Sean Ashcraft (00:00): Support for Pop of Culture comes from Stallings Wealth Management. Daniel Stallings financial advisor, securities and advisory services offered through Cetera Advisors LLC. Member of FINRA/SIPC, a broker/dealer and registered investment advisor. Cetera is under separate ownership from any other named entity. Jen Blackmer (00:16): This week on Pop of Culture, we take a dive into the archive. Kara DuQuette (00:21): We'll hear from Indiana's poet laureate. Jen Blackmer (00:23): We'll enjoy some music from a local band and an artist who makes up a band all by themselves. Kara DuQuette (00:29): And have a meditation on teaching, a beautiful thing. Usually. Jen Blackmer (00:35): That's all coming up in this encore edition of Pop of Culture. Luke Jones (00:42): Support for Pop of Culture comes from Stallings Wealth Management, the innovation connector. And from you. With state and federal money eliminated, you are the difference in keeping local programming on the air at IPR. Become a member today at IndianaPublicRadio.org. Kara DuQuette (01:14): From IPR, this is Pop of Culture. I'm Kara DuQuette. Jen Blackmer (01:17): And I'm Jen Blackmer. Our team is off this week, so we'll be listening back to some relevant interviews from the archives. Ella Abbott (01:25): Curtis Crisler is Indiana's poet laureate. He was on Ball State's campus this week talking about new forms of poetry, but first we heard him in season one. (01:35): Well, Curtis, welcome. Curtis Crisler (01:36): It's nice to be here. Ella Abbott (01:39): I want to start by congratulating you on being selected as Indiana's poet laureate. How are you feeling about that? Curtis Crisler (01:44): It's been a whirlwind. My life has changed so much in the sense that I'm a low-key person, not anymore. So I've been on TV, and just to get through emails and texts and phone calls has been crazy. And I'm still teaching, so it's kind of like, I have to teach too. I'm not a morning person and everything has to be in the morning. So then they're taking pictures and I have bags under my eyes and I don't feel like... I just got three hours of sleep and it's like, okay, we'll do this. Yeah, it's cool to represent poetry for the state. Ella Abbott (02:24): And what was the selection process like for you? Curtis Crisler (02:28): This is my second time going through it. The first time I went through in 2020, they got the questions to you. And then if they liked the questions, you went on to another round. It was still that, but this time they had a Zoom and I'm looking at like 15, 20 people and it's like, wow, okay. And everybody gets to ask questions and stuff. It was cool. I thought I flubbed the last question, so I was trying to get it out of my head. So it's like, "Oh, I flubbed the last question, so it's over." And I talked to a friend of mine who was on the panel and she's like, "Ah, you'll be okay. Whatever." And then I started detecting, "What did she mean by that?" (03:14): And then the director had said, "Well, I want to have a call with you. I want to do a Zoom call with you." And I was like, "Okay." So then the internal stuff started coming. So I just wanted it out of my head. And then we had the meeting and she said, "Well, you're going to be the next Indiana poet laureate if you so please." And I was like, "Yeah." In a 10-year period where my friend, my colleague, my mentor, George Kalamaras was that. I don't know of any school that had two poet laureates in it. So that's really, I think, unique and hopefully says something about our program. Ella Abbott (03:52): On your poetry, I had a chance to read Tough Boys Sonatas, which paints this really interesting picture of young boys growing up in Gary. Can you tell me about the inspiration for that book and how growing up in Indiana has affected your writing? Curtis Crisler (04:05): Well, that was my thesis for grad school. It was the first time I had... I was in a place where I could just write and focus on that, although you had to teach two and take two classes. My writing process is chaos in a sense. And when I get down to addressing stuff, I just get so focused that I drown out all the white noise because I'm focused on what I'm writing. In that place, I was able to do that for a long stint. So it was really a powerful time. I don't know how I got to the first image, but I just started thinking about where I came from and coming up with images of my mother getting us out of the projects. And I think with LaRoy, that poem addresses that, where she saw me spick-and-span or something like that. She saw me clean, and she didn't get us out just because of me, but in the poem it goes that way. And she got us out because she saw something in us, but it's showing that trajectory of going from the Delaney