(bright music) I’m Zinta Aistars with art beat at WMUK, happy to be a part of Kalamazoo lively arts.

This is your life, Zinta Aistars.

How’s it feel?

It’s a part of my life, not all of it, but yeah, it’s a very interesting and enjoyable part.

Very nice you are now on the other side of the microphone as we learn a little bit about your story and what you do isn’t it really?

Yeah.

um well, good, because it’s well deserved and we wanna know about you your journey and of course, the art that you present.

In storytelling fashion over the radio, how did you get into this?

You know, I’ve sometimes asked myself that question because my background is as a writer, in English, that’s my degree, did not ever think about broadcasting.

And how I got into the WMUK studio was at that time I worked in communications at Kalamazoo College, and I was always bringing our most interesting guests to be interviewed, and I’d sit quietly in the corner and and watch and listen, and that was it, and then at some point somebody asked me would you like to sit on this side of the desk how that happened I’m not quite sure, but I thought okay and how am I going to learn all these buttons and all of that?

But, you know, it was fun.

So at some point, yeah, I went on the other side of the desk and at first, I was given about four minutes for a program called Arts and More with a partner.

She did four minutes.

I did about four minutes, and then a few years down from that, somebody asked if I would like to do an expanded show to a whole nine rich minutes, and it was called between the lines.

I would talk to authors anywhere in Michigan with a Michigan connection, and then that evolved into artbeat, where I was allowed to talk to all kinds of creative people, any kind of artists, not just authors, but then I shrank my my territory to more or less greater Kalamazoo, southwest Michigan.

Any lack of artists in your world?

Oh, goodness, no.

I actually thought it first, gosh, you know, if this is just this region here, how am I going to fill every single week?

And I find that you know, I’ve tried very hard not to repeat so everybody gets a chance.

I have had very few repeats over the years, um and only because they’ve done something really wonderful.

which all of them have.

But um I try to give everyone a chance at it.

I try to find people who maybe haven’t had much of a voice and give them one, uh but repeat no, Continuing on giving your guests a voice.

What do you look for?

What is the criteria for an artist to get on your show and to share their story?

Something unique, of course, that something interesting, something a little different than everybody else is doing, um or if they’re really gaining a lot of traction out there.

For instance, Bonnie Joe Campbell is a big name in the Kalamazoo area.

and getting to be a big name even nationwide, she’s won a lot of awards.

She’s one of the very few people that I’ve had as a repeat just because she’s had so much success.

And and her work is original, but I look for all kinds of different things.

I’ve had a 16 year old who does little pieces of jewelry.

I’ve done big national names because they’ve had a Kalamazoo connection with communine program that happens once a year with the portage public schools, where they have a national bestselling author come in and talk about usually a controversial book.

and those are always interesting.

Has there been a conversation that’s moved you?

Oh, many, many, one of the more recent ones that has been memorable to me, uh she was one of those communine authors authors for portage public schools, invited to come to Kalamazoo and speak to the community, but also with a focus on young people, and her name was R Ruta Sepetys and she was at partially Lithuanian.

My background is Latvian.

My parents came here as refugees from Latvia during World War II.

so our languages are very similar.

English was actually my second language and Lithuanian is is her language.

She’s got a lot of that ethnic background.

And when I read that book, it’s historical fiction, but it really touched me in that it also talked about Latvian refugees and I recognized experiences that my parents and grandparents had had, and it was all new to me because it talked about a ship that had gone down in the ocean bombed by the Soviets with refugees on it, and thousands of people died and I thought, why don’t I know about this?

And that was the gist of of that interview is why did so few of us know about this?

So you’ll have to listen to the interview to find out.

Well, of course, you, part of our public uh media, um um public radio family.

It’s wonderful.

Who is your audience?

Who’s out there listening to you?

You know, that’s always something that’s a wonderment for me.

It’s anybody out there hear me.

