 See what's new on the Burlington Wall. Good morning to my viewers. This is Melinda Moulton, and I am the host of On the Waterfront. And my guest today is John Kalaki, who is a dear friend. It has been a dear friend for a long time. And let me tell you who John Kalaki is, if none of you know, and I'm sure most of you know. John Kalaki is a dancer, an artistic director, an activist, a physically diverse human, a raindrop fan and driver, a legislator, an artist and art administrator, a collaborator, a changemaker, out-of-the-box creator, gay married man, chair groupie, visionary, and my buddy. I think that pretty well sums it up, doesn't it, John? Well, thank you. My favorite thing is that we're buddies. And you know, it's nice to do this virtually, but I sure wish we were in the same room. So you are one of the most tactile people. And every time I would see you, I just love hugging you. So I'm just sorry that I can't hug you right now. I know, and I love touching you, too. But one of the things that I've been loving touching is this book that you've written. John Kalaki has finished an extraordinary book called Because Art. And it's commentary, critique, and conversation. And this is what we're going to talk about today is your book. And the feeling of this book is so tactile. You want to talk about it just feels good. It's almost like it's a skin on this book. So anyway. So John, explain to my viewers, why did you write this book? What inspired you to write this book? Well, I come from an Irish Catholic family, and there's five kids. And I'm a third child, first boy. And the youngest brother, Bill, is the one who sort of keeps family histories. And about a year or so ago, he said to me, oh, you know, once daddy gave me a cassette tape. And I had never heard of this. And I said, what's a cassette tape? And he said, well, if any of my kids ever interested in my life, I just put some thoughts down. And I thought that was a really good thing. So I began to think about, OK, well, what's my legacy for my family or my friends? And I've been a writer now since the early 90s. I've been doing lots of different kinds of writing, artistic writing, commentaries, political essays. And I just started looking over my writings of the past. Since 1993, I guess it is, it's the earliest piece. And some of the pieces suddenly made sense to tell the arc of a story that was some of it was first person narrative. But other parts of it is that there's a whole section where I review artists, but it's outsider artists. It's radical artists. It's artists who died from AIDS. And by telling their stories, I found I was able to tell my own story as well. So the book has three sections. The first section are these commentaries, the commencement addresses, me going off to the Himalayan mountains, to the very same monastery, that your husband, Rick Moulton, went to. The room tech monastery in Sakeem, of all places. It's just astounding. I was there in the 70s. And so there's part of that, me being confronted with Auschwitz. But really me living through the culture wars of the 90s, to some of the artists like David Warnanovic and Karen Finley-Ron Athe that I had presented, living through the AIDS pandemic. And both my own experiences there and artists that I write about in the book, I felt was really important because Peter Hujar, Keith Herring, Arnie Zane, all these people are dead. And the next generation don't know what happened with AIDS. And I felt like it was important to tell their stories. Some of them became famous artists. Some of them were, but they were so important in their day. So that's part of it. The third section where I interviewed people like Tony Kushner, which was such a trip, but he talked about Israel today, and this was in 2004 when he was talking. He had just taken a trip to Israel or our own Alison Bechtel. And it's just artists I really admire. I get to have these public conversations with them. And it's all about resiliency. It's all about beginning again, grappling with the artistic practice. So as I pieced it together, I thought, well, this actually is my cassette tape for the world. And so I was so grateful for my brother to give me that kind of idea that these things matter somehow. They do matter. Your book matters. You matter. So we're gonna step back a little bit in time. And I want you to share with my viewers a little bit about your childhood and how you grew up. Could you share a little bit about your childhood and your relationship with your father and with our viewers? Sure. Thank you. Some of this is in the book, but Irish Catholic working class, my father and my grandfathers all worked at the Chicago Stockyards. And in Chicago in their lives, that was the entry level jobs and the Irish got them. And so every morning, four o'clock in the morning, my father would get up and go to the yards and work. And then he'd come home at three and we had to be quiet. But my father was also an angry man and he had demons with alcohol. And I was the third child, as I had mentioned, but the first son. And I was a little effeminate sissy and it was really complicated for my father to deal with me. It's not what he imagined his first son would be. And so we had a very contentious