Projects to the suburbs. Ella Abbott (05:28): Related to that is that a theme that I've noticed in your poetry is odes to mothers. Can you tell me about what makes you write so passionately about moms? Curtis Crisler (05:41): Well, it's always about my mother. I think it's... I'm trying to think. One of the books George gave us and the author says, "The voice that he hears in his head is the voice of his mother." And that's the voice that's in my head all the time because I remember a time with my mom before my sisters came. My mom is just there. Her voice is in my head. I'm saying stuff that she says sometimes to my class or classes and like, "Oh my goodness, I'm sorry. I sound like my mom right now." And I don't think I can get away from it. It's so weird. So many people know my mother because I talk about her because she's such a fabulous person and a character, so to speak, that they know my mother before they even meet her. And so when they meet her, they're like, "Oh, so you're the one Curtis is always talking about." So she's just this shiny star in my life. Good, bad, or indifferent, she's always been there. And so yeah, that's just a voice that's in one of those rooms in my head. Ella Abbott (06:59): In Dreamist, a recurring theme throughout the main character's story is death. His grandparents die early in the book. He contemplates the loss of friends from home. And at one point he does consider his own death. What made you want to ruminate on that in that story? Curtis Crisler (07:16): It was weird because all the poems are so disparated in the way that they are in and of themselves, but I brought them together for Malik, and I wrote this story around Malik. So when he gets to Southern California and he opens up... He's unpacking and he finds the portrait book, all the images start running back to him and through those images, that's how he's writing the poems. So that book has the prose and the poetry. And so I tried to fit that together as well as tell the narrative of his story. And I think what happens is I never thought about death a lot, but death is always around me. The new book has a lot of life and death in it. So I think I'm trying to answer questions for myself or trying to get to questions. We always address life, life, life. We never think of death as... When we think of death, we shroud it in this shadowy darkness. Ella Abbott (08:32): In both Dreamist and obviously more specifically Don't Moan So Much (Stevie), there's call-outs to some great musicians. What's been the impact of music on your life and then ultimately your writing? Curtis Crisler (08:44): The reason that Don't Moan So Much (Stevie) came about was Michael Jackson died and I was like, wow, Michael and the Jackson five, or J5, have been a soundtrack to my life. Then I thought about Stevie. Then I thought about Motown, because I tell people when, "What kind of music you like?" I never say Motown because Motown is a default. It's always been there. So I always mentioned everything else and they're like, "What about Motown?" It's a given. Motown was there. So I didn't think anyone had written anything about Stevie and I wanted to write something about him before he passed. And then it was another aspect of writing about what I call Urban Midwestern sensibility in Detroit, how Detroit had this, from the late '50s to the early '70s basically, you're making cars; and when the cars come off the line and people turn on the radio, they're turning on Motown. (09:51): So the aspect of what Detroit was, is still, to a certain extent, but it was a conglomerate to the African American experience in that sense. And I thought that was really powerful. So I have like the poem where Berry Gordy is talking, "You need to be Stevie. You need to do your Stevie stuff." And I just took out all my Stevie CDs and read everything in the liner notes and stuff like that and looked up certain things and found out these certain things about him. And then I just started thinking about practical things. What would it be for someone who's blind to visit their cousins or something like that? And how would that be when you're in the house? You would hear sounds that you're not used to, the house settling or whatever it is, the commode or whatever it is, and trying to get in his head and address that. (10:52): So Stevie's in his house for the first time staying with his cousins and they just go to sleep, but he's listening and he's picking up these sounds, and they say Stevie has synesthesia. And so I say Stevie sees the notes, and the notes are his friends and to the extent where he's actually just playing with them, and then he say, "Hey, fellas, why don't we do this? And you get over there, you get over there, you get over there," and it becomes, "Isn't she