Kidnapped for Dinner

Alexis Oliva and Yanira Lopez are the husband-and-wife duo behind textile design business Yerbamala Designs. They took what some may deem a fun hobby or craft and built a full-fledged business, leaving behind their corporate jobs to develop their textile art practice.We discuss risk taking, supportive partnership, resourcefulness, approaching a new endeavor with gratitude and as a constant learning opportunity and more in our conversation.This episode was recorded live in December 2019 as a part of Shop Talk, a special talk series at Mima Market and happy hour with Radiate Kombucha. We discuss process, inspiration and purpose with local, independent artisans and makers.*Q&A starts at 01:00:42

Laura Marsh is a textile artist with a social practice whose work involves installations, weavings, flags, text and other tactile pieces. We discuss her process, the participatory nature of her work, play and fun as a means of accessibility, creating safe spaces, slow reflection, imagining positive futures for ourselves, generosity, hospitality and more.This conversation is one of four interviews, recorded with Orchid.fm, profiling Mana Contemporary artists at 777 Mall during Miami Art Week 2019.

Fereshteh Toosi is an artist of Iranian and Azeri ancestry whose work involves embodied experiences, encounter, exchange, and sensory inquiry. We discuss her body of work, including her current project Water Radio: Liquid Intelligence and latest initiative and O, Miami collaboration Reading Camp. Themes that emerge in our discussion include deep listening, the importance of “tuning into” our environments, shared experiences, modes of communication with nature that are beyond the language of words, wonder, imagination and more.This conversation is one of four interviews, recorded with Orchid.fm, profiling Mana Contemporary artists at 777 Mall during Miami Art Week 2019.

Jenna Balfe is a performance artist, musician and activist whose work promotes healing connections between self, other and environment. We discuss her current work, softening the lines of our experiences, the importance of movement, tenderness & compassion, remembering our connection to nature and each other, play & imagination and more.This conversation is one of four interviews, recorded with Orchid.fm, profiling Mana Contemporary artists at 777 Mall during Miami Art Week 2019.

Richard Vergez is a Cuban-American visual and sound artist with a background in graphic design and audio/visual collaboration. We discuss his Art Week installation Weeping Willow, hand-made collage work and sonic compositions. A few themes emerge in the conversation: the value of choice over skill in art, absurdity, nostalgia, the influence of Dada and Fluxus on his work, the importance of creating space in the work (and for ourselves), cutting through excess and more.This conversation is one of four interviews, recorded with Orchid.fm, profiling Mana Contemporary artists at 777 Mall during Miami Art Week 2019.

Shop Talk is a special talk series hosted by Kidnapped for Dinner at Mima Market and happy hour with Radiate Kombucha. We discuss process, inspiration and purpose with local, independent artisans and makers.On November 15, we hosted a live conversation with Gabi Serra and Ruth Jeannoel around the idea of “making” and building community. In considering this, Gabi and Ruth implicitly ask: What is your relationship to yourself, to your own community and to other communities you may not be a part of? And what are the socio-economic factors that affect these relationships?Ruth is a Full Spectrum birth doula, holistic healer, community organizer, writer and restorative justice trainer & practitioner. She is the founder of non-profit Fanm Saj and a co-founder of Carib Healing Collective.Gabi is a farmer, herbalist and artist. She is a part of Buenezas and Semillas Cooperative.

Shop Talk is a special talk series hosted by Kidnapped for Dinner at Mima Market and happy hour with Radiate Kombucha. We discuss process, inspiration and purpose with local, independent artisans and makers.We kicked this series off on October 18, 2019 with Mima Market’s Alexandra Cava Palomino, Radiate Kombucha’s Susan Cartiglia and Kidnapped For Dinner host Kristen Soller.Being an active participant in our lives, experiences over transactions, fostering genuine care & engagement, and cultivating curiosity over fear are among the themes that emerged in our conversation.

