The Shelleys /  by Akira Ohiso

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In 1995, I recorded an DIY album with a band called The Shelleys. I lived on Elizabeth Street in a 4th floor walk-up on the border of Little Italy and Chinatown. We played gigs in NYC’s LES and were done before we got started. Dennis, the guitarist and lead vocals, and I had not spoken in 25 years until this past week when I saw the songs on Spotify. I reached out to him and he sent me the album. We were and still are big Fugazi fans. After we broke up, Dennis, owner of Redrocks in DC, told me that he sent the songs to Ian MacKaye of Fugazi/Minor Threat and founder of Dischord Records. Ian had enjoyed the songs and wanted to hear us live. It’s all timing.

Time capsule: Listen to The Shelleys, a 1990s band on Spotify.

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Telling Stories: on Culturally Responsive Artificial Intelligence /  by Akira Ohiso

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In 2018, the The Tech Policy Lab at the University of Washington convened a Global summit to surface the implications of artificial intelligence. Along with 2 artists, I was asked to illustrate Telling Stories: On Culturally Responsive Artificial Intelligence, a collection of short stories

“Deceptively simple in form, these original stories introduce and legitimate perspectives on AI spanning five continents. Individually and together, they open the reader to a deeper conversation about cultural responsiveness at a time of rapid, often unilateral technological change.”

Public Art Portable Works Purchase: Fresh Perspectives II /  by Akira Ohiso

Two of Akira’s digital prints were purchased by the City of Seattle for their portable art collection.

“The City of Seattle owns over 3,000 portable artworks in its Civic Art Collection and has been collecting for over 40 years. These artworks will enter the Seattle Public Utilities Portable Works Collection managed by the Office of Arts & Culture. They will be displayed throughout city galleries and offices.”

Red Lines, Digital Mixed-media, 2018

Red Lines, Digital Mixed-media, 2018

My Muslim Neighbor, Digital Collage, 2019

My Muslim Neighbor, Digital Collage, 2019

Frozen Tire Ruts /  by Akira Ohiso

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I didn’t venture far from the apartment.   Roads and sidewalks are icy, so you look for sure-footing on crunchy snow where dogs defectate.   I took the kids to the nearby playground at St. Alphonsus Church.  It’s a destination we frequent year-round.  To walk familiar routes over and over again may seem monotonous, but there is always the chance to find novelty if you are attuned to it.  Xavier de Maistre journeyed around his room feeling that staying put was far more convenient than the hassles of travel.  As Alain de Botton said in The Art of Travel, “The sole cause of a man's unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room.”

The kids enjoy walking in frozen tire ruts and seeing the water move underneath.  Their masterful ability to be present is what we lose as adults.  Adults search, spend money, attend retreats, become addictive and clingy in order to experience fleeting presence.

I am in my head a lot these days.  I seek action to avoid silence, opinions to comfort uncertainty.  Yet these are delusional tactics to avoid my 48-year old self.  To find nothing in the silence is terrifying to me.  Is there a difference between “nothing” and “nothingness?” The former may be about a deficit, the latter about abundance.