(dramatic music) (people speaking indistinctly) - [Announcer] Welcome, everyone, to the Penny Stamps Distinguished Speaker Series.

(dramatic music continues) (audience applauding) (dramatic music fades) - Hi, everyone.

Thank you, Chrisstina.

What an introduction.

Hopefully I can keep the energy up.

How's everybody doing?

Good?

(audience cheering) Great.

As Chrisstina said, I'm Kelly Kivland.

I'm the new Deputy Director of Curatorial Affairs at UMMA.

And I joined UMMA about six months ago, and it's a true pleasure to be here tonight to introduce Holly.

I first met Holly over 20 years ago, and we've remained friends ever since.

So it's truly both meaningful and quite wonderfully serendipitous that the first exhibition I'm able to steward at UMMA is with her.

It really is truly a privilege.

One of the great joys I've had in my first six months is being able to discover all the wonderful ways in which we can partner with the university.

And this is, of course, one of the shining examples.

I'm especially excited about this partnership between the Penny Stamps Speaker Series as well as the Witt Residency, which is something that we hold very dear to us at UMMA.

It is allowing us to not only engage with artists, which is such a core part of our work, with sustained time, resources, the research, but also all of that partnership and co-thinking that we're able to do together to make this ambitious new work possible.

As Chrisstina mentioned, Holly's new exhibition at UMMA, "We Hold These Truths," is all original work made over her year of residency as a Witt fellow.

And it opens, as she said, October 3rd, so we invite you to come by.

We also are having a public celebration opening the following week on October 10.

So either of those dates, please mark and join us.

It is an honor now to introduce Holly Bass.

Holly is an award-winning multidisciplinary artist, cultural worker, poet, performer, and director.

Her work very much asks us to look inward, to examine the truths we've inherited about this country, interrogate the histories that have been erased, and imagine a more liberated future.

It also reminds us that truth telling can be both intimate and also a shared responsibility.

Moving across disciplines and pushing beyond limitations, she grounds her work in the past while also remaining especially open to what can be possible.

Her work is held in the collections of the National Gallery of Art and the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery in DC.

And in 2022, she performed "American Woman" at the Venice Biennale as part of Loophole of Retreat, which, if you don't know, is the renowned Simone Leigh's special project for the U.S.

Pavilion that year.

This fall, Holly is also a visiting fellow at the Center for Racial Justice at the Ford School of Public Policy, and she'll be teaching a class there.

She's also a regular contributor of reviews for the New York Times, and was the first journalist to term the saying "hip hop theater" and put it into print in a 1999 article for the American Theater Magazine.

Her commitment to social justice also extends beyond the work she makes.

She has devoted much of her career to cultivating young people's creative agency, directing an arts program for adjudicated teens in DC, and later leading Turnaround Arts at the Kennedy Center where she expanded access to the arts in under-resourced elementary and middle schools nationwide.

Please join me in welcoming the extraordinary Holly Bass.

(audience applauding) (applause ends) - [Fannie Lou Hamer] Is this America, the land of the free and the home of the brave, where we have to sleep with our telephones off of the hooks because our lives be threatened daily, because we want to live as decent human beings in America?

Thank you.

(soulful blues music) ♪ I can't sleep at night ♪ ♪ I can't eat a bite ♪ ♪ 'Cause the man I love ♪ ♪ He don't treat me right ♪ ♪ He makes me feel so blue ♪ ♪ I don't know what to do ♪ ♪ Sometimes I sit and sigh ♪ and then begin to cry ♪ ♪ 'Cause my best friend ♪ said his last goodbye ♪ ♪ There's a change in the ocean ♪ ♪ Change in the deep blue sea, my baby ♪ ♪ I'll tell you, folks, ♪ there ain't no change in me ♪ ♪ My love for that man will always be ♪ (soulful blues music continues) ♪ The blues ♪ (soulful blues music ends) (audience applauding) (audience cheering) (applause ends) - Thank you, Kelly, for that wonderful introduction and also for your generosity and friendship in this process.

And a big thank you to Chrisstina Hamilton for your passion, astuteness, and dedication to this incredible series.