relationship, especially when alcohol and with kind of triggers anger. And so we had a very hard relationship for many years. And I sort of distanced myself from him, but at the end of his life, end of his life, my dad had cancer and my sister Jean said to me, you know, I think you should go back and talk to dad. Cause you can do it in person or you can do it at the wake. And so, and I write about this in the book where I did go home and, you know, he greeted me at his door and he said, well, why come? And I said, well, I hear you're dying and I thought it'd be good for us to sit and talk. And, oh, what a healing it was. And you talk about that beautifully in your book, but I wanted my viewers to understand that. And this book is so tender about your past. And it takes you from that into pursuing your dance career. You became a dancer. I did, I went to school, I went, I was my school class went to, you know, a performance of the Alvin Ailey Company in Chicago. And I think my eight year old self came home at dinner that night and said, guess what, everybody? I'm gonna be a modern dancer. You know, and my parents were like, what's a modern dancer? But I did become a dancer. And it was because of that school trip, the Alvin Ailey. And I was very lucky at the age of 20, I moved to New York. And by that point, I was a really good dancer in Chicago, moved to New York, and I was a mediocre dancer on the world class stage. But I had a performing career, which, you know, for about a decade, which was very great. I danced in New York and Winnipeg on tour. It also was a moment where things were radically changing in the art world because this was 1973. Stonewall was 1969. So everything was politicized. Modernism was being exploded. Postmodernism was happening. Punk was happening. York was falling apart. And the possibilities were endless. And so part of this book starts talking about when I went to New York and this whole world changed. And I was able to go from classical ballet studio into Meredith Monk's loft and sing and roll around on the floor and find an artistic way forward. And that's when you met a lot of these folks. For my viewers out there, I'm talking with John Glackin, who has written this incredible book called Because Art. And we're talking about his life and his book. So I want to talk a little bit about your illness and how that was a turning point for you. And you can also go describe it in the book. But for our viewers, that was really an inflection point for you and your life. And I'd like you to share with that and share with us how you learned to walk again because there was a period in time where you could not walk. Well, it was 25 years ago that they found a tumor. The doctors found a tumor inside my spinal cord. It was way up high at C2 up here. And so it was blocking 60% of the cord. So they said, well, we can't really do a biopsy because it's in the cord to find out. But so we really have to take this tumor out even if it's benign. So they said I'd be in the hospital three or four days with a sore neck for a month. I woke up quadriplegic, paralyzed from the neck down. And after I stopped dancing, I'd been a marathon runner. So I was pretty physically fit. And the night before surgery, I ran five miles, thinking, okay, great. I'm a little nervous, but this will be okay. And to lie in that bed and not be able to move anything was just mind boggling to me. And it was a very chaotic time. My husband, we had been together just almost a year at that point and he stayed right next to me and everybody'd sleep on the floor. Every morning I'd wake up to his eyes looking at me, making sure I was okay. And so I was in a rehab hospital for six weeks. And by that point, I was able to, the fingers in my right hand returned. And I remember the first time I realized I could switch my finger and some friends had come over and I said, okay, I have something to show you. And Larry goes, okay, where do we look, John? Because he wasn't sure my toe or what. And I just, I mean, I'm raising my hand now for the camera, but it was just on the bed. I said, look at my right hand. And I just wanted to wave, you know. And so it went from there to the right, you know, took weeks at the right side uncurled. And then I was sent home in a wheelchair, but when I was in therapy, I said, you know, I don't have any sensation in my legs, even today, 25 years later. But back then that was the problem that I'd lost sensation and location in my legs from the surgery. So I said, bring the mirror over. I think I can learn to stand up visually. And we're like, what? And I said, no, I was a dancer and we learned in the mirror. So that's what happened, Melinda. And this is in the book, the chapter called spinal journey where I stood in front of the mirror. I had braces on both legs and I said, okay, this is now what it means to stand up. And then after that, they put the parallel bars and they hooked me in my, and then I would try to move my feet. And so, you know, even like when you and I are walking down the street, I'll trip every once in a while because if I don't see where my feet are, my brain doesn't know where they are and I don't have any relation to the ground. So I still walk