On ritual and spectacle

I started writing this essay on Super Bowl Sunday, one of the biggest capitalist rituals of the year. On one level, the spectacle of the Super Bowl is used by the ideological superstructure of capitalism to shape the collective consciousness of the masses here in the U.S. On the layer beneath this materialist analysis, in the realm of spirit, the function of rituals like the Super Bowl is to put the masses under a trance (a suspended state of consciousness).

            What is the relationship between dialectical historical materialism and the central role Spirit plays in our lives as African people? The dynamic interplay between spirit and matter is in and of itself a dialectical relationship. As a consequence of centuries of violent imperial rule, European nations had been cut off from their pre-Christian ancestral medicine. I would argue that this disconnection from spirit has been at the core of European philosophical thought for centuries.

Industrial economies devoid of spiritual grounding are only able to consider life on the physical plane of existence. This context produced hard sciences that deal primarily with physical, material phenomena. Dialectical historical materialism (Marxism), as a scientific methodology, deals with life in tangible, observable terms. In part this comes out of Marx and Engels’ move away from the institution of the church, which was the spiritual technology of colonialism.

            It is important to remember that it was not dialectical or historical materialism that guided the revolution that set Haiti free, Vodun did that. And it is a rejection of all things African in Latin America that has isolated Haiti in the region, and perhaps globally. Since asserting independent nationhood, our people in Haiti have only sought recognition as equal partners in trade and commerce. This is what it means to be a proud sovereign people. Haitian scholar Jemima Pierre reminds us that European governments harbor a bitter, vindictive grudge against Haiti going back to 1804, and that they will stop at nothing to re-take the island as a colonial possession. The imperialists are driven to re-capture what they could not control.

            As i write this, another island in the Caribbean is in the crosshairs of imperialism. I am speaking, of course, about Cuba. In 2004, on my first trip to Cuba, i was fortunate enough to be there when Fidel was still alive. I got to see him lecture live, in action on Cuban state tv. To me watching a meeting of the Assembly of People’s Power felt a lot like observing a class in a large lecture hall. This was my introduction to socialism as a science, and it looked and felt like participatory democracy.  

            The Cuban Revolution as an experiment in scientific socialism has not lost its African-ness. On that first trip, our group visited the Lucumi Museum. It’s across the street from the Cuban capitol building. Lucumi is part of Cuban culture. Because of this, we can look to Cuba as a revolutionary example that proudly affirms African spiritual technology. When Cuban fighters came to assist Angola and other African territories in liberating our people from colonial apartheid regimes, that was an expression of African spiritual power, as well as good military strategy.

            The elders say, “Pray and move your feet.” When we imagine how we are going to meet all of our basic needs in the future, scientific socialism offers us a practical methodological approach that might just be our best alternative to the extractive, exploitative system of imperialism now in the throes of its own demise. As Pan-Africanists, imagine a world in which Haiti, Cuba, and a liberated Benin could just simply exist without any outside interference from an imperial power. How might trade and cultural exchange between these nations look without the impediments imposed on them by the colonizers?

            The Blockade imposed by the U.S. on Cuba is an imposition saddled on the Cuban Revolution. We know the U.S. aims to wipe out any semblance of the Cuban Revolution because of the threat socialism poses to the U.S. Monroe Doctrine. They fear the very idea of others’ autonomy. The U.S. occupation of Haiti is an imposition to keep the people down. The fascist Confederates in the white people’s house do not want Haitian immigrants to be able to live inside the U.S.  because they would rather Haitians be re-enslaved by U.S. corporations on the island of Haiti.

            The colonizers want slavery. They want it here on U.S. soil, and on Cuba, and on Haiti, and everywhere else. For the small cartel of capitalist gangsters, slavery is the only economic project that have in mind for Planet Earth. In their greedy eyes, every inch of this planet, and all life on it are commodities to be consumed. Perhaps this is what DuBois meant when he wrote in The World and Africa that when the trade of human beings as commodities began, it set humanity on a decline, that this degraded all of humanity.

            At this time, we are witnessing the psychosis at the core of global capital. The moral rot, the degeneracy, is on full display with the release of the Epstein files. The ruling class elites have been exposed for what they truly are: a cabal that engages in group ritual abuse and blood sacrifice of children to their deity. They have been using these rituals as a spiritual technology to maintain their power. To this group of deranged criminals, domination and control equate to power. This death cult at the center of global imperialism only cares about gratifying their base urges to consume more and more… They must be stopped.

            Meanwhile Vodun Days in Benin has been in the spotlight thanks to the ‘iShowSpeed’ Africa tour. Personally, i loved seeing it! Content creator Speed purposefully bridged the information gap by bringing the African diaspora along with him in Africa. He dispelled myths about the Motherland, and this is a good thing. Meanwhile behind the scenes, Benin is being used as a staging ground for imperialism to launch counter-insurgency in the Sahel. In this context the iShowSpeed tour becomes a sideshow that distracts us from developments happening on the ground in West Africa.

