Audio Interference: Season 1

“So much of the dominant mainstream society at that point was so odious that it felt like a desperate need to find a place that was different and alternative.” —Josh MacPhee 

Greg Mihalko interviews Josh MacPhee, co-founder of Interference Archive, about his collection of hardcore punk flyers and ephemera.  

Music includes: "Guilty" by Spewing Cum and "While You're Waiting for the Revolution" by Action Will Be Taken, courtesy of the Free Music Archive.

Produced by Interference Archive.

Audio Interference 01: Josh MacPhee

“Communities have given up our power to police and institutions, and we have to take it back.” —Laura Whitehorn

Laura Whitehorn is a lifelong organizer and activist whose work spans anti-war, AIDS, anti-capitalist, anti-racist, and prison abolition movements.  Laura was interviewed by Lani Hanna about her work, including the recent Interference Archive exhibition, Self-Determination Inside Out.  

Music: "Improvisation in D" by Tate Peterson, courtesy of the Free Music Archive.  

For more information about Laura's work, visit thejerichoproject.com or rappcampaign.com. 

Produced by Interference Archive. 

Audio Interference 02: Laura Whitehorn

“I knew there was this punk rock stuff, I didn’t know anything about it, I just went to a show, and it was like, this is really weird and I kinda like it.” —Dread Scott

Dread Scott, artist and friend of Interference Archive, speaks with Vero Ordaz about his art, life, and connections to the Chicago punk scene--including memories prompted by his recent donation of posters to the archive.  Image: Burning the US Constitution, documentation of a 2011 performance by Dread Scott (www.dreadscott.net).  Music: "Sick of You" by the Britemores, performed live on WFMU's Three Chord Monte with Joe Belock.

Produced by Interference Archive.

Audio Interference 04: Dread Scott

“In retrospect, we tend to create these seamless histories to tell a particular kind of story, but Greenham--it was messy. It was a messy occupation.” —Susan Jahoda

Susan Jahoda is an artist, educator, and organizer whose work includes video, photography, text, performance, installation, and research-based collaborative projects. Charlie Morgan speaks with Susan about her experiences organizing the September 2014 exhibition at Interference Archive about the Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp, a 19-year anti-nuclear protest and encampment at a U.S. Military Base in Berkshire, England.  

This podcast contains music as sung by the women of Greenham Common.


Audio Interference 03: Susan Jahoda

“It’s not about the things, it’s about the people: who made it, who saw it, who was influenced by it.” -Lincoln Cushing

Lincoln Cushing is an artist, author, and archivist from the Bay Area, who worked with Interference Archive on our recent exhibition on the Organization of Solidarity of the Peoples of Africa, Asia, and Latin America (OSPAAAL), Armed by Design.  Lani Hanna interviewed Lincoln about movement archives,  large institutions vs. community-based organizations, and the importance of accurately documenting the past.

A selection of OSPAAAL posters can be seen in Lincoln’s book, "Revolución!: Cuban Poster Art."  You can also visit his website, docspopuli.org, for more information.

Music: "Mid-Day Blues" by Tate Peterson, courtesy of the Free Music Archive.

Produced by Interference Archive.


Audio Interference 05: Lincoln Cushing

“It’s difficult for people to imagine an organized workplace in the arts, but we really want to make it a reality.” —Chloe Siebert

Interference Archive's current exhibition, Just Cause : Bad Faith - Art Workers' Activism and Organizing in NYC and Beyond, presents a history of cultural workers’ organizing efforts and demonstrations as well as the recent investigations and concerns of artists and individuals working within the culture industry.  As part of the programming for this show, which was organized by Art Handlers Alliance of New York, AHA member and exhibition organizer James Whitman interviewed Kevin McGrath, Chloe Siebert, and Neal Vandenbergh, three art handlers at the Chicago-based company Terry Dowd, Inc, where workers successfully organized and fought to unionize their workplace.  

Image Credit: Neal Vandenbergh. “The Equality Rule”. 2015. Vinyl, Graphite, Resin on Panel. Detail View. Courtesy of Neal Vandenbergh.

Produced by Interference Archive.

Audio Interference 06: Chicago Art Handlers

"The importance of art in the movement was that not everyone could see themselves at the front lines...art allowed for a more inclusive community." - Tina Orlandini

Tina Orlandini is a writer, human rights advocate, and creative organizer whose work identifies crossroads in community, arts and social change. In 2012, Tina, along with fellow collaborators Stephan Andreas, Pedro Lugo, Lourdes Santiago, Isabel Ferro and Marimer Berberena, co-curated smArtAction: ¡A estudiar y a luchar!, a collaborative art exhibition in recognition of two of the most resourceful and inspiring student strikes of the last decade. Through an arts-led approach, University of Puerto Rico students were able to outwit the administration while rallying popular support around the struggle for an accessible, democratic and quality university. Both strikes provide an instructive repertoire of action for present and future student resistance movements worldwide. 