It's truly an honor to be here.

Happy Constitution Day.

I didn't know it was Constitution Day either until they told me.

(chuckles) But the United States designated September 17th as Constitution Day and Citizenship Day way back in 1952 by joint resolution.

So together we are celebrating a unique American tradition that's 75 years old.

And in case you haven't read it in a while, the Constitution begins... Well, you probably know, we probably all know the first three words, right?

What are the first three words of the Constitution?

- [Audience] "We the people."

- "We the people."

"We the People of the United States, "in Order to form a more perfect Union, "establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, "provide for the common defence, "promote the general Welfare, "and secure the Blessings of Liberty "to ourselves and our Posterity, "do ordain and establish "this Constitution for the United States of America."

To me, the preamble is the most beautiful part of the Constitution.

It's the part that contains the most poetry and promise.

The rest of the Constitution is, it's constituting.

It's like what the executive branch can do, the judicial, the relationship between the states.

It's really doing its job, but the preamble holds our ideals.

You could even say it holds our truths.

So my upcoming exhibition, "We Hold These Truths," takes its title from the other very famous American document, the Declaration of Independence, because I'm interested in what makes us a nation beyond geography and circumstances, and how we the people are defining and refining these ideals.

You may have noticed when you walked into the lobby, a couple of tables set out with some large mason jars, strips of colored paper, and that's for my ongoing project, "Cultural Preserves."

It's a community story collection project that was inspired by watching my mother make preserves.

Here's a picture of her and my dad this past winter.

She's making strawberry jam.

And there's also a big bag of pears on the counter.

After she finishes the strawberry, she's going to make pear preserves.

This is something my mother does every year.

And so I grew up seeing this.

And the way my mind works, I started thinking about the idea of preservation and the phrase cultural preservation.

And usually when we hear that phrase, we think about buildings, landmarks.

But the culture of a place is really defined by the people, we the people, who live there, and our stories.

So I wanted to create a kind of fun, inviting way for people to share something that was personally meaningful.

And we've done this project in DC, in Detroit at Eastern Market.

We just did it this past June at the Ann Arbor Arts Fest.

Maybe some of you were there.

These are a few of people's responses.

"The most beautiful thing about America "is how it welcomed my ancestors.

"The most heartbreaking thing about America "is how it's not welcoming future ancestors."

So people, they were asked to respond to two questions: What is the most beautiful thing about America, and what is the most heartbreaking?

And they could write their answers, they could draw their answers, and we got about a hundred responses, very multi-generational, like little tiny tots to much older folks.

So in the spirit of democracy and civic engagement, if you didn't get a chance on your way in, I'd like to invite you to participate in making cultural preserves after this talk.

So we have tables set up in the library, supplies.

Not the library, the lobby.

I just love libraries.

I really do.

The lobby, supplies and volunteers to help you gather American stories.

And as an artist who makes participatory community-engaged work, I like to find different ways of incorporating the words, the values, the hopes of people who are in proximity to the work.

So as it was explained earlier, some of the responses may be displayed in the exhibition or they may turn into audio pieces.

So that show's going to open on October 3rd, and I hope you all go.

And I've been to Penny Stamps talks before, and I know that as soon as the talk ends, like right before the Q&A, there's this mass herd of students that leave.

But jokes on you tonight because there's no Q&A, as Chrisstina said, because we want you to have a few more minutes to participate in this art project.

I know you have papers, I know you have art to make, I know you have conversations to have, I know you have all-nighters to have, but if you wouldn't mind just taking five minutes and then we have a little housekeeping to do after the talk, but then I'll also come out to the lobby and happy to answer questions.

(glass clangs) So to celebrate Constitution Day, the prompts and questions for "Cultural Preserves" are based on the preamble.

So, we all know "we the people."

But that got me thinking about a question: what makes a nation a home?

So that's our first question for today's cultural preserves.

And another phrase in the preamble that stood out to me, and honestly, I had never noticed it before, the "Blessings of Liberty."

I mean, that is so beautiful.

