This spring Applied Mechanics partnered with Women’s Community Revitalisation Project (WCRP) and some of their community partners in order to work with young people in Point Breeze to make a piece of theater about their experiences of life and maintaining community in a rapidly gentrifying neighborhood. Due to closing of school districts and businesses in order to prevent the spread of the corona virus this project has been postponed until further notice.
Photo by Eboni Taggart
That being said, it does not stop us from celebrating the guest artists that we brought on to the project. Without further ado meet Nia Benjamin. Nia is Co-founder and Co-Artisitc Director of Ninth Planet, a live performance platform with womxn at the helm.
What brought you to the arts?
Nia: I am an only child with an active imagination with parents who worked full time and then some to support me. I spent a lot of my childhood entertaining myself with stories, doodles, dances and skits (and I still do when no one is watching). One day at the mall in my hometown, there was a magnet school fair. At that fair was a booth for Ulysses B. Kinsey Elementary School of the Arts. My Mom applied, I was accepted, and then I was in a rigorous arts elementary magnet school where I played violin, was in the drama troupe, art club, and a library assistant. That school served as my foundation, and I’ve been incredibly blessed to have attended art schools my entire life. I learned from mostly black teachers, and went to school with mostly black kids. My introduction to theatre was from a black woman named Cynthia Geiger, who loved to laugh, make us do push ups, and tell us stories about how performing was essential to the black experience and to black history. Going to art school absolutely changed every molecule in my being and I’m always eager to make that space for the young people in my community who aren’t given that same gift.
The arts has helped me to understand how to be with myself and with others, especially in a world that often makes me feel I don’t belong.
Where are you from?
Nia: I was born in Santurce, Puerto Rico, but I grew up in the town of Haverhill, Florida, west of the famous Palm Beaches and Poo Poo Drumpf’s Golf Course. My roots are in the city of Charlotte Amalie on the island St. Thomas, United States Virgin Islands. Both my mother and father were born and bred on that island, and most of my blood relatives still live there.
What do you like doing?
Nia: In no particular order: Listening to young people and saying yes to their impulses, thoughts, and needs. Doing the same thing for adults, especially those who aren’t frequently listened to and respected. Learning from my friends and loved ones, who challenge me everyday. Singing karaoke. Being gross! Walking by myself for long stretches and pretending that I’m in a music video. Looking at photos of myself when I was young and trying to hold that little one with so much love, adoration and tenderness. Being in the rehearsal (and all the other rooms!) room with my company, Ninth Planet. Thinking critically about pleasure and how to access and welcome as much of it into my life as possible…working on this actively!! Watching scary movies alone at night with some spicy Indian food! Going on museum tours by myself and visiting the Rare Books Department at the Free Library. Going to double features by myself! Complimenting my cat, Socks. Organizing and gathering people in spaces to make theatre and watch how brilliant each and every single human being is!
What are your guilty pleasures?
Nia: DISCO MUSIC. Tik Tok (no posts, just sending silly videos). Sad, black queer poetry. Horror Movies. Speaking in silly accents. Waxing poetic on how to be a better artist, friend, lover, human. Watching videos of people (particularly fashion models) falling. Giggling. Cooking for my friends. Daydreaming about a future when queer and trans* bipoc people can truly rest, have land returned, receive reparations and heal from the many layers of oppression being loaded upon us on the daily!
What do you like about teaching?
Nia: I think about “teaching” the way I think about theatre-making: how can we, together, create a temporary new world? A world where you can be 100% yourself, where you can bring the good parts of you and the bad parts of you, and the parts you’re still trying to figure out and lay them out in front of a group people that you’ll grow to love and trust and respect. And in this magic space, the rules of the outside world don’t have to apply…if you are quiet you can be loud, if you are “hard” you can be “soft,” and if you’re always right, you can also be wrong. And somehow in that between space, you can be whole.
How can we exist together with each individuals good parts and bad parts and approach challenges and questions? And how can we be silly and wondrous and still boundaried? So many people, young and old, aren’t really given the opportunity to be listened to. And also to listen. It’s amazing to see someone surprise themself, and discover a new facet of their being. And to be seen in all their wonderful complexity and not be made to feel less than. I was teased a lot for all the different selves and interests I hold in my body, so I try to affirm as much of the strangeness and magic of the people I teach.
I also love to disrupt the dynamic between “teacher” and “student,” I love to let them lead me and others in the room!
What do you like to shine a light on?
Nia: As Vashti DuBois of the Colored Girls Museum (one of my favorite places on the place!!!) says, I like to illuminate the ordinary extraordinary in black and brown folk. Primarily I do that by making art and facilitating workshops for black and brown folk.
What’s your favorite vacation?
Nia: I haven’t been on a vacation where I didn’t have to work in some capacity in so long that I don’t have a clear answer!! But, I do really want to visit my birthplace in Puerto Rico and my parent’s birthplace as an adult, and see and experience those place for myself. I also want to go to a theme park…take me on all the coasters and let’s scream together!
Would you rather be in the room with 500 tiny puppies or rollerskate in a rink filled with tapioca balls?
Nia: Tricky tricky tricky here, as both of these options fill me with an overwhelming joy…unfortunately, I’d have to go with Tapoica Balls n’ Roller-skates. The reasoning here is quite simple…I cannot roller-skate, so I’m bound to fall. I’m also quite clumsy. And I have a thing for textures, so I’m having a slight daydream…follow me here: You, very capable and skilled, see me—looking like a just-born deer—careening at full speed through a tapioca roller rink, leaving a stream of popped tapioca in my wake, then…upon reaching max speed, I slip…landing in the tapioca sludge, sliding slightly like a slug until inertia brings me to a gentle, goopy stop. I am covered head to toe in tapioca. I laugh. You laugh. I am sticky.
More about Ninth Planet:
Ninth Planet makes work that puts artists at the helm. To help support these artists they use their resources to provide open studio time for artists who have things in the works. We at Applied Mechanics think that pretty radical.