lovely?" And it's that kind of thing, how he sees music, how he hears music, how he plays music. And so yeah, so the whole thing came about after Michael passed and then yeah, it was just wanting to do something to honor that aspect of that soundtrack to my life. Ella Abbott (11:46): In your work, you discuss race and specifically being Black in America in a way that is not shy at all. What do you hope people who read your work get to take away from those observations? Curtis Crisler (11:59): Well, this is my life. It's not something I'm making up. It's a difference now for me when I get pulled over to be aware of what I do, how I do it, when I do it, how I talk, how I say things. It's a conversation that has been had for many generations. So when you look at Tough Boy Sonatas, it's said to be a lot of boys, but it's actually just me. So this is what I found out. With LaRoy in Tough Boy Sonatas and Malik in Dreamist, I had to give myself to those personas. So my name is Curtis Leroy Crisler, but my mother used to call me LaRoy. So one day I did ask her, I said, "Is my name Leroy or LaRoy?" She said, "It's Leroy, but it's LaRoy when you piss me off." And I was like, "Oh, okay." So LaRoy became the catalyst and persona for the book. Once I gave everything to LaRoy, it kind of veiled me and LaRoy took on everything, and then I can move around and play around with that. (13:24): And the same thing with Malik. The problem I had with Malik at first was I was still holding onto the poems. These are Curtis Crisler poems and it's like, you have to give the poems to Malik. And once I gave them to Malik, again, Malik just ran with them, what he did with the pictures, how he saw the pictures. I even changed the... There's a poem in there that I say would be my eulogy. So most of, like I say, 90% of Tough Boy Sonatas is creative nonfiction and the other 10% is just word magic, because it's just my life. And if you can't see my life or if you don't want to see my life, then you have a problem. (14:08): There are Black people all around us. There are white, Latino, Asian, everything. And if we're not paying attention to that, then that's on us. Yes, we can move to suburbs and different places and all that. You're going to come into connection with someone at some point. So why can't I tell my life like Samuel Clemens or whoever it may be? I have a life too, and I just want you to see it. Ella Abbott (14:39): Well, Curtis, thank you so much for joining me today. Curtis Crisler (14:41): Oh, so glad to be here. Thank you for having me. Jen Blackmer (14:44): That interview came to us in 2024 from Indiana Public Broadcasting. Kara DuQuette (15:00): You're listening to Pop of Culture. Meanwhile, the NPR Tiny Desk team is listening to thousands of 2026 contest entries. Jen Blackmer (15:09): That's right. The window to enter this year's contest closed earlier this week, so we thought we'd rewind one of the Hoosier entries to last year's contest. Let's listen. Kara DuQuette (15:20): We are speaking with IPR's local favorite from NPR's 2025 Tiny Desk Contest, SUN.DYLE. And we're happy to have you with us. Emma Torres (15:31): Woo-hoo. We're happy to be here. Ben Beutel (15:32): Happy to be here. Kara DuQuette (15:33): Excellent. Can you all please start by introducing yourselves for us and what you do in the band? Emma Torres (15:41): Hi, I'm Emma Torres. I'm the vocalist. Ben Beutel (15:44): And I'm Ben Beutel. I'm the bass player. Emma Torres (15:46): And Carlos Rosa, our drummer is also here. Kara DuQuette (15:49): Excellent. I want to know, how did your band form? How'd you get together? Emma Torres (15:57): We got together almost two years ago, July of 2023. It started out as a mutual jam session that was happening between our sax player, Ashton Morris and our drummer, Carlos Rosa. And from then on, they met with our original guitarist, Luke Delgado, and he introduced them to me. Ben Beutel and Ben Francis, our bass and keys player, we got them in October of that year. And yeah, it's been history since then. Kara DuQuette (16:33): Excellent. So the jamming brought you together. So I've listened to some of your music, which is fabulous. And what genre do you feel like your music fits into? What's your vibe? Ben Beutel (17:30): That's tough. Oh, that is [inaudible 00:17:37]. Kara DuQuette (17:36): Sorry. Emma Torres (17:36): Thank you for saying that, too. Ben Beutel (17:36): No, no. It's hard to pinpoint, I think. Emma Torres (17:37): It's so cool that people are loving the music the way that we do. So thank you for saying that. I'd say when we originally started, we wanted to form a jazz fusion, R&B, neo soul type of vibe, but right now it's forming into, we play a lot of funk, we play a lot of mainstream, more pop music, and I