What does it mean to be at home? Where and with whom do we get to call home? Who gets to claim space? These questions are extremely charged in the context of urban development, where ‘home’ literally is in flux.GeoVanna Gonzalez offers an artist and curator’s perspective to these questions as we talk about her art & community space Supplement Projects. We talk about what it means for artists to claim and create within space and the part they may play in shifting urban landscapes. For GeoVanna, the role of the artist & curator is undeniably tied to serving community and perhaps for holding, or hosting rather, space to connect with others, develop relationships, build homes - however you define it.GeoVanna is a multidisciplinary artist and curator based between Miami and Berlin. She founded Supplement Projects, an alternative art & community space exploring ideas of domesticity within the urban landscape. As an artist, GeoVanna works with ideas of translation and forms of communication in today’s technological and consumer-driven culture. As a curator, she is interested in collective practice, working outside of institutional spaces and providing a platform for people of diverse backgrounds to have face-to-face conversations and interactions. GeoVanna also co-founded the collaborative project Coin In / Coin Out with artist Angel Garcia and the international reading club and performance art collective Read What You Want.

Jayme Gershen shares the making of her first documentary Six Degrees of Immigration. As she discusses her development as a filmmaker, she illustrates how starting a new project or trying a new medium, though daunting, can be an important step in expanding and evolving our own creative language. Her story is an example of how the desire to create and share with others can work in tandem with our doubts.Jayme is a filmmaker and a photographer based in Miami, FL. Her work uses universal experiences to shed a surprisingly relatable light on issues that at first-glance seem unfamiliar.Gershen recently premiered her short documentary, Six Degrees of Immigration, at the 2019 Miami International Film Festival, co-winning the Knight Foundation’s Made in MIA Best Short Film Award and is currently working on her first feature length documentary, Birthright?!, which explores what it means to be a hyphenated American through the eyes of Miami’s favorite Cuban-American electro-funk sweethearts, Afrobeta.Gershen works around the globe, filming behind-the-scenes action on feature films and commercials, photographing history for publications like Bloomberg, Vanity Fair and The New Yorker and working as a director/cinematographer on a variety of documentaries and doc-style commercial content.

Monica Uszerowicz’s experience as a writer cannot be separated from her challenging inner experience. We talk openly about her self-doubt, critical inner voice and self-image, as well as how she is able to find tenderness for herself through a sense of interconnectedness in the world around her. We also talk about the challenges of permalancing, her writing process (or lack thereof), being an “exposed nerve,” stress eating, Miyazaki soundtracks and more.Monica is a Miami-based writer and photographer. She has contributed to a number of arts and culture publications including Hyperallergic, Bomb, Vice, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Hazlitt, and Filmmaker Magazine. Monica is also the former Film & Performing Arts Editor for the Miami Rail, an independent extension of the Brooklyn Rail, and currently serves as a web editor for Cultured Magazine.

Liza Meli owns and operates BarMeli69, a Mediterranean Restaurant & Wine Bar she opened in 2014. Through our conversation, Liza shares a glimpse of her 30+ years in the restaurant industry and her approach to her latest project. She offers an image of herself as a woman who knows who she is, what she wants and is actively & creatively living out her personal vision.We talk about passion being a foundation to build upon, approaching work as a lifestyle rather than an endeavor compartmentalized from life, being willing to lose in order to gain, trying & failing rather than regretting, how to stay relevant & inspired, owning her role as a female restauranteur and more.Liza, raised in Sydney, Australia and of Greek descent, dedicated herself to travel, dance & music from the 90s to the early 2000s. She toured with her then-husband Flamenco guitarist Alex Fox as his agent, dancer and producer.Following the challenges of a growing family while traveling and an amicable separation from Fox, she rooted herself in Miami, Florida and pursued her passion for food & wine.Liza is no stranger to the restaurant business, getting her first taste of the industry by working at her uncle’s popular Greek seafood restaurant at the age of 15. She owned Ouzo’s Greek Taverna in North Beach and Anise Mediterranean Taverna on the Miami River before opening BarMeli69.

