war | torture | detention | absurdity | tenderness | human | love
Organized by Links Hall Associates Amber Ginsburg & Aaron Hughes
Links Hall presents the Tea Project, an ongoing dialogue that traverses a variety of landscapes. From the tea sipped at a family gathering, to a cage in Guantanamo Bay, to a motor pool in Iraq, tea is not only a favored drink but a shared moment that transcends cultural divides and systems of oppression.Through the Tea Project, Aaron Hughes and Amber Ginsburg present three weekends of programing that offer you a role in telling the story of our current involvement in war, detention, and torture. From intimately staged Tea Performances, to a cabaret of guest speakers and performers at Tea Engagements, to guest performances by Rohina Malik and Jeremiah Day, the Tea Project offers a collection of narratives that exemplify moments of absurdity and tenderness.
PROGRAM
All events are free and begin at 7pm. RSVP required: Links Hall RSVP
Links Hall, 3111 N. Western Ave, Chicago IL. More info at 773-281-0824
All events are free and begin at 7pm. RSVP required: Links Hall RSVP
Links Hall, 3111 N. Western Ave, Chicago IL. More info at 773-281-0824
Week One:
Thursday, March 31, 2016 | Tea Performance w/ Special Guest James Yee
Friday, April 1, 2016 | Tea Performance w/ Special Guest Larry Siems
Saturday, April 2, 2016 | Tea Engagement w/ Special Guests Aliya Hana Hussain, Baher Azmay, James Yee, Kathy Kelly, Larry Siems, Poetry from the youth group Fresh Expressions, Pakistani tea by Sadia Nawab and Seemi Choudhry, and more
Friday, April 1, 2016 | Tea Performance w/ Special Guest Larry Siems
Saturday, April 2, 2016 | Tea Engagement w/ Special Guests Aliya Hana Hussain, Baher Azmay, James Yee, Kathy Kelly, Larry Siems, Poetry from the youth group Fresh Expressions, Pakistani tea by Sadia Nawab and Seemi Choudhry, and more
Sunday, April 3, 2016 | Tea Forum on Justice & Reparations | CAIR | Invitation Only
Week Two:
Thursday, April 7, 2016 | Tea Performance w/ Special Guest Jeremiah Day and Bart De Kroon
Friday, April 8, 2016 | Unveiled performance by Rohina Malik
Saturday, April 9, 2016 | Tea Engagement w/ Special Guests Bart de Kroon, Jeremiah Day, Kathy Kelly, Marc Falkoff, Poetry by Fatimah Asghar, Ladan Osman, and Roger Reeves, and more
Saturday, April 9, 2016 | Tea Engagement w/ Special Guests Bart de Kroon, Jeremiah Day, Kathy Kelly, Marc Falkoff, Poetry by Fatimah Asghar, Ladan Osman, and Roger Reeves, and more
Week Three:
Thursday, April 14, 2016 | Tea Performance w/ Special Guest Kathy Kelly
Friday, April 15, 2016 | Tea Performance w/ Special Guest James Yee
Saturday, April 16, 2016 | Tea Engagement w/ Special Guests Aziz Haq, James Yee,Kathy Kelly, Tom Ginsburg, Poetry by Warrior Writers, Sarah Ross, and more
Thursday, April 14, 2016 | Tea Performance w/ Special Guest Kathy Kelly
Friday, April 15, 2016 | Tea Performance w/ Special Guest James Yee
Saturday, April 16, 2016 | Tea Engagement w/ Special Guests Aziz Haq, James Yee,Kathy Kelly, Tom Ginsburg, Poetry by Warrior Writers, Sarah Ross, and more
SPECIAL GUESTS
Aliya Hana Hussain: Advocacy Program Manager for the Guantanamo Global Justice Initiative at the Center for Constitutional Rights and travels to Guantanamo regularly to meet with CCR’s clients. She also works on the issues of drone killings, profiling and spying on Muslim communities, and accountability for torture and other war crimes.