And the fact that it's in this document that's essentially about governance, and they thought to include something like that, I just thought it was so lovely.

The Hebrew origin of the word blessing speaks to power that is granted or bestowed.

So the prompt is: What blessing would you bestow on your fellow Americans?

And yes, this is a written activity, but because we're not doing Q&A and because I like to, I don't know, mix things up, I'm wondering if maybe we could get three or four brave, open-hearted people to just answer one of these questions right now?

And I'm going to ask Hannah to turn up the house lights a little bit so I can see your faces.

So you could answer the question what makes a nation a home, or what blessing would you bestow on your fellow Americans?

And it's not an exam.

Whimsy is welcome.

Emotion is welcome.

We're just sharing.

But could I get three or four people to come up to, there's a mic here and there's a mic there, just to come up and... Yay, we got our first person.

We just need... We got our second person.

Can we get a couple more people?

I see someone coming down the aisle.

Great.

All right, I think we've got it now.

And you can take the mic off the stand if it's more comfortable and maybe tell us your name and answer one of the questions.

Are the mics on?

- [Audience Member] I think this one's on.

- We'll start over there, and then when that happens, we'll go back and forth.

So, yes.

- [Sage] Hi, my name is Sage, and I'd like to answer the second question: What blessing would you bestow on your fellow Americans?

A warm, safe bed every night.

I think that's one of the greatest blessings that I experience.

And it's the first thing that radicalized me as a kid is learning that not everyone has that.

- [Holly] A warm, safe bed.

Thank you so much.

(audience applauding) (Holly speaking indistinctly) (Holly speaking indistinctly) - [Audience Member 1] It doesn't have batteries.

- [Holly] Ah.

Okay.

- [Hannah] All right, since we're still working-- - I'll take the mic.

- Thank you.

- [Holly] I'll bring this mic to you.

- [Audience Member 2] To keep things even, what makes a nation home?

I think it is about whether that nation, whether you feel safe and welcomed there, which means that a nation isn't necessarily always going to be a home for all people, but I would like, the blessing I would bestow is if it did end up that way or at least tried to be.

- Thank you.

So welcome and safety are the two words that I pull from that.

Thank you so much.

(audience applauding) - [Audience Member 3] I answered this on the way in.

I did the paper.

(chuckles) I answered what makes a nation a home?

I say it's how you hold your compatriots in your heart, how you think of them, and how you value their future just as much as yours.

(audience applauding) - [Kore] Hi.

My name's Kore.

I think a blessing I would bestow on my fellow Americans is deep mutual understanding.

I've come to learn that deep mutual understanding creates empathy, which destroys division.

- [Holly] All right.

(audience applauding) - There's someone behind you.

- I'm so sorry.

- We'll do five.

Okay.

- [Sophie] This thing goes far.

Hi, I'm Sophie.

You can also call me Skull because that's my nickname.

I think I cannot answer the first one very easily because there's so many facets of all of these questions, but I would bestow the blessing of being able to just exist freely.

There's animals, there's plants, there's things that they have to contend with the external forces around them.

And as humans, we have to do the same thing, but staying human and staying with people in America kind of means you have to find a way to exist and not feel like you're pushed around and crammed in a corner, which is very easy to do with the massive proportions of who we are as a people.

- Thank you so much.

(audience applauding) Thank you.

So I'm going to quickly review what we gathered.

We have safety and welcome.

We have a warm, safe bed.

We have deep mutual understanding.

And we have heart.

So those are the sort of synthesis of all this beautiful sharing.

So thank you, again, to everyone who shared.

And just remember, we're going to come back to this.

Transparent facilitation.

So as Chrisstina mentioned, I have the unique pleasure of being on campus as a 2026 Witt Artist in Residence and also as a Towsley Policymaker in Residence.

So I'll be teaching a class at the Ford School this fall in the second half of the semester.

And I understand there are still some spaces left.

So if anyone is interested in learning how art strategies can be applied to public policy, there's still time to sign up.

You do not need to be a student in the Ford School, and it's open to undergraduates and graduates.

So I'm very excited.

It's not going to be a lecture.

We're going to have field trips and guest speakers.