At the end of 2018, ceramic artist Kira Tippenhauer found herself signing the lease of her very own ceramic studio, a vision she hadn’t planned on realizing any time soon. She shares what lead her to open a space sooner rather than later and how her experience called into question her own resilience, sense of worth and abilities.We cover a number of things including embracing the imperfect, intuition, self-forgiveness & awareness, creating literal and figurative spaces for ourselves, knowing when to work and when to rest and more.Kira Tippenhauer is an artist and the owner of Kiramade, a design line of modern, handmade ceramic homeware inspired by her Afro-Caribbean roots and Haitian heritage.Kira moved to Miami from Port-au-Prince, Haiti in 2004. Since earning her MFA in Visual Arts from Miami International University of Art & Design in 2011, she continues to exhibit her collage work and ceramics locally and abroad.Kira incorporates collaborative teaching in her art practice, offering ceramic workshops and classes to people of all ages through her business.

Kidnapped for Dinner recently partnered with Baiser Beauty to host Woman & Woman, a craft fair celebrating Miami’s up-and-coming women creatives through an intimate, indoor market and special programming, including a live recording of the show with community organizer and artist Niki Franco.Our conversation focused on women’s insecurity, sense of lack vs love, shame and other themes factoring into self-worth and how we show up for ourselves and others.While placing these themes within a larger social and political context, we covered specifics such as non-commercial practices of self-love and care, intention as a kind of freedom, the power of community in healing and reimagining our environment and showing up in all relationships in more loving, honest ways.Niki is a Miami Native of Puerto Rican and Panamanian heritage. As a community organizer, her work addresses issues surrounding systems of power and oppressive narratives and upholds reproductive justice, holistic health and building community.She is the Political Education Director of (F)empower and Civic Engagement Organizer at Power U Center for Social Change.

Trust, ego, chemistry, playing off of strengths & weaknesses, preserving & sharing ideas and empowering your peers — just a few things we cover with singer-songwriters Nick Mencia and Oly in our conversation about creative partnerships and collaborations.Nick and Oly are members of the newly-formed country supergroup Nick County & The Rainbow Smoke, which includes the respective talents of musicians Rick Moon, Jorge Graupera, Corey Perez, Juan Ledesma and Jason Mavila.Oly is a singer-songwriter, DJ and founder of Let’s Sang, a classic karaoke event for music nerds at Wynwood bar, Gramps. She also organizes LASH Wynwood, a female DJ collective.Nick Mencia is a singer-songwriter, UX designer and self-proclaimed Chihuahua lover. He released his first album, In the Valley of the Red Sun as Nick County in 2017.

How do you define yourself? Is it limiting to try? Should you stick to one interest and run with it, or do as much as you can? How do you know which opportunities are worth pursuing?We entertain these questions with Willie Avendano, while discussing how he fell into co-founding 01 in Miami’s Wynwood Arts District, a prototyping lab and studio for new educational ideas and products in technology and gaming.Willie has a range of interests and creative pursuits including virtual reality, artificial intelligence, education, art and music. As a new media artist, Willie has exhibited video & sound work at &gallery, Locust Projects and the Institute of Contemporary Art and DJs under monikers Yung Algebra and Drake Tears. He graduated from Columbia University in Operations Research and Computer Science.

Yaima Arbona Bello and Maudie Valero founded their arts organization PAXy without prior experience and in spite of other people’s skepticism and the red tape of starting a non-profit and securing funding, among other challenges. Due in part to adaptability while remaining committed to their original creative vision for the org, as well as a spirit of collaboration, they’ve seen steady growth since starting in 2015.PAXy, which stands for “Putting Art in the galaXy,” is a non-profit organization connecting diverse communities through accessible arts programming and outreach. Their main community project, Wake Up Miami!, brings art into the everyday by offering free, live music and performing arts at Miami Metrorail & Metromover stations. Their first “mini concert” was with musician Ominé Eager.Wake Up Miami! was awarded a $50,000 Knight Arts Challenge grant for their 2018 programming.

While some may take film and other analog media for granted, Barron Sherer immerses himself in it. He talks about how working with moving images can be a precarious act of using and maintaining technology that today could be considered “obsolete,” and more.Barron is a time-based media artist and principal at Obsolete Media Miami (OMM). His background as film archivist, researcher and curator informs his art practice of altering and repurposing sound and moving images. As a 2017 South Florida Cultural Consortium Fellow, Barron has curated and co-produced various film programs and festivals for local cinemas, art spaces and moving image archives.In 2015, he co-founded OMM with artist and cultural producer Kevin Arrow as an experimental archive and art project that invites media makers to repurpose their material. OMM presents these materials in new contexts through performances, collaborations and workshops.

