Citizens for Global Solutions:

Let the 6th Annual Citizens for Global Solutions Multimedia Contest Begin!

$4,000 is up for grabs!

Citizens for Global Solutions is once again holding a contest for artists, webmasters, graphic designers, poets, video artists and creative activists who are interested in creating some unique digital art on the Web!

This year's theme:
"Choose Your Global Solution"

The top entries will be published on our website and the winners will get cold hard cash!

The basic idea behind this year's competition is called Interactive storytelling. It's actually been around for a long time. All interactive fiction has a couple of commonalities: 1) The stories or games must branch at a couple of points in the story, and 2) your viewer/player gets to make choices about which direction to go.

That's it. That's the concept (don't be afraid, it's not as hard as it sounds!).

Artists and Writers Against Torture

World Can't Wait: Call for Entries

In the months following 9/11, the government of the United States began unjust and immoral occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq leading to the deaths of countless civilians. It began warrantless wiretapping and suspended habeas corpus. And it began openly torturing people and justifying it with questionable legalese.

In the hyper-sensitive environment that surrounded 9/11 and the military action that followed it, we lost sight of the most important commodity to which we can lay claim:

the Truth.

And the Truth is: torture is a crime.

Snip

Submission Deadline

The deadline for submissions of artwork or written work is November 1, 2009. If your piece/s is/are accepted for inclusion in Artists and Writers Against Torture, you will be notified by email by the end of November 2009........Rest Found Here

Now at the end of the page they give this: Remember to attach all submission files to your email! We look forward to seeing your submissions. Good luck! with the type files and other information you can send them in boxes provided.

RIP Jim RIP! Jim Dickinson 1942-2009

Memphis musician Jim Dickinson dies at 67

Iconic Memphis musician and producer Jim Dickinson has died at age 67.

The 67 year-old Dickinson passed away early Saturday morning in his sleep, according to his wife Mary Lindsay Dickinson. Dickinson had been in ill health for the past few months, and was recuperating from heart surgery at Methodist Extended Care Hospital. “He went peacefully,” said Mary Lindsay.

Just last weekend, a tribute concert, headlined by John Hiatt, had been held in Dickinson’s honor at the Peabody Skyway, to help defray his medical costs..............

Mudboy & Sons: "Hitler Lives"

Members of Mudboy and the Neutrons, Jim Dickinson, Sid Selvidge, and Jimmy Crosthwait, joined by Steve Selvidge and Paul Taylor at the "Songs & Stories" benefit concert for True Story Pictures.

Footage produced by Live From Memphis (on camera: Christopher Reyes, Brad Phelan, Sarah Fleming) and edited by True Story Pictures' Ryan Hill. Recorded at Minglewood Hall in Memphis, TN on 4/19/09.

"War/No More Trouble"

Playing for Change



"Songs Around The World (CD + DVD)"

Playing For Change: Album Release

Songs Around The World CD/DVD In Stores Now!!

Introduction:

The Latest Song: Chanda Mama

This Song Around The World is a folk tune from Chennai, India. We started the track in New Orleans and added musicians from the across the globe before finally delivering it the people of it’s origin. We ended up in Chennai recording and filming the vocals from the Oneness Choir. The track has a feeling of perseverance and joy and features vocalists from four continents.

Today, April 28th, 2009 is a big day and has been a long time coming. After 4 years of filming and recording musicians around the globe, we are finally releasing our album "Playing For Change: Songs Around The World" featuring a 10 song CD and 7 track DVD. This is a collection of songs and videos featuring over 100 musicians from around the world that have never met in person, but have been brought together through the power of music

Click here to visit the site or visit your favorite Starbucks location to pick up a copy in person!.

Today is our chance to show the world that independent projects designed to connect and inspire people can be successful. If you have been moved by the music you've heard or the videos you have seen from Playing For Change then I encourage you to purchase the CD/DVD for yourself and/or give it to a family member or friend as a gift. Our continuing journey is not possible without your support.

The album demonstrates that regardless of our religion, race, gender, or political views we can unite through music. The time is now to unite as a human race and this global collaboration driven by your love and encouragement is designed to lead us in that direction.

After supporting the movement, take your own online journey and get to know the musicians through our new site (which will be updated regularly with new videos, songs, photos and much more ... ).

Thank you for your help and keep your thoughts, questions and advice coming. Together, we will continue to connect the world through music.

