Exhibitions
UNPLANNED JOURNEY: PRE-COLLABORATION
CONVERGE / 1224 Martin St. January 6, 2018 - January 6, 2018
Jama Mohamed
Mary Jennings
CONVERGE is pleased to present Unplanned Journey: Pre-Collaboration, an event featuring recent work by Jama Mohamed and Mary Jennings. Jama Mohamed, a local filmmaker exploring the topic of disability, and Mary, Jennings, a local singer-songwriter, will present their current individual work on January 6th, from 6:00 to 9:00 pm, at CONVERGE, 1224 Martin Street. This event is a precursor to Unplanned Journey: A 5-Shot Shorts Installation, a collaborative film and music piece by Mohamed and Jennings that will be featured on February 3rd, from 6:00 to 9:00 pm at CONVERGE. Both events are held in conjunction with Arts & Music at Wedgewood-Houston and are free and open to the public.
For his first series of “Nashville 5-Shot Shorts”, which will be on display on the first floor of the building, local filmmaker Jama Mohamed collaborated with the Family Voices of Tennessee on a unique project empowering families and individuals affected by lifelong special healthcare needs, chronic illness and/or disabilities to tell their stories through video. The project was inspired by Mohamed’s own experiences as parent to a child with disabilities. Mohamed, a first generation Somali-American, visited participants in their homes and taught them the basics of creating video to assist them in depicting their own experiences with disability—simply using five short video shots. “Nashville 5-Shot Shorts” was a recipient of Thrive funding from the Metro Nashville Arts Commission last spring.
Jama Mohamed’s own short, “The Big Pull,” will also be screened. “The Big Pull” is the story of Alex Nicely, a man with cerebral palsy who set out to break a world record while helping others.
Concurrently, local singer-songwriter, Mary Jennings, will be performing her music live on the second floor of the building at CONVERGE. A Casio-sponsored artist, she was featured in an online advertising campaign for the company’s new line of keyboards in 2011 and her song “The Darkness” was placed in the Lionsgate motion picture “Devil Seed”. In 2014, her song “Move” was featured during a final dance on Lifetime’s TV show “Dance Moms.” Mary has organized a number of extensive tours as well, opening for artists such as Jeffrey Gaines, Mike Doughty, Teddy Geiger, Ryan Cabrera, and Rachel Yamagata, and she has appeared at several major festivals including CMJ and South by Southwest. She often treats fans to a unique stage set-up when performing on her own, prominently featuring a loop pedal that she uses to effortlessly layer rhythmic beats and beautiful background harmonies over her unmistakably unique piano playing and vocals.
CONVERGE is a curated community of creative thinkers who collaborate on interdisciplinary projects that have a positive social impact, initiated by the husband and wife team, architectural designer Eric Malo and artist and poet Alysha Irisari Malo. The group conceives and realizes project-based art and design, lifestyle, cultural, and community programming. Alysha Irisari Malo is the Project Manager and Facilitator of this CONVERGE project.