We're going to go to the museum one of the days, and we're going to develop our own projects that connect to real life, not just theory.

So while I consider myself a student of history, I'm not a historian and I'm not a policy expert.

I learned about government from watching "Schoolhouse Rock" as a child.

"I'm just a bill.

I'm sitting here on Capitol Hill."

I mean, you know?

(chuckle) But I do know that in order for there to be a functioning democracy, we the people have to be involved.

We have to participate beyond just voting.

And I firmly believe that participating in the arts is a really beautiful and effective way for us to practice working together in our communities.

The author and cultural organizer, Adrienne Maree Brown, says, "All organizing is science fiction "because you're trying to create a world "we've never experienced and never seen.

"We are shaping the future we long for "and have not yet experienced."

In my writing and research, I'm exploring the differences between activism, organizing, and culture shift work; how we go from dreaming and visioning to creating and implementing ideas, policies, programs; how we work to forge a more equitable society.

And I think that knowing your role and your strengths in the ecosystem can really help with change work and progressive work.

I also explore how creativity and joy can guide our social justice work as individual agents of change and also collectively.

I'm researching right now how we can use art strategies to inform work that we do in our communities or in the communities that we hope to be in service to.

So basically, I'm working on a book.

And with the support of the Center for Racial Justice at the Ford School, I'm working with these art strategies so far.

Rehearsal, improvisation, composition, cultural care, world-building, stamina, and what I like to call radiance, which I think is about embracing the unknown.

Now, I recognize that's a lot of text on the screen, but I just want to make sure that you get a sense of these concepts.

And one of the art strategies that I'm really, really interested in is the idea of rehearsal.

Rehearsal or practice is key to any art form, and rehearsal happens in collective groups, like a choir rehearsal.

It also happens by the individual alone.

Jazz musicians talk about going into the woodshed, and that's an idea that you're not expected to be perfect immediately.

You're actually expected to spend a lot of time refining your skills.

So our American Constitution talks about forming "a more perfect Union," which means that this country, what we have is also not perfect.

It's also not complete.

As artists, we have permission to learn from our mistakes, and in fact, it's sort of imperative.

But how do we translate that to governments, to public policy work, to living in communities where we may not always agree on every issue as some of the folks who shared brought up, right?

So before I talk about the show at UMMA, I want to share, this is about a four-minute video I'm about to play, about a piece I did with my dear friend and collaborator, Simone Jacobson, in 2012.

And you should be able to recognize some of these art strategies.

"Dance 1" is a piece that I co-created with Simone in 2012.

It was inspired by "Song 1" by Doug Aitken.

He's a video artist.

He did this incredible live projection on the exterior of the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington DC, and it included all these different versions of the song, "I Only Have Eyes For You."

So for several weeks from sunset to midnight, the music and the video played in a constant loop.

And Simone and I come from a culture of street dance and block parties and hip hop, and we were like, "Man, it would be so great "if we just brought a group of people together to dance."

So that's what we did.

♪ I only have eyes ♪ - [Holly] Let's lower the volume a little bit.

♪ For you ♪ - We didn't ask the museum or anyone for permission.

We just posted an online signup on Facebook and made it totally open, no performance experience necessary.

We thought maybe 10, 15 people are going to show up.

Forty people signed up to participate, and 28 of them actually came.

And the vast majority, about 75% of the people, had never performed in their lives.

So I knew the biggest obstacle would be gathering that many people at the same time.

So we held the rehearsal right before the performance.

We gave ourselves one hour, so we were really organized, we were really thoughtful.

We divided people into groups of four to five.

We made sure that each group had a more experienced dancer to kind of be a guide.

The rehearsal started with walking, with making eye contact, and then slowly offering a hand or a small touch.

There were three improvisation structures.

For section one, we all stood in a long line.

I would do a move, the person next to me would repeat it and so on and so on, kind of like the game of telephone.

And then Simone was at the other end, and she would reverse the direction with a new move.

For the second section, each person had a role as an embracer or an evader, which gave the performers a clear sense of purpose, but also created this natural tension and drama as they interacted.