Journalism is not for the faint of heart, especially as a freelancer. Christian Portilla walks us through the highs and lows of developing her journalism career all while maintaining a sense of gratitude and passion. Beyond pitching stories, Christian illustrates the importance of independence, motivation, finding your worth beyond the glamour of working for any one publication or institution, having a solid support system and more.Christian is a journalist focused on diverse, culturally rich stories relevant to the South Florida community and abroad. She is a regular contributor to a variety of publications, including the Miami Herald and Miami New Times, and hosts a weekly radio show called Meet Them Mondays. She earned her Bachelor’s degree in Mass Communication and Journalism from Florida International University.

Cristina Nosti, the Director of Events and Marketing at Books & Books, speaks about the chaos and magic of working in a small business; the challenges of fulfilling a demanding role that requires energy and creativity while carving out time for personal projects; the proximity of death as one ages and its effect on sense of time, security and being; and more in this episode.In addition to her role at Books & Books, a locally-owned independent bookseller and celebrated community center spanning nine locations, Cristina is a board member of the CINTAS Foundation, which recognizes creative accomplishments and encourages the development of Cuban artists in architecture and design, literature, music composition and visual arts.

Jason Fitzroy Jeffers has made a few leaps of faith in his life, including quitting his job at an established newspaper without knowing what would come next; taking time to develop his music career and, inspired by a Reddit thread on tire machèt he found in the midst of a depression, making a short film without prior experience.As Jason shares these "leaps," a few threads emerge in our conversation: trusting yourself and what you love, even if the outcome may be unclear; fueling conversations about what the Caribbean is and how it is depicted in popular consciousness; challenging (resisting, even) what is presented on different digital media platforms in today's social and political climate; and questioning why people have trouble being vulnerable and intimate with one another.Jason is a writer, filmmaker, journalist and musician who hails from Barbados. Above all, he is a passionate storyteller focused on the Caribbean experience and diaspora.He produced and co-wrote, with Keisha Rae Witherspoon, the award-winning and internationally celebrated short film, Papa Machete. The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2014 and at the Sundance Film Festival in 2015 and has since been featured in a number of respected film festivals and platforms such as NPR and the Associated Press. He also produced Swimming in Your Skin Again and Dolfun, two short films featured at Sundance 2016.Jason is a founding member and director of Third Horizon, a media company, film festival and Miami-Based film collective of Caribbean artists, musicians and filmmakers.His most recent endeavor, Foggy Windows, is a “podcast and party decoding the mysteries of love through the history of sweet, sappy R&B.”

Carol Jazzar is a Miami-based artist who helped shape the city’s art scene as a curator, turning the two-car garage of her home in the quiet neighborhood of El Portal into a thriving exhibition space in 2007. A deeply personal, challenging event led Carol to shift her focus from the more public, established life of her art circles to her inner life and to reclaim her home as a personal sanctuary and studio, developing her own body of work which employs collage, writing, psychoanalysis and astrology.Carol shares the details of this event and in turn, shares her wisdom about self-acceptance vs external validation, being present, the ever-evolving self, spirituality, art as a necessary means of expression and a tool for self-examination and much more.

(Note: Due to technical difficulties, only the last half of the show was captured, though the Baiser ladies keep things real, insightful and fun until the end.)From frequenting pawn shops to make ends meet, stressing to the point of imagining one’s own early death and taking a chance on an out-of-budget PR agency — Erika Arguello and Maria Copello remind us that, despite the dread and anxiety that come with going after what you want, it’s important to have fun, to work with others to bring out our best ideas (and selves) and to approach things with a mix of spirituality, authenticity and humor.Erika and Maria founded Baiser Beauty in 2014 with a vision of living more conscious lives. Using the natural beauty around us to enhance the natural beauty within us, their products utilize organic, plant-based, aromatherapeutic-grade ingredients, old family recipes, and the spiritual, physical and healing principles of Mayan Medicine for a more holistic approach to skincare and cosmetics.Community-minded, they also conduct natural beauty workshops for the women of Lotus House among other non-profits and donate 10% of their sales to a number of organizations such as Miami Rescue Mission, Pridelines Community Center and the National Voices for Equality.Baiser Beauty has been featured in publications such as such as Nylon Magazine, Paper Magazine and Hello Giggles and are stocked at Urban Outfitters as well as internationally.