guess you could say it's got a couple twins that Indie in it sometimes too. So it's really hard to put a label on it, but I think right now we're still sticking with that jazz fusion and R&B feel. Kara DuQuette (18:13): Oh, I think it was so hard for me to form that question because I was hard-pressed to come up with labels and I think you did a really good job in giving us a feeling. I wanted to delve a little deeper into your process for creating songs, if you could talk about it a little bit. Emma Torres (19:03): It's kind of funny. We don't have a blueprint, I would say, at all. Each on our own, like me personally, I'm not good at sitting in a group and thinking of lyrics on the spot or melodies on the spot, but it's this soup of every single one of us. We write our own parts, but everybody has a say in everything. So if somebody brings to table a fully formed song, it's going to sound completely different than the way that it started. Ben Beutel (19:36): Yeah, and a lot of times what we'll do, we'll let maybe two or three of us get together sometimes to write if we're looking to write something or just hanging out to play. But we'll record it and we'll put it up for everybody and then Emma can take it and try and come up with a melody or lyrics or whoever's not there can listen to it and maybe think of a part. Or even we've had times where they'll be like, "I really like this, but what if the feel was this way?" Or, "What if we slowed it down?" those kind of things. Because we come from different places, we all have these different tools in our arsenals. (20:14): So like our keyboard player, Ben Francis, that couldn't be here today, because he's not feeling well, he does a lot with... He likes to build his own synth sounds and he loves to run synthesizers and those kind of things. And so every song that we bring to him, he'll try and come up with a new sound for it, which really changes the feel. Me coming from the jazz background, I'm big on playing the bass all over the place. So it's still a really nice collaborative process most of the time. Kara DuQuette (20:47): Oh, you can hear the collaborative flow, I will say that. Ben Beutel (20:50): Well, that's good. Emma Torres (20:50): Good, good. Ben Beutel (20:51): I'm glad. But it still takes work. Kara DuQuette (21:24): So my next question is, as we were talking about who's doing the lyrics and how you freeform, so if I went and listened to your concert, it would be very different than some of the recordings I've heard, possibly. Emma Torres (21:39): Yeah, yeah. I'd say, because we released our debut album, Mirror, last... Almost a year ago. So we've been playing these songs and we went on a tour last summer, which was awesome, but we've been playing these songs for quite some time, even before the album was released. And yeah, we're all a little crazy. We like to change it up. Carlos Rosa (22:05): Dude, yeah. I think modulating is one of my favorite things to experiment with. It's super difficult to do, but when you can put a completely different rhythm over what we're already playing, and it's not the same anymore, but then we can switch right back to it and go back to what we were doing before, that's one of the coolest things in music, in my opinion. So anytime I get to do that, that's like a huge treat. Emma Torres (22:33): Heck yeah. Kara DuQuette (22:35): Well, I see you're booked up through the summer, so there's going to be a lot of opportunities to listen to you. Well, I must know, why Tiny Desk? Why did you all want to be a part of NPR Tiny Desk? Carlos Rosa (23:27): Hi, this is Carlos. Kara DuQuette (23:29): Hey, Carlos. Carlos Rosa (23:32): I don't know if you are familiar with the series. Of course you are, obviously, but... Kara DuQuette (23:38): I've heard of it. Carlos Rosa (23:41): That YouTube series is just like, it's massive. It's a place where I feel like everybody goes to for comfort in some way, shape or another. We've all had an artist that we feel so personal with, be on that series. And we're just like, dude, a chance to be on that. That's awesome. Plus, the quality always sounds super cool and it's like I want my playing to come through that clean. Emma Torres (24:08): Well, not only that, too, you see artists that you're familiar with and then you see artists that you've never heard of before. And it's just a great place to find new music and to connect. Kara DuQuette (24:19): I completely agree with that. Well, I just wanted to really thank you all for talking to us. And it's been quite a pleasure to get to know you all a little bit. Ben Beutel (24:30): Yeah. No, this has been great. Thank you so much for taking the time to have us on. Emma Torres (24:34): Agreed. Thank you so much for having us. Kara DuQuette (24:39): We spoke