            When we watch the film Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat,  it shows us how tactics of misdirection have long been used as a part of the ‘soft power’/hybrid warfare playbook. Our culture has been used as cover while neocolonial puppet regimes (compradors) collaborating with the U.S. State Department wage war on us. In this way we may not even realize that our own culture is being used against us. The film is instructive in this moment of excitement and celebration.

While we love to see Speed sharing the power and beauty of Vodun, that same power that set Haiti free, the spectacle that iShowSpeed creates also provides a convenient cover for covert operations in the region. When terrorist groups funded and armed by France and the U.S. blew up part of the airport in Niamey, Niger, the terrorists were traced back to the border with Benin. Evidence suggests the governments of Benin and Côte d’Ivoire are collaborating in a covert war on the Alliance of Sahel States (AES). 

            No one is suggesting that Speed knew anything about this. It’s just convenient, that’s all. Speed is just doing his thing, exploring the world, using his platform to inform and educate his audience. And it looked like he was having fun! It’s all fun and games until you stand up to imperialism as the AES has so bravely done.

When a nation stands up to assert their sovereignty as Cuba did in 1959, just as Haiti had done before in 1804, that is when Wall Street will send in their goons. The Pentagon has been allocated unlimited resources in order to spread terror and destruction around the globe. On one layer, in the materialist view, the Pentagon is a military command center. On the layer of spirit, we can view the Pentagon as an instrument of spiritual warfare. The architecture of the State under monopoly capitalism serve very specific functions.    

            When Patrice Lumumba was sworn into leadership, the people of Congo were ready to throw off the shackles of colonialism. When the Belgians came for the Independence ceremony Lumumba told them all about their crimes to their faces. The U.S. State Department financed a jazz concert in the Congo.

It was an elaborate ruse to kidnap and assassinate Patrice Lumumba. Louis Armstrong and them had no idea they were being used by the CIA to provide cover for this plot to snuff out liberation in the Congo. The bands went to play because that is what musicians do, and who can afford to turn down a paying gig?

So, our cultural workers and content creators get put in these compromising positions where they are presented with seemingly great opportunities to share their gifts and talents on a world stage. On the surface it appears simply to be a cultural exposition, but as Jemima Pierre reminds us, imperialism never stops. The imperialists are constantly plotting and scheming. Just as they seek to re-establish slavery on the island of Haiti, and a mafia paradise on Cuba, they also have designs on how they might sabotage what the Alliance of Sahel States is building in Africa.      

There is Hope

We can work to change the conditions of our lives. We can undo the damage that life under capitalism has done to our hearts, to our minds, to our relationships with one another, and to the communities in which we live. If today feels too hard to deal with, then let’s create a better tomorrow. There is hope. A better tomorrow is within our reach.

Buddhism & Marxism

This is a fascinating podcast conversation between the hosts of Upstream and Rev Left Radio. Check it out here

Suggested Reading+

Two books that i am excited to suggest to you are What It Takes To Heal by Prentiss Hemphill and Break The Cycle by Dr. Mariel Buqué

in the streets

On Saturday June 8 i joined a direct action at the White House in Washington D.C. We people of conscience here in the U.S. are calling for an end to the U.S.-supported genocide of the Palestinian people! To send a message to the Biden Administration, we surrounded the White House with this giant red line. Even if the mounting war crimes committed by Israel using U.S. made weapons have yet to cross Biden’s “red line”, our message is clear: We Are The Red Line!

Here’s a photo i took at the action

the free black women’s library

This season i would like to uplift the work of Ola Akinmowo of The Free Black Women’s Library in Brooklyn. In 2025 they will celebrate 10 years of being in the community! Check out this feature in the Met museum news.

Client Testimonial

“I've been working with paul for several years, and the strides I've made personally and creatively in that time have been truly life-changing thanks to his endless support and encouragement. Because of our sessions, I am able to set better boundaries for myself, have more confidence in pursuing my artistic goals and passions, and self-regulate on days when I'm overwhelmed. paul is a warm, compassionate, curious, and attentive listener who offers a truly safe and collaborative practice. I am grateful for our time together and for the personalized resources he provides for further reflection outside our sessions.” -Anonymous

The Self Atelier

*This manifesto was written in 2013.

Historically the atelier (a French word meaning “workshop”) has been a model for artists to teach other artists-in-training. As an artist and creative arts therapist, i’m interested in how the atelier model may be applied to the work of therapy. In many ways, the field of Art Therapy is behind the curve of Postmodern thought.

How has Art Therapy as a profession kept up with postmodern notions of self? Where is the conceptual framework for the way therapist and client work together? This essay seeks to posit that an atelier model, or “self-atelier”, a kind of “workshop of the self”, is that conceptual framework needed to guide the work of client and therapist. The mission of the self-atelier is to cultivate a re-envisioning of the self by using media to drive forward a process of change.

From the moment the client enters the self-atelier, they get the sense that this is a place to do real work. We are to emphasize that there is work to be done unearthing the self, reimagining the self in relation to the environment, and drawing on past experiences for themes to explore. The role of the therapist is to introduce new conceptual vocabulary to expand the language of the client.

