that the tram was going to be passing through a canyon and bringing this whole new entrance to campus. And was that a condition for which it would be very interesting to respond. And and of course it was immediately and we were thinking about the fact that the arrival of this transportation system for the first time , bringing people to campus , which then forms a whole new entrance into the university and obviously into a world that is really structured around language , came forward and really intersected with my own work , thinking about how we tactically experience and make the words we use or make the compositions that we use. This is what really what I want to say is that when you walk across this almost 900 foot long pathway , it's the words that catch your attention and the sequences that those end up being placed in your attention because of the pace of walking , that each passage across it is its own composition. Just as each student entering the labyrinth of the university is really in many ways making their own program.
S7: And when I was walking through it , you know , I was walking straight across. And I think it's been referred to as the spine of it. But I noticed that the words in the center were both facing me and then reversed and facing the opposite direction. So immediately that caught my eye because I'm thinking to myself , this is something designed for whichever direction you're going. Exactly.
S6: Exactly. So what we call the spine words or what I call the spine words that structure the entire composition. So it's step by step now becomes then. And so that's a sequence of words that I composed that really just refer to the act of walking through the landscape and across this surface. And then the occurrence of each of those words in another text is what forms the horizontal. And it was very important to structure that spine so that it could read in either direction and still have a kind of rhythmic order and sense. What's interesting to me is I've walked across it is that how quickly we read and easily read words of a certain scale upside down.
S7: And then when you do stop on this walkway , then what catches your eye is what's going the opposite direction to what you're walking. And then you start seeing full sentences that go across.
S6: Right ? So those , I hope , might lead you down the rabbit hole as actually coming to the original text from which they are derived. And there are then more full sentences. There's actually fragments that are sometimes 2 or 3 words long , but then you connect , you know , as you keep walking , our eye takes in and scans right to left very organically. And one of the things we did was we worked closely with the library and with special collections , and they have a website that actually has each line referenced by its spinal cord , and you can actually go to the text and its location in the library if you're interested in dipping further down , kind of like found footnotes. You know , sometimes it's footnotes in a book that's the send you , you know , kind of open like it's a door threshold into a whole nother inquiry.
S7: Now , you mentioned that a lot of people experience art as destination art , where you're going to a gallery , you're going to a museum. Everyone who's looking up at those walls knows that that's artwork up there and knows that there's this specific kind of relationship you have. So how do you feel as an artist having your work as something where people are walking on it ? I mean , there's no separation between the art and people and people can walk on it , realize it's art or walk on it and just think it's a cement walkway.
S6: Well , either it's really fine , but I think there is a tactile rhythm to it. There's a way know. I like to think that our language forms from the way experience seeps up through and out our body and this , you know , kind of this duet , really between how we articulate or find words for our experiences and how our experiences then make those words likely. That's not what someone's thinking about is they walk across. But I was talking to someone , the composer show category , who was working on the opening and he said , You know , I walked out of this meeting and then the first word I found was the word singing. And it was like the word I needed at that exact moment. And , you know , whether you recognize that as art is maybe less important , that you just recognize that you've been touched and that your own attention has been drawn. And I think that's actually where the art form sits in the way that it draws your attention. And then the way you recognize that didn't really answer your question , but.
S7: Well , I mean , I am just curious.
S6: No , I mean , it's meant to be experienced. That's really what it is. So I love the fact that people are walking on it and touching it. You know , over time that will become its own document of where.
S7: And how do you feel about the work being on a campus ? I mean , the steward collection brings all this art to a campus where students are. Do you feel there's a different kind of engagement in that kind of a setting than public art that's just in a park or on a walkway in a city street ? I mean , I think.
S6: It's so it's such a unique collection. I think works have been commissioned and made there that have been able to be supported by the kind of infrastructure that is very unique to a large research public university and those kinds of projects. It's hard to imagine how some of them might have survived a press that's that would have , you know , maybe been in the kinds of processes that need to surround approvals , like in a public park. The condition of the campus is also a place of experiment and of study. And so , you know , I think that you have a kind of culture , I think that's ready to embrace the questions and ready to embrace the experiment that works are and I would say that's probably not an atmosphere you always find in other public realms and.