with the band SUN.DYLE in season two, episode 14. Jen Blackmer (24:52): The Pop team has taken a break this week, and speaking of breaks, schools across the country have experienced some disruptions over the past month for a variety of reasons. That got us thinking about this beautiful thing. We are featuring a micro essay today by the author, Robert Earl Barham. And Beautiful Things is a weekly online magazine filled with nonfiction micro essays. Today's essay is a meditation on teaching and the relationship between teachers and students. Welcome to our show, Robert. Robert Earl Barham (25:31): Thank you so much, Jen. Thank you for having me. Jen Blackmer (25:33): Well, we're so happy you could take some time and share your piece with us. And the piece is entitled For My Students. Robert Earl Barham (25:44): From Alabama, Tennessee, and Michigan, China, Austria, and Indonesia, they see the world's grandeur and glory, menace and ruin. They are Nabokovs, Morrisons, O'Connors, Didions. They want answers, want to know what matters, would rather be somewhere else. They wear masks, stare at me in silence, say everything tastes different after COVID, especially oranges. They lose friends, grandparents, parents. They break down, break open. They come to class, say they didn't want to fall behind, didn't know what else to do. They say Juliet was maligned; the Iliad feels real, feels like Afghanistan; the writer took tragedy and made it beautiful; this is what grief is like. They ask me how I met my wife, what it's like to have kids. They stay after class and ask is this true, is this how the world is. They ask, can I talk to you; how am I doing; what's the point; why am I here. They say they want to belong somewhere; don't know who they're supposed to be; feel like two opposing magnets, like their blood and brains are at odds. When class ends they say I wish I had talked more; wish you had talked more; this stuff is the bee's knees, ant's pants, cat's pajamas; would rather have watched paint dry; didn't like it but know you tried; appreciate that you listened. They say thanks. Jen Blackmer (27:13): Thank you so much for sharing that piece with us, Robert, and anyone who has spent any time in a classroom, either as a teacher or a student, I think understands this moment. And I in particular understand it profoundly and viscerally. And just the specifics with which you set up the contradictions of what it means to be both a teacher and a learner in this space is so powerful. Robert Earl Barham (27:46): Thanks. That's a great encouragement. Yeah, it's humbling and mysterious, I think, to try to teach and stand in front of these kids who are all looking at you earnestly, and they're candid. Yeah, it's pretty magical and terrifying. Jen Blackmer (28:00): Magical and terrifying. And I love that. And again, the thing I seek in my own work are those contradictions that we embody all the time. And this idea of they want to know, yes, what you have to teach, but they also want to know you. And there's such a strange, I think, tension in that, because our subject is supposed to be isolated from us. It's supposed to be isolated from the person who shares the knowledge, but it never really is. Robert Earl Barham (28:34): Yeah, that's right. I think I often want to deflect toward the material, but they'll ask questions and I'm like, "Well, I guess I should answer." So yeah, it's way more... I guess the teacher is as legible as the material is sometimes, and they're looking for answers. They really are. It's something else. Jen Blackmer (28:56): Right. And I think the times I remember in the classroom, which your piece made me reflect upon, are those moments where your passion for the material is really what drives the interaction. And I love that. So obviously, the world that you've created here in this piece that is a reflection of your classroom is certainly clear and lovely and specific. So what inspired you to write this? Robert Earl Barham (29:31): Oh, sure. So the piece began with a conversation with a student. Yeah, so a student from Tupelo, Mississippi. We walked to the Great Hall where we have the dining hall and we were just standing in line, and yeah, he was just musing, talking about graduation and he made the remark... I think we were talking about the strange consequences of COVID, and he's said, "Everything tastes different after COVID, especially oranges". And I was like, that is an amazing line. That's such an exquisite expression. And so he said it and I was like, "Oh my gosh. Nathan, can I write that down?" And then I think with that line, I thought that's shorthand for all the interesting things that students say. (30:23): And often they don't have a filter. They're so candid in a way that I feel like in middle