Baher Azmy: Legal Director of the Center for Constitutional Rights. He directs all litigation and advocacy around issues related to the promotion of civil and human rights. While a Clinical Law Professor, Baher represented Murat Kurnaz, a German resident of Turkish descent imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay, until his release in August 2006.
Bart de Kroon: Dutch guitarist and singer songwriter. De Kroon has roots in the DIY scene, playing in experimental rock bands. Since 2010 he has recorded three albums as Homemade Empire blending folk songwriting with an experimental sound that borrows from minimal drone music and lo-fi. Bart is working in collaboration with Jeremiah Day.
Gerald Hankerson: Outreach coordinator at the Council on American-Islamic Relations and a host on Radio Islam. Through CAIR, Gerald addresses Human Rights violations in the areas of Islamophobia, media bias and forms of representation.
James Yee: Former US Army Chaplain and graduate of West Point who served as the Muslim Chaplain for the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. After being officially recognized twice for outstanding performance, Captain Yee was arrested and imprisoned for 76 days in September 2003 while being falsely accused of spying, espionage, and aiding the alleged Taliban and Al-Qaeda prisoners. He was held in solitary confinement and subjected to the same sensory deprivation techniques that were being used against the prisoners in Cuba that he had been ministering to. After months of government investigation, all criminal charges were dropped.
Jeremiah Day: Berlin based, American artist re-examining politicalconflicts and resistance through unfolding their subjective traces and contexts in photography, speech and body language. Day’s work has been presented at the Centre George Pompidou, Paris, this year’s Thessaloniki Biennial, and presently at MAXXI, Museum of Art of the Twenty First Century, Rome.
Kathy Kelly: Peace activist, pacifist and author, one of the founding members of Voices in the Wilderness, and currently a co-coordinator of Voices for Creative Nonviolence. As part of peace team work in several countries, she has traveled to Iraq twenty-six times, notably remaining in combat zones during the early days of both US-Iraq wars. Her recent travel has focused on Afghanistan and Gaza, along with domestic protests against U.S. drone policy.
Larry Siems: Balancing writing and activism, he has published scores of articles on human rights and cross-cultural themes. He served for many years as director of Freedom to Write Programs for the writers advocacy organization PEN. He has three books out including The Torture Report: What the Documents Say About America’s Post 9/11 Torture Program and Guantánamo Diary.
Marc Falkoff: Provided legal representation for a number of detainees held in the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He edited Poems from Guantanamo: The Detainees Speak, a bestselling anthology and has been translated into a dozen languages. He currently teaches at Northern University School of Law. He received the Frederick Douglass Human Rights Award in 2007 from the Southern Center for Human Rights together with many other awards.
Mark Templeton: An Associate Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Abrams Environmental Law Clinic at the University of Chicago, Mark was special assistant and senior advisor to the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor and an advisor to the U.S delegation to the U.N Commission on Human Rights.
Mary Zerkel: Having worked at the American Friends Service Committee for twenty-two years and as member of Lucky Pierre, Mary combines activism and art. At AFSC Mary, among other vital roles, is co-coordinator on the Wage Peace Campaign, which works towards the demilitarization of U.S. foreign and domestic policy.
Rohina Malik: Critically acclaimed playwright and solo performer for her one woman show Unveiled.
She is an artistic associate at the 16th Street Theater and a company member at Voyager Theater Company in NYC. Her work had been produced or developed at The Goodman Theatre, Victory Gardens Theater, 16th Street Theater, Crossroads Theater, Chicago Dramatists, Voyager Theater Company, Silk Road Rising and Theater Project Baltimore.
Sadia Nawab: Generously offering her family tea recipe for the April 2nd Tea Engagement, Sadia, through her work as Youth and Arts Manager at the Inner-City Muslim Action Network, is coordinating poets from CommUNITY Café and Fresh Expressions, which are productions of socially conscious artists that connect a diverse array of communities and celebrates the rich storytelling, music, movement and visual art of urban and folk cultures throughout the world.
Aliya Hana Hussain: Advocacy Program Manager for the Guantanamo Global Justice Initiative at the Center for Constitutional Rights and travels to Guantanamo regularly to meet with CCR’s clients. She also works on the issues of drone killings, profiling and spying on Muslim communities, and accountability for torture and other war crimes.