visually. And, you know, I'm so grateful that I've been a dancer because I really don't think I would be able to walk unless I could do it visually. Well, what a credible determination. So I wanna talk to my viewers to let them know. I'm talking to John Claggy who's written this book because our new three sections, commentary, critiquing conversation. And the first section is really a lot about your life but I wanna move into the critique section where basically there are discussions that you've had and identifying folks in your life and a lot of it has to do with the AIDS epidemic of which you live through. And I was hoping, John, that maybe you could read a section of your book called Unforgiven Fire on page 156 for my viewers and do a reading of that. And then we'll talk a little bit about that on the other side. You can do that. Sure. Yeah, yeah. Thank you. I really felt the need as I was at the Walker Arts Center in the late 80s and early 90s. And so many of my friends were dying and there was such chaos and there were such malfeasance from the government about people with AIDS and there was such hysteria about the body and the body fluids and stuff that I really felt I had to call out their names to hold on to them. And so this excerpt is from a voice over a film I made in 1993 and it's a combination of some of my friends and it's called Unforgiven Fire. Late night phone calls still frighten me. Years ago, my neighbor Charlie would call in the middle of the night screaming through his dementia for help, begging us to get him out of the hospital away from his real and imagined demons. I wouldn't answer the phone. I could only listen to his voice coming through the answering machine, silent and paralyzed with fear. I thought there was nothing I could do. I never did visit him in that hospital. I was too ashamed and he never came home again. I remember holding Peter trying to warm his shivering body, hoping that somehow I could heal him even for a short while so he could sleep. Both of us were drenched in his night sweats. He kept apologizing as he cried. I wept too, but my tears were filled with rage. Earlier that day, we had spent hours waiting in lines, filling out forms that enabled him to get medications. He had no health insurance and each stop demanded that he be present to sign the proper forms. So he's had exhausts that consumed by his fevers while I held his place in line. Once later, I dreamt and called only to speak to his dad. Peter had died that morning in Michael's arms as his mama urged him to go on. I called my friend Lee at home to see how he was feeling. I just returned from an extended business trip and wanted to re-establish contact. His sister answered the phone, thank me for calling and asked if I wanted to share something with those gathered in the apartment for his memorial service. Selfishly, I felt cheated. I wouldn't have any private closure with him. Weeks afterward, I called his disconnected number hoping we could talk one last time. Once later, I called his phone number again explaining to the newly connected household how special Lee had been. When the call came ending Kevin's death watch, I was relieved. Three weeks prior, the doctors had stopped his feeding up the morphine and said he would go in 48 hours. But they didn't know the Kevin I did. We were lovers a decade ago. We trained together, made love and dream together. Upon hearing the news, I thought at least I wouldn't have to call the hospital anymore. In his last month with the morphine obliterating all feeling, I would call and be continually told his condition was satisfactory. Satisfactory. Satisfactory. Satisfactory. Most recently, I cried with my friend Margie over the death of her brother Christopher. Margie told me of crawling into Christopher's death bed to hold him. As the spirit began to leave, instead of releasing, his body contracted as only a dancer could and tightly embraced her. She held on knowing that he was going, leaving her the unfinished legacies of all those prematurely lost. It chosen to die peacefully with great clarity, letting Margie know that his work was now done, but hers and ours only begun. They're all gone now, 96 of my angels. For too many of them, I didn't get to say goodbye. I still need to somehow resow the forlorn reality of their death. The impact of the grief and mourning of each new loss remains as intense as the first. Oftentimes, late at night, it's hard for me to breathe as I cry for all the devastation among us, heroes, all of them. So needlessly lost, I am truly blessed to have been touched by them all. To have been loved by angels, for all of us that have gone before, and for those that remain, they either be passionate, unforgiven fire. So beautiful, John. Thank you so much. Thank you. So as we move on through your book, that was beautiful. Thank you, John. It's hard to get through. The last section of your book is called Conversation. And those are individuals that you sought to have conversations with in basically an interview style, from Trisha Brown, to Allison Bechdel, to Bill Jones, Meredith Monk. Talk a little bit about that section and how your connection with these people and how you chose these people and what it meant