Melody Santiago Cummings has over 10 years of experience in arts administration, business development, community organizing, event planning and publishing under her belt. She is the Operations Manager for O, Miami, a non-profit organization dedicated to building literary arts & culture in Miami, Florida. O,Miami’s programming includes an annual month-long poetry festival, a publishing imprint and a poets-in-schools residency, among others that expand access to poetry. Melody also serves as Managing Director for Jai-Alai Books, O, Miami’s independent publishing arm.Melody walked us through O, Miami Festival 2017, when the organization's founder and director was hospitalized for most of the month. Rather than simply playing proxy, she found new perspectives to her position and a heightened sense of purpose and community. We also talked about being "busy," the importance of rolling with the punches and more.

Sara Rose Darling is the founder and curator of Rose Coloured Floral, a floral design studio based in Miami. Developing a keen eye with her background in Art History, Sara curates seasonal flora and foliage and paints wild, whimsical colors and compositions in her pieces. Sara almost single-handedly runs Rose Coloured while also dedicating time to her curatorial and programming positions with organizations such as the Museum of Art and Design at Miami Dade College, EXILE Books and local galleries.Over chocolate donuts and rosé, we delved into the baby steps that equal the giant leap of starting your own business, learning to own your role, authentically promoting one's self versus the sales pitch, time — personal, family/loved ones — amidst multiple jobs and your own venture, magic envelopes and setting intentions and more.

While others may be afraid of what lurks in the dark, multimedia artist Jen Clay chooses to dive into it. Informed by horror and science fiction stories, H.P. Lovecraft, hallucinations and supernatural sightings, Jen navigates themes of the unknown, otherness, the uncanny and the inhuman. She contrasts these themes with a sense of childhood friendliness and constructs encounters with the “dark” through claymation, interactive performance, costume, video and installation. Jen was included in the Girls’ Club Collection’s Off Site Performance Series, has shown at the SuperFine Art Fair during Art Basel Miami Beach and was voted “Best Emerging Artist” in 2016 by the New Times of Broward and Palm Beach. In this episode, we talked about Jen’s performance Nearing, questioning how clearly one’s ideas are communicated in art, seeking validation as an artist, the things that can limit one’s work, the challenges of saying no, how to embrace the things that scare us and much more.

Andria Morales and Rafael Vargas Bernard are artists-in-residence at the historic 777 Mall in Downtown Miami as part of Focus on Puerto Rico, an initiative by Clocktower Productions, Mana Contemporary and MECA International Art Fair. We spoke with Andria and Rafael at the end of their three-month residency which concluded in December, during Art Basel Miami Beach.Andria is a NY-based artist who works with a variety of media, taking a more humorous approach to personal and cultural narratives to explore different aspects of identity. Her sculptures focus on objects that express individuality and her work at 777 explores wearable and portable audio inspired by urban life.Rafael Vargas Bernard is a Puerto Rican-born artist who uses sound, programming, performance, video, painting and drawing to create work that explores functional and nonfunctional systems, such as power structures, as well as societal relationships to these infrastructures. His work at 777 is a response to Hurricane Maria and involves interactive pieces using readily accessible and found materials. Among many things, we discussed their experience at the residency, privacy, community, group dynamics, the unique generosity of their peers and what makes a good learning environment.

Michelle Weinberg is a Miami and NY-based artist who renders fantastical yet familiar environments filled with color, geometry, stylized perspective and pattern. We discussed how artists can be “uniquely marginalized,” being creative in one’s work and life, articulating one’s ideas and more.