To see a gallery of images from the exhibition, and to learn more about the UPR student movement, visit www.smartactionexhibition.com.

Image: Isamar Abreu, "La UPR No Se Vende."

Music:
What True Self? Feels Bogus, Let's Watch Jason X by Chris Zabriskie
You Must Believe in Summer by Learning Music
(freemusicarchive.org/music/Learning_Music)

Audio Interference 07: Tina Orlandini

"Jean would take her income tax refund check and go to the track and bet on horses, and whatever money she made funded Tabloid."

Tabloid was a collectively edited critical journal of mass culture and everyday life which emerged out of (and in opposition to)  Stanford University in the late 1970s and 1980s.  Interference Archive's Lani Hanna and Vero Ordaz spoke with Jean Franco, Mary Louise Pratt, Maria Damon, Dana Polan, and Ed Cohen about the history of the journal.

Music: "Nights Tale," "Summer’s Coming" and, "After The Week I’ve Had" by Dexter Britain; "Strange Wedding 60908" by Marcel.  All music courtesy of the Free Music Archive.

Produced by Interference Archive. 

Audio Interference 08: Tabloid

"What I value about a political event, or what I value about a dance party--I don't know if those are very separate values at the end of the day."

In this episode, Lani Hanna talks to Los Angeles-based artist and activist Steven Rodriguez about Southern California culture and identity, the whiteness of anarchism, and creating aesthetics around police brutality.  

Music: "Ocean" by Zebra and "Stars" by She-Wolf., both courtesy of the Free Music Archive.

Produced by Interference Archive. 

Audio Interference 09: Steven Rodriguez

"We saw the hierarchical constraints of the society our parents created, and we wanted to do it differently.  So we created this flattened, non-hierarchical approach to almost everything we did."

In the 1960s and 1970s, California-based print collective Peoples Press produced numerous books and pamphlets on international political struggles.  In this episode of Audio Interference, Lani Hanna talks with collective members Jane Norling and Marty Williams about the influence of Cuba, organizing volunteer labor, and becoming a self-taught printer.

Music: "Conscience" by Ketsa and "De Cuba" by Songo 21, both courtesy of the Free Music Archive.

Produced by Interference Archive.  

Audio Interference 10: Peoples Press

"I really wanted people to understand what the past was.  At its base level, this is what happens when women have to use a coat hanger when they need an abortion." -Leela Corman

Leela Corman is an illustrator and comic book artist, based in Gainesville, Florida.  Her 2012 graphic novel Unterzakhn is about twin sisters growing up in the Russian-Jewish neighborhood of the Lower East Side at the turn of the last century.  Lani Hanna sat down with Corman in February to discuss the book.

Produced by Interference Archive. 

Audio Interference 11: Leela Corman

"I just remember when I was first making comics, it just felt really powerful.  It's kind of like that feeling when you first start riding a bike." - Jan Descartes

In this episode, Louise Barry speaks with two contributors to Interference Archive's exhibition, Our Comics, Ourselves: Jan Descartes, an artists and one of the curators of the exhibition, and zinemaker Elvis B., creator of the series Homos in Herstory and co-founder of the NYC Feminist Zine Fest.

Music: "Minus Mercury" by Thorn1, courtesy of the Free Music Archive.

Produced by Interference Archive.  

Audio Interference 12: Elvis B. & Jan Descartes

"Before we ask questions, we find out more about the problems that are happening.  And sometimes we even go out and ask the people around us: what is something that you don't feel comfortable with?  Where do you feel disconnected?...I think that's the way that we actually find political issues to do art with."  - Stephanie Roman

Mobile Print Power is a multigenerational collective based out of Immigrant Movement International in Corona, Queens, who use silkscreen printmaking to engage communities and explore social and cultural situations.  Mobile Print Power's history of collaborative work is the subject of Interference Archive's upcoming exhibition, Soñamos Sentirnos Libres / Under Construction, opening May 1.  In this episode of Audio Interference, Charlie Morgan and Lani Hanna talk to collective members Marissa Campiz, Brandon Castillo, Jennifer Muñoz, Stephanie Roman, and Patrick Rowe.

Produced by Interference Archive.

Audio Interference 13: Mobile Print Power

"We're blessed with being the keepers of some very valuable stuff.  It's not ours.  It's intentional that this is part of the community and belongs to the community." - Claude Marks

Freedom Archives is based in San Francisco and contains over 10,000 hours of audio and video tape, which chronicles both revolutionary struggles and state repressions.  They also create audio and video documentaries of their own.  Interference Archive reached out to Freedom Archives because of their shared commitment to archiving the histories of social movements.  Lani Hanna spoke to Freedom Archives co-founder Claude Marks, and his co-worker Nathaniel Moore.