One Love,
Mark Johnson

Stand By Me:


"Songs Around The World (CD + DVD)"

"Born Again American"

By Keith Carradine

Just a workin’ man without a job
It got shipped off to China via Washington, D.C.
And I know I’m nothin’ special, there are plenty more like me
Just the same
I thought I knew the rules of the game

I stood up for this country that I love
I came back from the desert to a wife and kids to feed
I’m not sayin’ Uncle Sam should give me what I need
My offer stands
I’ll pull my weight you give me half a chance

I went up to a congressman and said to him “you know
Our government is letting people down”
He said he’d need a lot of help to buck the status-quo
I said there was a bunch of us around

I’m a Born Again American, conceived in Liberty
My Bible and the Bill of Rights, my creed’s equality
I’m a Born Again American, my country ‘tis of me
And everyone who shares the dream from sea to shining sea

My brother’s welding chassis at the plant
He’s earning what our granddad did in 1948
While CEOs count bonuses behind the castle gates
How can they see
When all they care about’s the do re mi

It’s getting where there’s nowhere left to turn
Not since the crash of twenty-nine have things been so unfair
So many of our citizens are living in despair
The time has come
To reaffirm that hope’s not just for some

The promise of America’s surrendering to greed
The rule is just look out for number one
But brace yourself ‘cause some of us have sown a different seed
A harvest of the spirit has begun

I’m a Born Again American conceived in liberty
My Bible and The Bill Of Rights
My creed’s equality
A Born Again American, my country ‘tis of me
And everyone who shares the dream from sea to shining sea

It’s clear my country’s soul is on the line
She’s hungering for something that she lost along the way
The principle the framers called upon us to obey
That in this land
The people’s will must have the upper hand

I felt the calling once before and took a sacred vow
And faithful to that vow I have remained
I hear the calling once again, my country needs me now
And to her cause I have been re-ordained

I’m a Born Again American conceived in liberty
My Bible and the Bill Of Rights, all people living free
A Born Again American, my country ‘tis of me
And everyone who shares the dream
From sea to shining sea
And everyone who shares the dream
From sea to shining sea
A M E R I C A

A Place to Visit for 'PEACE' while in DC for Inauguration

While those of you attending the Inauguration may be staying over for a few days, either before or after, you may find this a restful and enlightening venue to stop in and visit.

1/1-31 Georgetown: The Peace Mural, the unbelievable 2,000 paintings exhibition of art on war, peace, and torture that the Vietnamese-American artist Huong has on display in a 10,000 square foot gallery on M Street in Georgetown: Peace Mural Foundation

About the Artist HUONG: A young journalist at the time of the Vietnam War, Huong climbed aboard one of the last refugee boats before the fall of Saigon, wearing only one shoe and carrying her infant son in arms. She first settled in Alaska where she swapped her pen for a brush in an effort to”paint out” the passions within her. Eventually she launched an art career that has captured the attention of art audiences and critics internationally. Not unlike Picasso’s own war protest painting Guernica, Huong’s paintings collectively form a body of work addressing the global issues of war and peace. Through hundreds of painted canvases, the Peace Mural is a symbol of Huong’s determination to purge our culture from the ways of war and to advance an emerging culture of peace.

An inspiring video introduction about the artist Huong, her Peace Mural, and the mission of the Peace Mural Foundation, Inc. (6 min)


And

Vietnamese Artist Huong Strives for Peace


Here are a few links to view some of her work right now:

The War Pieces

The Peace Pieces

Let's Think Peace

The Flag at War

For much more information and directions etc. visit The Peace Mural Comes to Washington
A Time for Change ... A Time for Peace … The Time is Now

For abit more information you might want to read this Washington Post article In Images of War, a Plea for Peace
Artist Lost Father, Brother Before Fleeing Vietnam in a Small Boat in 1975

"Peace is simple," said the Vietnamese-born artist known as Huong.

Gliding through gallery rooms in Georgetown, where thousands of her paintings are on exhibit, Huong, a onetime war refugee, swept an arm toward one wall, then another.

"Very simple. . . . See?"

Here, on two floors, is her vision of peace, shaped by personal pain and expressed vividly on canvass, her style influenced by cubism.

There you will also find a slide show of Huong and her work.

Some Other Events This Coming Weekend:

Friday, Jan. 9: Warmonger's Wake

Saturday, Jan. 10: PeaceBuilders Reception, National Peace Foundation

Sunday, Jan. 11: Nonviolent PeaceForce DC Chapter Organizing Meeting

Sunday, Jan. 11: Seven Years of Guantanamo, with Hector Aristizibal

As everyone knows there will be much more going on both prior to and into the days after this Historic, on so many levels, Inauguration of President Barack Obama.

Let us Hope a New Page is turning on the real direction of this Country, not of what we like to think and say we are But Become Those Words and Actions, not only for us but for the World!

As Leaders Lead By Example, our examples have been the Negative, especially extreme negatives against even our own Laws, those Examples we've followed are how we're perceived now and have been these long seven years and will be into the near future!

Here's hoping we can rapidly change those tragic examples and lead as we should, it's up to us for those to come!