age, tired and grumpy with taking care of three kids. But these are fresh-faced kids, earnest and honest and reckoning with things. And so you have a ringside seat to their lives, and they're struggling with hard things and engaging with ideas for the first time. So it's really animating. But he said that and it was retroactive igniting all the memories that I had about students who say the things that they've said. Jen Blackmer (30:58): Right, yeah. And I think they're just so profound, not even realizing that they're being profound, which makes those moments stand out. You're like, wow. And within that, sometimes I just have to remind them that their voice matters. So you can trust these observations that you have about the world. And I also love the line, "they break down, they break open", because that's both difficult and hopeful at the same time. Robert Earl Barham (31:32): Yeah, that's great. They're living away from home for the first time. A lot of them are losing loved ones for the first time. So there's a kind of vulnerability coupled with articulacy because they're diving into ideas and they're giving language to things that they're experiencing. So it's just ripe for... So I teach a number of classes, including writing classes, and their open-heartedness that shows up on the page is really just exquisite and moving and humbling to have a ringside seat to these kids and their making sense of the world. Jen Blackmer (32:12): It really is. And I'm assuming in your writing classes you have them share work with each other. Is that... Robert Earl Barham (32:21): That's right. Yeah, exactly. Jen Blackmer (32:23): And I do that as well in my playwriting classes. And they're so surprised when I, as an instructor, am moved by what they have done, because there's this sense of, "Well, well, wait, you're the teacher, right? You've got all this figured out. And I'm just somebody who's kind of stabbing in the dark with this." And the fact that they can write something, much like what you were talking about with your students and the line about COVID, the fact that they can write something that moves you, the experienced older voice in the room, is so surprising to them. Robert Earl Barham (33:00): Yeah, yeah. That's it, yeah. And giving them permission, authorization to explore these ideas and to affirm and say, "Yeah, nobody has seen the things that you have seen in the way that you have seen them. And I think you need to testify all that's fallen in your direction." And so I think they take that and run with it. Jen Blackmer (33:26): Hopefully, yeah. And my guess is based on the observations in this piece that we just heard, that your students are incredibly lucky to have you. Robert Earl Barham (33:38): That's encouraging. Oh, that's kind of you to say. Yeah, it's aspirational. I want to be as attentive and as open-hearted as they often are. Jen Blackmer (33:49): Oh, Robert, thank you so much for joining us here on Pop of Culture and sharing your piece called For My Students. (33:57): This story comes from IPR's collaboration with River Teeth's Beautiful Things, a weekly magazine of micro essays. More at RiverTeethJournal.com. (34:12): We spoke to Robert Earl Barham in season two, episode 32. Kara DuQuette (34:17): We also spoke to 142 other guests last season. That's dozens of artists, curators, and community members crafting the culture in East Central Indiana. You can catch up on every episode of Pop of Culture with our podcast. Find us on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcast, and IndianaPublicRadio.org. Jen Blackmer (34:43): We're doing a themed month for WAYWO. Kara DuQuette (34:46): What are you working on? Jen Blackmer (34:47): So we reached back to season one for one of our favorite painters. Kara DuQuette (34:51): We are here today with Anne Maddox. She is an artist, educator, writer, and wildlife advocate, British born and currently resides in Marion. Welcome, Anne. It's nice to have you here with us today. Anne Maddox (35:05): Thank you. I'm glad to be here. Kara DuQuette (35:07): Excellent. We would like to ask you, what are you working on? Anne Maddox (35:14): Well, I am finishing up the last of a series of six ecosystem paintings. I've been working on them for over 15 years now, and this will be my last. They're very time-consuming. Kara DuQuette (35:27): Can you explain to us what an ecosystem painting is? Anne Maddox (35:33): Okay. It's like a little slice of time and space that shows the interconnectedness of both nature and the animals or critters, insects, that inhabit that space. And I restrict it to a time period so we're not going from month to month. Kara DuQuette (36:00): So you say it's a slice of time and space. So during a certain season or... Anne Maddox (36:09): Well, in