to you to have the opportunity to interview them and know them probably intimately. Well, thank you. And Jan is seeing so many people friends. I think, let me talk a little bit about Trisha Brown, because in the early 80s, I was Trisha Brown's manager, her dance company manager, but that sounds grander than it was because I worked in the air shaft between the loft and the living space. And I was the only person in the office. That's what modern dance was at that time. And I had a great three years with her and she premiered a piece called Set and Reset with Rauschenberg and Laurie Anderson's music. And it became, you never know this, but it became a masterwork. It became a game changer. And suddenly we opened up Europe and I was traveling with her and it was a very exciting time. And my career went on, her career went on and it was in 2009, I got a call from her office and they said, she's gonna be at Dartmouth. Would you mind coming out and doing a public conversation with her about Rauschenberg? Because I knew Bob as well. And so I said, sure, but it seems odd. I haven't worked with her in such a long time. And her manager said, well, it's really not public yet, but Tricia is having a really difficult time with memory. And she's frightened now to speak in public. And she just said, ask John to come because if I start getting lost in the stories, he'll remember the stories. And so we did this and it really was the whole talk is about collaborating with Rauschenberg and who was this extraordinary human being. They pushed each other, but they did things, they always challenged each other, but they led each other to do their same thing like this set and reset. It was 18 minutes long, right? And so Tricia never saw the set till we'd loaded it in the theater because she knew whatever Bob was gonna do was gonna be okay. And then Laurie Anderson was making music and I remember one time we were in a meeting with Bob and Tricia and she was like, okay, do you want the version with these words or without the words? And Tricia said, I don't care. Just give me 18 minutes, which do you want, Lord? But so they challenged each other, supporting each other, came up with crazy ideas. Some were terrible ideas, some were good. They kept pushing each other. And Tricia and Bob had this lifelong relationship. So it's a great interview about friendship and about collaboration and about artistic process. What was amazing, Melinda, about this is six months later, Mills College was doing something in an exhibition of Tricia's work and they again said, would I come and talk with Tricia? And the veil was gone. We did a talk and it was her last public talk. She could no longer really remember and then the last years of her life, she had no memory. And so it was just a profound gift for me to kind of talk with her and, you know, say, well, oh, I think that was Tom Judd. I don't think Bob did that to me. Oh, you're right. That was Don's piece. Let's go back talking about Bob. And to hold that kind of artistry, you know, and to share it was such a gift for me. And there's so many lessons for me in my life about resiliency with all of these interviews that I really felt like it's their voice, but as you know, I did a concert documenting with Janicean and there's an interview with Janicean about being 15 years old and confused on the road with the hit songs Society's Child and how you struggle and what you do. And then all of these artists, how do you make work? How do you make new work? How do you fail? How do you continue your practice? How are you political? And I think you'll see that many of these artists, Tricia's not, but many of them are queer. Many of them are political, Bill T. Jones and other folks. And that's important to me because I think artists create a safe place for society to have really complicated issues happening. And also artists, these artists were change agents, aesthetically and in society. And so I really felt like I honor them. They were my role models and I hope that some of the work I've been able to do as an artist, as an arts administrator and not as a politician, is modeled on their kind of activism. What a testimony to their lives and to your own. And as we come to the end, John Kalaki, I want you to just end with a quick explanation because you talk about the state of Kensho in your book when you were studying in the Himalayans at the monastery. And so as we end this interview, can you share with our viewers? Because I'm feeling, I feel like I'm in that state listening to you and certainly I felt that way after reading your book. Talk to us a little bit about that as we come to the end of this interview. Well, I had been sitting with a Zen teacher in New York, Ishimiro Hiroshi. But when I got there, Anthony Tudor had actually brought him over for the First Zen Institute. But that didn't work out. And so he had four students and he was an elderly man. And so I wanted to be one of his students and he said, well, you can't, you can come sit but I'm not gonna teach you and you're not my student. But if you wanna come sit on Saturday and Sundays, you can, Friday and Saturdays. And then once a month we would sit for eight hours. And so it was fascinating for me to have a