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PROJECT BRONZEVILLE

A Community Arts Project Exploring a Unique Chapter in LA History

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PROJECT BRONZEVILLE

PROJECT BRONZEVILLE

PROJECT BRONZEVILLE

PROJECT BRONZEVILLE

PROJECT BRONZEVILLE

A Community Arts Project Exploring a Unique Chapter in LA History

A Community Arts Project Exploring a Unique Chapter in LA History

A Community Arts Project Exploring a Unique Chapter in LA History

A Community Arts Project Exploring a Unique Chapter in LA History

Kathie Foley-Meyer
Kathie Foley-Meyer
Kathie Foley-Meyer
Kathie Foley-Meyer
1 Campaign |
Los Angeles, United States
$10,025 USD 34 backers
50% of $20,000 Flexible Goal Flexible Goal
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Art. Theatre. Music. A meeting of the minds.  Join us in the spring and summer of 2013 as we bring creative and intellectual energy to shine a light on Bronzeville - -  Learn how a little-known period in the history of LA helped to shape the city we have now.

Project Bronzeville is a multidisciplinary collaboration by LA Artcore, The Robey Theatre Company, musician\composer Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, scholars Dr. Christopher Jimenez y West, Dr. Hillary Jenks, Dr. Anthony Macias and graphic designer and artist Kathie Foley-Meyer.  

During the time of the internment of Japanese citizens during WWII, large numbers of African Americans moved into the part of downtown Los Angeles known as Little Tokyo, and almost overnight it became Bronzeville.  The area become known for its jazz clubs, but was also one of the few places black citizens and war workers could live and work. 

After a long day of supporting the war effort, workers could relax by catching a performance by Charlie Parker at the Finale Club, Coleman Hawkins or T-Bone Walker at Shepp’s Playhouse or many other jazz and swing notables performing at Bronzeville staples like Club Rendezvous, The Copper Room, Cobra Club or Creole Palace to name just a few.

We're going to bring Bronzeville back to life with an art exhibition, a play, music and an afternoon of exploration and remembrance, and we’re excited for it to be a distinctive series of events in the cultural life our city. 

A Little History of Project Bronzeville

Project Bronzeville was created by artist and graphic designer Kathie Foley-Meyer. Kathie’s impetus to create art inspired by Bronzeville came about after years of walking the streets of Little Tokyo and taking photographs, and encountering works such as Sheila Levrant de Bretteville and Sonya Ishii’s Remembering Old Little Tokyo. She wondered if black people had ever lived in the neighborhood, and she could not shake the sense that other lives had been lived there, and her feelings were later confirmed during a Los Angeles Conservancy tour of Little Tokyo, when the first words spoken by the tour guide were about Bronzeville.  

She completed her first mixed-media glass and neon piece, Bronzeville, in 2005, and while she continued to make art inspired by other subject matter, Bronzeville kept popping up as a subject for further exploration.

In 2009 she attended the final performance of Robey Theatre Company’s production of “Bronzeville,” and was by then hard at work on the mixed media sculpture, Bronzeville III. It was completed in 2010 and exhibited at the Louisville Visual Arts Association exhibition “Ne 10: Louisville,” held during the Glass Art Society Conference.

Her interest in the period led to her being one of the sponsors of a series of performances of the play Bronzeville held at the Manzanar historic site in the spring of 2011, and she launched Project Bronzeville shortly thereafter. 

What We Need & What You Get

  • Our goal is to raise $20,000 total to support all four segments of the project.
  • The amount raised will go to the actors, crew and materials for the play, the musicians in the jazz concert, the scholars for the symposium and the promotional materials for the project as a whole.
  • If we don't reach our entire goal, the funds raised will be divided evenly between all four components of Project Bronzeville.

The Impact

 

  • The eviction and internment of the Japanese citizens from their homes in Little Tokyo and the subsequent influx of African Americans, the post-war transformation of the neighborhood and the effect of the city’s restrictive housing covenants provide a direct connect for understanding contemporary LA. The Bronzeville period was short (most estimates put it at 1943-46), and outside of select photographic and microfiche archives, little or no traces of it can be found today, but it looms large as a harbinger of a changing Los Angeles. Project Bronzeville offers a unique opportunity to examine our shared history through the lens of the arts, and to bring these perspectives to new audiences, both within and outside of the subject communities.

  • LA Artcore and The Robey Theatre Company have proven track records of distinctive arts programming.

  • Miguel Atwood-Ferguson's work is vast, having contributed to over 300 recordings, and countless live concerts. Miguel’s interests are many and he performs, tours and records with ensembles ranging from electronica, avant-garde, jazz, classical, hip-hop, and pop to name a few from countries all around the world.

  • Symposium moderators Dr. Christopher Jimenez y West (currently Instructor at Pasadena City College and the former History Curator at the California African American Museum) and Dr. Hillary Jenks, author of “Japanese Don’t Believe in Evacuation: Bronzeville, Little Tokyo, and the Unstable Geography of Race in Post-World War II Los Angeles” published in the Summer 2011 issue of Southern California Quarterly will be teaming with Dr. Anthony Macias, Associate Professor at UC Riverside, who has written extensively on music culture and politics and is the author of a forthcoming Summer 2013 article on jazz bandleader and composer Gerald Wilson for Boom:  A Journal of California.

Your contribution will help us shine a light on a period that helped to make LA into the diverse and complex metropolis it is today.

Other Ways You Can Help

  • Student attendance at the theatrical production:  We’d like to reserve a select number of performances  of the play “Bronzeville” for schools, particularly students in grades 4 and above, so if you are involved in the education field and would like your class to attend a performance please drop us a line at projectbronzeville.com, Attn:  Kathie.

  • If you’re unable to give us funding, but would to participate in another way, we’re also looking for photos from the period (and, if possible, the stories that go with them, no matter how spare).  The generation that remembers the period is falling victim to time, so we would like to preserve as much as possible via an online archive.  We may also (with your permission) feature the photo during our symposium.

  • Use Indiegogo's share tools to spread the word about this campaign with family, friends -- anyone who loves LA, its history and the arts!

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