Baher Azmy: Legal Director of the Center for Constitutional Rights. He directs all litigation and advocacy around issues related to the promotion of civil and human rights. While a Clinical Law Professor, Baher represented Murat Kurnaz, a German resident of Turkish descent imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay, until his release in August 2006.
Bart de Kroon: Dutch guitarist and singer songwriter. De Kroon has roots in the DIY scene, playing in experimental rock bands. Since 2010 he has recorded three albums as Homemade Empire blending folk songwriting with an experimental sound that borrows from minimal drone music and lo-fi. Bart is working in collaboration with Jeremiah Day.
Gerald Hankerson: Outreach coordinator at the Council on American-Islamic Relations and a host on Radio Islam. Through CAIR, Gerald addresses Human Rights violations in the areas of Islamophobia, media bias and forms of representation.
James Yee: Former US Army Chaplain and graduate of West Point who served as the Muslim Chaplain for the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. After being officially recognized twice for outstanding performance, Captain Yee was arrested and imprisoned for 76 days in September 2003 while being falsely accused of spying, espionage, and aiding the alleged Taliban and Al-Qaeda prisoners. He was held in solitary confinement and subjected to the same sensory deprivation techniques that were being used against the prisoners in Cuba that he had been ministering to. After months of government investigation, all criminal charges were dropped.
Jeremiah Day: Berlin based, American artist re-examining politicalconflicts and resistance through unfolding their subjective traces and contexts in photography, speech and body language. Day’s work has been presented at the Centre George Pompidou, Paris, this year’s Thessaloniki Biennial, and presently at MAXXI, Museum of Art of the Twenty First Century, Rome.
Kathy Kelly: Peace activist, pacifist and author, one of the founding members of Voices in the Wilderness, and currently a co-coordinator of Voices for Creative Nonviolence. As part of peace team work in several countries, she has traveled to Iraq twenty-six times, notably remaining in combat zones during the early days of both US-Iraq wars. Her recent travel has focused on Afghanistan and Gaza, along with domestic protests against U.S. drone policy.
Larry Siems: Balancing writing and activism, he has published scores of articles on human rights and cross-cultural themes. He served for many years as director of Freedom to Write Programs for the writers advocacy organization PEN. He has three books out including The Torture Report: What the Documents Say About America’s Post 9/11 Torture Program and Guantánamo Diary.
Marc Falkoff: Provided legal representation for a number of detainees held in the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He edited Poems from Guantanamo: The Detainees Speak, a bestselling anthology and has been translated into a dozen languages. He currently teaches at Northern University School of Law. He received the Frederick Douglass Human Rights Award in 2007 from the Southern Center for Human Rights together with many other awards.
Mark Templeton: An Associate Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Abrams Environmental Law Clinic at the University of Chicago, Mark was special assistant and senior advisor to the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor and an advisor to the U.S delegation to the U.N Commission on Human Rights.
Mary Zerkel: Having worked at the American Friends Service Committee for twenty-two years and as member of Lucky Pierre, Mary combines activism and art. At AFSC Mary, among other vital roles, is co-coordinator on the Wage Peace Campaign, which works towards the demilitarization of U.S. foreign and domestic policy.
Rohina Malik: Critically acclaimed playwright and solo performer for her one woman show Unveiled.
She is an artistic associate at the 16th Street Theater and a company member at Voyager Theater Company in NYC. Her work had been produced or developed at The Goodman Theatre, Victory Gardens Theater, 16th Street Theater, Crossroads Theater, Chicago Dramatists, Voyager Theater Company, Silk Road Rising and Theater Project Baltimore.
Sadia Nawab: Generously offering her family tea recipe for the April 2nd Tea Engagement, Sadia, through her work as Youth and Arts Manager at the Inner-City Muslim Action Network, is coordinating poets from CommUNITY Café and Fresh Expressions, which are productions of socially conscious artists that connect a diverse array of communities and celebrates the rich storytelling, music, movement and visual art of urban and folk cultures throughout the world.