Music: "Kentucky Mule" by Tate Peterson, courtesy of the Free Music Archive.

Produced by Interference Archive.

Audio Interference 14: Freedom Archives

"I think about posters as a way of starting a conversation, but I don't feel like we talk enough about how that conversation is started and where that conversation goes beyond talking."  -- Kameelah Janan Rasheed

On Nov 4, 2015, Interference Archive hosted a panel entitled Solidarity, Distribution, Design: The Poster Today,  which explored the intersection of graphic design and socio-political engagement.   Josh MacPhee of Interference Archive moderated the event and was joined by artists Dread Scott, Kameelah Janan Rasheed, and Avram Finkelstein for a rousing discussion that touched on topics of appropriation, respectability politics and even the Fast and Furious movie franchise.

Produced by Interference Archive.

Music: "Welcome Departure" by Ketsa, courtesy of the Free Music Archive.

Audio Interference 15: Solidarity, Distribution, Design

"We were still coming off the afterglow, in many ways, of May '68.  There's no question about that." - Greg Sholette.

In this episode, artist, writer, and activist Greg Sholette relates the history of the political art collective PAD/D, and how the collective used art to resist gentrification in 1980s New York.  Sholette was interviewed by Louise Barry and Eric Triantafillou in March.  

Produced by Interference Archive.

Music: "Bruises," "No One's Trophy," and "Asleep," by Christian Flanders, courtesy of the Free Music Archive.

Audio Interference 16: Greg Sholette

"We were subject to an FBI sting.  We were placed under surveillance, and we were able to discover the surveillance and get rid of it, but then for the next nine years we were living underground." - Diana Block

In this episode, Lani Hanna speaks to Diana Block about her life as an activist, organizer, and writer.  Block was a founding member of San Francisco Women Against Rape and the Prairie Fire Organizing Committee.  When her activism in support of the Puerto Rican Independence Movement attracted the attention of the FBI, she spent thirteen years living "underground" under a different identity. 

You will also hear Diana Block read from her novel, Clandestine Occupations, during the exhibition Armed By Design/El Diseño a las Armas: Posters and Publications of Cuba’s Organization of Solidarity of the Peoples of Africa, Asia, and Latin America (OSPAAAL).

Produced by Interference Archive.

Music: "Fibonaci Effect in Two Movements" by Lanark, "El Danzon de Noventa Millas" by Cuban Cowboys, and "Pivoting on Salsa Key 11," by Tracky Birthday, all courtesy of the Free Music Archive. 

Audio Interference 17: Diana Block

"The image allows for the viewer to interpret it quickly.  And I guess that's what an advertiser tries to do--that's what a propagandist tries to do."  - Kevin Caplicki

In this episode, Brooke Shuman talks to Kevin Caplicki, one of the founders of Interference Archive and a member of Justseeds.  Founded in 1998, Justseeds is a worker-owned cooperative that produces politically-themed prints.  With members working from the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, Justseeds operates both as a unified collaboration of similarly minded printmakers and as a loose collection of creative individuals with unique viewpoints and working methods.  Justseeds produces collective portfolios on subjects including climate justice, the Zapatista movement, migration, reproductive rights, and the US prison system. 

Music included: 
"Kufanya Mapenzi (Making Love)" 
Ramsey Lewis
7" Single (Columbia Records, 1972)

"Anti-manifesto"
Propagandhi
How to Clean Everything (Fat Wreck Chords, 1993)

Produced by Interference Archive.  For more information, see the following links:

http://justseeds.org/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taller_de_Gr%C3%A1fica_Popular

Culture Strike
http://www.culturestrike.org/

Justseeds works with frontline advocacy organizations to create their prints. Here are a handful:

Critical Resistance
http://criticalresistance.org/

Marcellus Shale Earth First!
https://marcellusshaleearthfirst.org/

Audio Interference 18: Kevin Caplicki

"It's people who are more familiar with archives who have more trouble figuring out how to negotiate this space...There's one researcher I remember, she came in with this question about Adrienne Rich, so I mistakenly assumed that she wanted to see Adrienne Rich's papers.  And so I took down the box and she was just so intimidated to be in front of this collection of personal papers that had been personally donated by Adrienne Rich." - Rachel Corbman

In this episode, Lani Hanna and Brooke Shuman talk to Maxine Wolfe and Rachel Corbman, of the Lesbian Herstory Archives.  Based in Park Slope, Brooklyn, the Lesbian Herstory Archives is home to the world's largest collection of materials by and about lesbians and their communities.

Music and spoken word from the 1977 album, Lesbian Concentrate: A Lesbianthology of Songs and Poems.

Produced by Interference Archive. 

Audio Interference 19: Lesbian Herstory Archives

Interference Archive is a social space, exhibition venue, and open stacks archive of movement culture, based in Brooklyn. 