relationship with a teacher who wasn't my teacher, who I wanted desperately to be my teacher, right? And so I would sit there in my Zen stuff, kind of, you know, trying to do the breath thing and be present and be mindful. And one time it was so painful. And I just, so I looked up and I looked over at him. And in my mind, oh no wonder, he's asleep. I never looked, I said, that old guy's asleep. That's how he can do this. And as I was looking over, thinking that, that raises his eyes and just stares at me. Then he goes back and does meditation. So what it did was I got into the Tibetans because they were friendlier and they would teach me. And so then I went off to the Himalayan mountains for to be with the Karmapa at the room tech monastery that your husband was at. On my way back, I went to San Francisco and this is in the book. And because I didn't know what I was gonna do, I thought, well, Roshi's in New York. I'm not gonna, I'm not a student. I have to figure out my new life. Harvey Milk was assassinated. Jonestown happened. I get a call from New York saying Roshi, the Japanese teacher from New York, had been in Japan and he's coming to San Francisco. And he wanted to see me. I thought, oh, I'm gonna be his student. This is so great. This is like his dream, right? Well, there was a reception firm that night. And apparently when he got to the airport, he didn't feel well. And so they took him right to the hospital and he died. I didn't get to greet him. So suddenly I had to make with his students, I had to make funeral arrangements. And so I called Japan and got someone who could speak a little English. And what I understood, because I don't speak Japanese, is that when the Roshi left, the dog cried. And so they went into his room. Until they played out his cremation robes. And what I remember, and when in the book itself, the part of Kensho that you talk about is something he would say sometimes to his students. Not to me, but I would hear him say to his students. And they would ask what Kensho was. And I just wanna make sure I get in the part of the book here. So Kensho is Kensho. And Kensho is Kensho is exactly, but it's like, here we go. A state of being, it's a state of being. Yes, and he talked about it's like, Kensho is a state of seeing into your own being, your insight into your own nature. And, but when he was pushed, they were like, Roshi, what is Kensho? And he would just say, Kensho is just Kensho is his being. And so I feel so blessed that I was able to experience that man. Also go to the Himalayan mounds and experience miracles because they taught me so much about the possibilities and also about just being true to ourselves. Just being authentic, whatever that means. And to find your voice and that's all we can ever be. It's just Kensho, nothing more. Just Kensho. Well, in this moment, which is this moment, is as it should be. And all things are, they are because that's the moment that we're living in. I honor you on so many levels. To my viewers, speaking with John Glacky, the author of Because Art, this book is available at Phoenix Books. Any other places, John, where this can be, your book can be found? Is it on the Amazon yet or? Oh, it is on Amazon and Target. But I love Phoenix Books and an independent bookstore, but you can go to your own bookstore, wherever it is, and they can order it for you as well. As well, I want to mention that you will be at the Pride Center on September 23rd, where you will be reading. A book launch. Yes. On the 23rd of September at the Pride Center. And on the 27th of September, you will be reading from your book with Mark Redman at the South Burlington Library, correct? My buddy, Mark, and he's an extraordinary man and he has a new book called It's a Memoir. And the first chapter in my book is called To Serve. And so I think both books are about a vocation. And vocation is vocari, which means call. So we are called to our vocation. And I think Mark's has certainly been about working with youth and mine has been about working with artists and social change. Well, thank you to both of you for meeting your measure in your life to serve others in your selflessness. I also would like to send my viewers to your website if they want to know more about your book. It's JohnKalaki.com. It's my political website. You'll get my blog in there too. But there's also a section dedicated to the book. But you know, Melinda, I don't want to end this without saying how extremely grateful I am to you, to call you friend, you inspire me. Your fierceness and righteousness is so important. And continually you've spoken and written about things in a very profound way for me. You've made me see things differently. And so I just, you know, I'm grateful to you, Melinda Moulton. So thank you. Well, I'm very grateful to you. I cherish you on so many levels. So thank you for your time. I want you to stay on after I end this recording so I can say goodbye to you. And to my viewers, thank you for being with us today with John Kalaki, the author of Because Art. Go to your local bookstore and buy it and read it. It's a beautiful read. And thank you for joining me and Mr. Kalaki. And I will see you all next month. Be well and stay safe. Thank you.