So for the third section, we gave them very simple weight-bearing exercises, and encouraged people to engage each other gently and to freestyle, to improvise.

And then for the finale, everyone had a scoop of talcum powder, and we made this cloud of white smoke by all clapping at the same time.

Each section took place at a different spot outside the museum.

I carried a bright orange umbrella like a tour guide so that both the performers and the audience would know where to go as we sort of moved around the outside of the museum.

The only rules were there was no talking during the performance and everyone had to wear white because we wanted to create some visual cohesion, and also on the practical level, to make the dancers more visible at night.

This was very DIY, and we didn't set up any professional lighting.

To be honest, after the first scene, the performers pretty much ignored me and my orange umbrella and they just kept dancing.

And then toward the end, you might notice that my umbrella was on the ground and I was just sitting on a chair watching because at that point, no one needed a director or a leader.

The group was leading itself, which is really beautiful.

And when you think about how quickly we were able to organize and take action, people had this awareness of freedom within structure, which led to a kind of self-governing.

So if you ask me, I think this is why the arts can be really threatening to certain kinds of governments and certain kinds of leaders and institutions.

When people understand not just intellectually, but tangibly, viscerally in their bodies how to come together, how to organize themselves, how to create a deep sense of belonging and joy, that is very powerful.

So in that clip that I just showed, we saw rehearsal, improvisation, composition, and maybe some of the other art strategies.

Another strategy I want to talk about is stamina.

Stamina is important because the work of changing the world for the better is not something that happens overnight or even in our own lifetime.

So it's important to think about how we plan to sustain ourselves for this very long haul, and it's especially important that we build up our mental and spiritual muscles for those times when hope is hard to come by.

For some of us, right now is a time when hope is hard to come by.

And so we need joy and we need community.

One of the things I'm known for doing is very long durational solo dance pieces.

And this is an image from my longest performance.

This was called "Moneymaker."

I did this at New York Live Arts in 2020 during the pandemic.

It was 12 hours long.

I performed the entire time, no meal breaks, no bathroom breaks.

I did have water, but I was in front of the public the entire time.

And because it was the pandemic, I was inside of a glass door front and people were socially distanced outside.

We had some chairs and stools, and also people could just walk by.

It was really actually wonderful, but I'm not doing that again.

(Holly laughs) (audience laughing) And then here's an image from a work that grew out of that piece.

This is "American Woman."

It's also part of the video that I showed at the very top of the talk.

And I've done this one for as long as eight hours.

This photo is from the Venice Biennale that was mentioned earlier.

So that was a relatively short performance.

I only danced for 30 minutes at Loophole of Retreat, which was this incredible convening of Black women artists and scholars that Simone Leigh really spearheaded.

Okay.

Pop quiz.

Who remembers words from our sharing earlier?

Does anyone remember any of the words and phrases?

- [Audience] Heart.

- Heart.

Beautiful.

- Welcome.

- Welcome.

(people speaking indistinctly) - A warm, safe bed.

Safety, and deep mutual understanding.

Okay.

So we're actually going to do some choreography.

Don't worry.

I'm not going to ask any... There's no more standing up at the mic for the rest of the talk.

You get to stay in your chairs, but we are going to do some collective choreography.

This comes from a sort of structure that I learned at least from Liz Lerman and Liz Lerman Dance Exchange when she had her company.

So Hannah, if you can, well, bring up the house lights a little bit more, that'd be awesome.

And I'm going to play the role of director, but basically, I'm going to collect some gestures based on our phrases.

Okay.

And so let's see.

As collaboratively as we can make this with like 500 people in the room.

Okay.

So... I may change the order.

But let's just start.

I'd like to see people do a gesture.

If you think of a warm, safe bed, what are some hand gestures?

Okay, I see someone.

I see some sleep gestures.

I see some... I see some embracing and tilting.

Let's see.

Okay.

So we're going to do a sort of cozy embrace and then sleep, but I want to let it melt away.

Okay?

So let's try that.

So we have cozy, sleep, melt.

Okay, we'll do that one more time.

Beautiful.