And then when I do go out in public, and it’s interesting that people don’t recognize my face, but I’ll be saying something to a friend and people will come up to me and I know your voice, and that’s always kind of fun and also a little spooky.

It’s like, okay, I have to be careful what I say in public.

um But um I think it’s it’s all ages and generations, you know, communing, like I said, is is teenagers.

um but older people as well.

So I think it’s a very broad range.

And because I cover a very broad range of creative mines out there, I think it’s a a big audience.

At least I certainly hope so.

They keep bringing me back.

Good.

Zinta, what is it about Kalamazoo that has brought art alive.

Oh my gosh, in a lot.

What’s in the water in Kalamazoo?

You know, I think a lot of people have tried to answer that.

I’m not sure with how much success.

It’s it’s a wonderful mystery in a way.

I I personally believe that it has a lot to do with the academic atmosphere that we have.

We’ve got Kalamazoo College.

We’ve got Western Michigan University.

We’ve got Kalamazoo community college.

You know, we’ve got all this and I think academia brings about a lot of curiosity, a lot of openness to be creative and and explore self-ex expression of all kinds.

But yeah, for some reason that I’m not sure I can identify.

We’ve got art galleries.

We’ve got bookstores, some some in some towns have closed their doors, but we’ve got bookstores that have been there for a long time and I’ve gone to library author readings for poetry and the place will be packed.

and who does that for poetry?

I mean, no offense to poets, but we can fill a room and I think that’s wonderful in Kalamazoo so yeah, I it’s the perfect place to do a show like this.

Act to storytelling and this art of radio.

uh no one has killed the radio star yet to put it lightly.

uh this medium, uh speaking to this microphone, talk to me about how that moves you, I trust, and and keeps you doing what you do.

Yeah, that is interesting.

Well, I certainly know that when I commuted more instead of doing a show from from home with chickens and dogs in the background, that radio was the way I got through those miles and those traffic jams.

That was a great time to listen.

I think it’s the variety.

I think it’s the local interest.

There are few sources for news these days that that have such a focus on what’s going on in our community.

um people like to learn about who’s living next door, what’s going on in town, and we can sometimes go into more depth than perhaps TV news where they do these quick sound bites.

We can get into it a little bit more.

There’s something, uh said for a driveway moment where we don’t want to leave a conversation with with uh with you.

uh Again, how important is it that you capture that attention without me seeing you?

Well, one of the things with nine minutes, it can be a while, but a lot of times I end up putting a lot of things on the editing floor.

We do post the complete interview as well so people can go online and listen to the longer version.

and I don’t know we don’t measure those hits, but I certainly hope that people bother because there’s a lot of great material that that ends up on the editing floor.

So if you really want to know about that artist, I I hope people do take the time.

Why support the arts?

Support the arts?

Are you serious?

Are you to me the arts are everything?

I grew up in a family of artists.

My my father was a Latvian painter.

Viestarts Aistars.

I miss him very much, passed away a few years ago.

um and I have rooms full of his paintings that I’m trying to get into the art world.

So for me, art is everything.

In my family, that was the thing that you pursued writers, painters, musicians.

They were all in my family.

I can’t imagine life without it.

I think of it also as therapy.

I’ve had several people on this show who also have a part of their career is in some psychological field and they will use it as therapy.

They will use it for grief.

They will use it for health issues.

I’ve had those kind of conversations with people.

I think it is a way for people to express themselves that they can’t in any other way.

Well, I’m glad we can bring you visually into our airwaves to talk about what you do behind the microphone so well.

Zinta, thank you for your time.

Thank you.

It’s been a pleasure.

Thank you so much for watching.

There’s also more to explore with Kalamazoo lively arts on YouTube, Instagram and wgvu.org.

We’ll see you next time.

Support for Kalamazoo lively arts is provided by the Irvine S. Gilmore foundation, helping to build and enrich the cultural life of greater Kalamazoo.