This is done in much the same way a teaching artist working with students introduces the students to a new medium as well as new concepts of self to explore, but ultimately it is the student’s own personal motivations that will drive the work. Once given the freedom to explore one’s relationship to a theme, there is a great potential for growth, expansion, and eventually for change to occur- even more so when the theme originates from one’s own life experience.

Exploration is key. Only a handful of people are motivated to make art in any context if given the chance (let alone in the context of “therapy”). This is a result of the suppression of creative genius at an early age. A lot of adults will comment that they are simply “not creative”. So the conditions of the workshop/studio space must be inviting and inspiring for those willing to plunge into self-exploration.

The self-atelier as a space needs to be constantly stocked with fresh ideas and it must remain committed to maintaining a culture of free thought by challenging old habits and ideas. The workspace must be filled with things that not only inspire, but also inform, because the self-atelier is a place for the serious work of improving the self, for negotiating values, and perhaps for feeling some sense of spiritual union with a greater Creative Intelligence.

The ethos of the self-atelier is to push yourself and to take risks, but with the support of a therapist to guide your work and to push you as well. The self-atelier should be an incubator for ideas about the type of lives we want to lead. It is a workshop for doing the hardest work of all: working on oneself.

Therapy should be a dialogue fueled by inquiry and motivated by a problem that needs resolving. Inherently, the artist studio is a place for problem solving through the cyclical process of fashioning/shaping and inquiry. In order to bridge the gap between Art and Therapy, the methods of a traditional atelier can be repurposed for use in the therapeutic partnership.

The atelier method was developed to train the young artist’s eye. It is based on three main techniques: 1) Sight Size, 2) Comparative Measurement, and 3) Illusion. Taking each of these terms at face value, we can give each a new definition that suits the purposes of therapy work.

‘Sight size’ here might refer to the “size” of the problem we are presented with. The artistic principle of Emphasis applies here, as in ‘what might the client be emphasizing through their view of their world?’ Size, of course, is relative to your distance from an object.

And since proximity determines size, the size of the problem faced in the work is therefore a question of perspective. Time and physical distance away from a problem not withstanding, how might approaching the problem from a different vantage point change things? The workshop space attempts to offer this.

We are constantly comparing ourselves to other people. ‘Comparative Measurement’ within the context of the self-atelier deals with how we see ourselves in relation to others based on our own set of personal goals and values. What values are we measuring ourselves against and where do these measurements come from?

In design principle terms, here we are talking about scale and proportion. The scale of the self in proportion to environment. In terms of designing and constructing a better environment for the self, what factors are at play in comparative analyses?

Lastly ‘Illusion’, in and of itself, is a complex phenomenon. Just as artists in an atelier learn to create a visual illusion within a work of art for an audience, we also constantly construct illusions for ourselves and for others. What is the relationship between an illusion generated in the environment and the individual, and vice versa?

The aim of the self-atelier is to examine the role of false beliefs in the construction of the self and in the construction of the reality in which the self inhabits. Many architecture firms concerned with constructing space carry the moniker atelier. The self-atelier is concerned with the construction of our inner world. And just as a flat drawing can give the illusion of depth, so can our minds give form to what’s not really there.

We do not wish to overemphasize the individual here, as no person can be extracted from the contexts of family, culture, geographical region, or sociopolitical climate, all of which play a continuous role in shaping who we are. Above we noted the concepts of Sight Size, Comparative Measurement, and Illusion as they relate to an examination of the self. These are merely techniques used for enacting themes relevant to the work.

In terms of Art Therapy, the themes that the client brings into the partnership are the raw materials for creating the work, just as much as the clay or paint. We use the techniques to turn the “material” (the problem) that is brought into the therapeutic partnership into the work created by the client. Art Therapy, in essence, is about this, not the product.

In the older ateliers, artists-in-training would sit around looking at a nude. The difference with the self-atelier is that clients in the self-atelier look at themselves. And they are looking at themselves naked, without all the things we cover ourselves in.

Since we are using various media, we must ask ourselves: How many materials can serve as a metaphor for the self (body, mind, and spirit)? How many artistic processes serve as an analogy for the process of constructing our inner world? The answer is that the number of materials and processes are as vast as the number of personal experiences happening right now. They are as varied as the stories that shape us, making the possibilities endless, as we are all just simply works in progress..

Client Testimonial

“I've been working with paul for over two years now and the progress I've made in that time has been tremendous. He helped give me the tools and confidence to get myself through a really rough period of my life last year and I feel forever grateful for having him as my therapist. Paul is patient, compassionate and a great listener and has an endless amount of creative tools always ready to go to help you overcome whatever you're processing and going through. As an artist myself, I feel deeply understood and supported in my sessions.” -Anonymous

Client TEstimonial

“I’ve been practicing with paul since the summer of 2020 and quite honestly cannot believe where I am today. From our very first session I felt safe. I was very guarded, emotional and a bit closed off when we started, but with his creativity I was able to find my way. From sound bowls, meditation and body scans to art practices and podcast recommendations, I’ve grown tremendously. Paul has equipped me with the tools to truly explore my emotions and better express myself to my loved ones. I’m so thankful to not only have him as my therapist, but to also now trust myself enough to know that even between sessions, I’ll always have the tools we’ve worked on together. “ -Anonymous