Okay, so... Welcoming safety.

Okay.

So I see arms up for welcoming.

And then waving.

Okay.

So we'll go arms up and wave our hands.

This looks so good from this side.

(audience laughing) We need to get someone with a cell phone at the end so we can record from this side out because it looks so lovely.

Okay.

So let's review our first one.

Our second one.

Nice.

Okay.

Deep mutual understanding.

Let's be creative.

Okay.

Oh, okay, I see a lot of heart, but also, I saw this and I liked that one.

Okay.

So we're going to do like this.

Like, I see you, you get me.

And then we'll bring it in to the heart.

Okay, let's do that again.

Okay.

So let's go back to the beginning.

Okay.

And the last one is heart.

Okay.

Depending on your generation, I... (audience laughing) Y'all be doing... I'm not doing that one.

I'm just not, sorry.

(audience continues laughing) But you can do your heart however you like.

Millennials, Gen Z, and Gen X.

(audience continues laughing) Okay.

So we have our series of gestures.

All right, let's start at the beginning.

A warm, safe bed.

Welcoming safety.

Deep mutual understanding.

And heart.

Beautiful.

Okay.

So I'm going to talk a little bit more, but we are going to come back to this.

And we're actually... This was our rehearsal.

I'll make sure we review, but we're actually going to do a little performance at the end, like 90 seconds.

Okay.

All right.

And now back to our talk.

Y'all did great, by the way.

That was awesome.

Okay.

So, let me check my notes.

So I do suppose that I should talk about the show that's happening at UMMA on October 3rd.

And you might think that based on the talk so far that I was avoiding talking about the exhibition of totally new work that is in the final stages of completion that will absolutely be ready to install in the museum two weeks from now.

(audience laughing) My work, it's very conceptual and it's very influenced by history and place.

And it evolves over time, much like "we the people" and much like our nation.

And originally the show was supposed to open the first week of September and then I was going to do the talk and then you'd be able to immediately see the show.

But what happens when you renovate a building from the 1800s and you pull up the floor is you find some things that you didn't expect to find.

And so that required some extra care and problem solving, but it's all good because everything happens in its own good time.

What I can tell you about "We Hold These Truths," it's a celebration of our semiquincentennial America 250, and it focuses on three anniversary years, 1876, 1976, and 2026.

And in terms of the sort of shape and form, it's a riff on historic house museums, but kind of like exploded out, like not literal.

So the dining table is 30 feet long and it's made up of table styles from the past century.

And then there's a little 1976 living room and an 1876 parlor.

And you'll be able to hang out, sit in the chairs, play some board games from the 1800s that also are from the 1900s, read books from the 1800s that you probably might not have realized were that old, and read books from the 1970s and explore.

We're also going to do some Sunday afternoon tours.

And my favorite thing I'm looking forward to, toward the closing, we're going to have a bicentennial ball 1970s disco funk dance party.

It's going to be so good.

So all of that is to say, yes, the show is coming.

No, I don't have images of it.

But what I think is more interesting maybe is how it started and how it's going.

So I want to read a few lines from my proposal that was written in 2024 because I had to apply in 2024 in order to be approved in 2025 in order to do the show in 2026.

So I wrote, "I envision transforming the space "into the formal salon of an antebellum home, "only highly exaggerated and stylized, "festooned with an outrageous number of American flags, "upholstered chairs and furnishings with flags, "curtains and floor coverings with flag designs, "flag banners and bunting.

"My aim with the 'Civilities' installation "is to create a hyper-patriotic scene "that evokes the feeling of luxury "on the brink of collapse."

That was my original idea.

I was thinking that it would be this immersive stage set for a play that I am actually working on called "Civilities, "or How to Secede Without Really Trying."

(audience laughing) But then I went to Greenfield Village for the very first time.

(audience laughing) Oh my gosh.

I was like, "Oh, this?

"Yes, this is my new jam."

And I went to the Kemp House, which is only a few blocks from here.

I hope you all check out this lovely historic home.

And I also spent hours sitting in the Apse in UMMA, looking at the columns and the skylight.