Lilian Banderas and Steve Saiz are the brains behind Dale Zine, a creative platform for artists of all ages and imaginations. Established in 2009, Dale serves its community as an independent publisher and host of community art workshops and events related to zines, among other art forms. ⠀ ⠀ Dale Zine has published work by artists such as FriendsWithYou, Michelle Weinberg, Ahol Sniffs Glue and Matt Furie and is stocked in Miami, Tokyo, LA, New York and Beijing, along with being available online.⠀ Cuban pastelitos in-hand, we discussed a number of things such as not compromising your values as creatives/not having to be everything to everyone, recognizing that kids are artists, learning by doing and bettering your community through your passion.

Luisa Santos is the founder of Lulu's Nitrogen Ice Cream, which she established in Miami, FL in 2015 with a prime storefront location on Biscayne Boulevard. While Lulu’s proudly sources local ingredients and liquid nitrogen to create the freshest ice cream from scratch. At the heart of Luisa’s business is education, community and sustainability. In our eighth episode, Luisa candidly lays out the origins of Lulu's and her fascination with nitrogen ice cream, the value of naivety and "winging it," the nitty-gritty challenges of finances and the red tape of opening a business, building/maintaining company culture, (im)perfectionism and more. 

Founded in 2015 by Lina Chaparro and Carolina Montoya, LÜM is a multidisciplinary project focused on mindfulness, well being, understanding and self-empowerment. Through workshops and events incorporating yoga, meditation, oriental medicine, acupressure, crystals and more, Lina and Caro educate and guide others in balancing mind and body.  We talked about Lina and Caro's first major community event, the value of simply starting a project and of keeping an open mind when running your own business, the importance of breathing and much more.

AMLgMATD is the multidisciplinary studio and funhouse of artists/designers Natalie Zlamalova & Laz Ojalde. Wit, humor and nostalgia inform their practice, which ranges from furniture and painting to environments and sculptures. Their work has recently been shown at the Maker Faire Miami, International Contemporary Furniture Fair and UNTITLED Art Fair, Miami Beach. We talked about the challenges and rewards of creative partnerships and collaborations among a number of other subjects such as nostalgia, art vs design, key lime pie and more.

Daniel Clapp is a visual artist, DJ and electronic musician performing in numerous projects such as Nightly Closures, Das SaD and Chilean Minors. He was based in NY for several years, showing with Giacobetti Paul Gallery in Brooklyn before returning to Miami to continue his art and music-making practice and to work as preparator for the de la Cruz Collection. We covered failed ideas, being one's own obstacle, originality (or lack thereof), modular synths, psychedelic kung-fu movies, disco, painting and more.

Kate Torregrosa is the Colombian-born, Miami-based founder and designer behind The Velvet Party, an independent, bespoke festival and swimwear brand and online retail company. She is involved in every step of the process, designing, producing and marketing her made-to-order pieces.  Kate talked to us about brand loyalty via social media, her design process, Bernie Sanders swim suits, the financial challenges of starting her own business and much more. 

Karina Iglesias is the Co-founder & Managing Partner of NIU Kitchen, a Catalan style eatery with a flare for the surreal, Co-founder of Second Miami, a “tropical vintage” shop with distinctly Miami charm and Co-Founder of Arson, a josper-centric restaurant.  Managing all three businesses is no easy task. Karina talks openly (and irreverently) about how she balances her ventures, loving Billy Ocean more than Michael Jackson, freedom for her and her daughter and more.

Amanda Keeley, artist, curator, writer and founder of EXILE Books speaks candidly about shifting gears from New York to Miami, the spirit of collaboration, community building, balancing multiple creative roles and so much more in this episode of Kidnapped for Dinner. EXILE Books is a pop-up artist’s bookstore migrating to different venues around Miami and presenting a thematically curated selection of titles with public programming.

Jordan Magid is a social entrepreneur working at the intersection of arts, civic education & urban development. He’s also the founder/managing partner of Unconventional, a creative consultancy using art to elevate businesses’ brand cultural and social impact.  We dove into how he let his first venture go, how he didn't go to med school, how he realized the importance of company culture and more.