And I went to the Bentley Museum to research the history of UMMA and the Apse.

Look at this from the 1960s.

All this crazy scaffolding.

They were like, "Yeah, we want more space for art, "so we're just going to build crazy walls "and floors and stairs."

It was like this insane maze.

And I went to the Clements Library where my little nerd heart exploded.

UM Students, if you have not been to the Clements Library, you absolutely should.

They focus on 18th and 19th American history, but I promise you that whatever you are studying, whatever it is, there is something in those archives.

This is Confederate wallpaper newspaper.

So when the South ran out of paper, they still wanted to print the news.

It was important to share the news with people.

So they found wallpaper and printed on the back of the wallpaper.

So I got to hold these newsprint that was 160 years old, people's diaries from the Civil War, their letters.

And I would read these journals and letters and I was supposed to be focusing on the content, but then I got really obsessed with the handwriting and the patterns.

This person, they were like, "I'm running out of paper," again, scarcity shortages, but creativity, innovation, so they just started writing the other direction, and it's just so beautiful to me.

So then I went down this whole rabbit hole.

That style of handwriting is called Spencerian Script.

And then that became this whole other thing that I'm super nerdy about now and I'm slowly teaching myself.

And I even went to Geneva, Ohio where Mr.

Spencer lived and where there's still an association that teaches this handwriting style for free in the library every week.

And then Joe Brussell from UMMA's education department introduced me to Mary Henrietta Graham, a.k.a.

Mollie Graham, the first Black female student at the University of Michigan.

And what year did she start attending?

1876.

I mean, the coincidences.

So I allowed my curiosity to lead me.

And the wonderful folks at UMMA and Stamps were generous enough to trust that these tangents and digressions would lead to something interesting and unexpected.

So instead of creating a piece about Southern belles and trad wives, I created a new character: The Penn woman.

Her name is Centennia Lewis.

She was born in 1876.

She lives 101 years scribing and documenting the American century.

And so she goes from 1876 to 1976.

And I'm really excited for all of you to come to UMMA in October and see the show.

And before we end and before we do our final performance, last minute reminder that when you leave here, you're going to stop by the "Cultural Preserves" table and share your American story with the community, and I will join you.

So we've pretty much come to the end, and I just want to recap for us that we've made parallels about the arts, public policy, and civic engagement, but we haven't just been talking about it.

We've been doing it.

We found some common themes.

We generated artistic material in the form of text and movement.

We rehearsed together.

So before we perform, I think we should do one more rehearsal.

And then I selected a song by an artist who also appreciates the Clements Archive here at UMMA and who I had the pleasure of meeting a couple of years ago, Rhiannon Giddens.

Her song is called "Cripple Creek."

So we're going to do our dance to that.

But first we're going to rehearse.

So Hannah, thank you for bringing up those house lights.

So I just, you know... I want to do one more rehearsal and then we'll do our performance, and that will wrap up our time together.

Okay.

So... Because the song is 90 seconds, we're going to repeat some of the gestures, okay?

Is everyone good with that?

- Yeah.

- Okay.

And... I think what I'll do is I'll say the words.

So I might go from a warm, safe bed to heart and then back to a warm, safe bed.

Are we good with that if I do a little conducting?

Okay.

All right, but in order, here we go.

A warm, safe bed.

Safety welcoming.

Deep mutual understanding.

Heart.

All right.

You guys got this, I think.

Okay, cool.

You ready with the cell phone?

Okay.

(gentle music) Let's turn that sound down.

(footsteps echoing) (shoes thudding) (feet shuffling) (feet shuffling) ♪ A warm, safe bed ♪ ♪ Safety welcoming ♪ ♪ Deep mutual understanding ♪ ♪ And heart ♪ ♪ Deep mutual understanding ♪ ♪ And heart ♪ ♪ A warm, safe bed ♪ ♪ A warm, safe bed ♪ ♪ Safety welcoming ♪ ♪ Deep mutual understanding ♪ (gentle music continues) Heart.

(audience applauding) Thank you.

(audience cheering) (audience applause continues) (people speaking indistinctly) (indistinct speaking fades)