summertime is when you get all of the flowers that grow on the roadsides. The woodland is more of the spring flowers before the trees foliate and so they get maximum sunshine. But in the summer, you'll get all the roadside and meadow flowers with all of the accompanying critters that inhabit that little space and time. Kara DuQuette (36:36): Wonderful. I read that a few years ago you received the Robert Cooper Audubon Society Award for Education Through Art and they're a chapter of East Central Indiana. And this year you were the recipient of the Hoosier Women Artists Award. And I wanted to talk to you about the award you got for Ecosystem 1. And actually you've brought Ecosystem 1 into the studio today, and myself and Luke are amazed. Your work is just so intricate. How would you term your work, your style? Anne Maddox (37:18): Well, it's realism, obviously. I want people to be able to recognize what they're looking at, and then I have a guide that goes with each painting that gives you the names of all of the plants and insects and birds in the picture. Kara DuQuette (37:36): Yeah. It looks like a map that you could put up next to the work. And without it, you might miss some things because it's so packed with beautiful things. Can you talk a little bit about the colors you utilize? Anne Maddox (37:53): Well, it's the colors you find in nature. Some of them are very hard to duplicate because the pigments don't always line up with the actual flower. So some things are easier to paint than others, but I try to be as true as I can so that people can recognize it and be able to see it in the wild and know what it is. I was painting flowers initially. I was teaching in The Bahamas and discovered that there was no local book, other than experts, that could identify the flowers. So I figured it couldn't be too hard to just go ahead and I started painting the flowers that I found and then got help identifying them. Kara DuQuette (38:44): What medium do you use typically to create them? Anne Maddox (38:47): These are all done in watercolors. Kara DuQuette (38:49): The whole series is watercolors. Anne Maddox (38:51): And I work from the actual plant. I don't use photographs and there's nowhere you can go and just take a snapshot of what I've got and say that this is the ecosystem because I go back constantly to the area or similar areas and then add the birds or other critters that I have seen, but not necessarily all at the same time, at the same place. So I work piecemeal and build it up like a jigsaw puzzle. Kara DuQuette (39:26): Well, you said that you're working towards the end of this series after 15 years on it, which is amazing. Anne Maddox (39:34): They take a minimum of two years apiece. Kara DuQuette (39:36): Wow. That's an incredible commitment. I wanted to know what's next for you in your artistic journey. Anne Maddox (39:47): Well, what I'm doing is moving out of having to do shows and festivals and things. I want to just concentrate on going out as a speaker. So I'm using my art to illustrate my message. So it's education through art. So I'm finally, since I also trained as a teacher, I'm bringing all my skills and loves together: art, nature, and teaching. Kara DuQuette (40:21): Oh, that's beautiful, right? When everything you love can coalesce. How do you utilize your art in teaching? Anne Maddox (40:32): Well, what I'm trying to tell people. I'm trying to open their eyes to understand what is happening in nature. And that is that nature is interconnected in so many ways that we're still learning about, that we're talking about relationships and we can't pick and choose what we want to save or nurture or whatever. We have to have the whole picture because when you start missing out certain building blocks, the whole thing collapses because everything in nature eats and is eaten by something else. So the birds rely on the caterpillars. If there aren't enough caterpillars to satisfy the needs of the birds, then the caterpillars won't be around to turn into butterflies, so it's that balance in nature that needs to be maintained. And we are very uneducated, generally speaking, about how all this works together. Kara DuQuette (41:49): Well, that's a wonderful endeavor. I do think that a lot of people are unaware of the synergy that nature has. Anne Maddox (41:56): Oh, absolutely. So what I'm trying to do is to encourage people to create habitats in their gardens or yards because they have control over that area, whereas out in nature, what the farmers don't get, real estate does, or all the roadsides are mowed on a regular basis. Kara DuQuette (42:19): Is that what your Wild About Marion Facebook page is? Anne Maddox (42:24): Yes, it is. And what I'm finding is that there are other communities that have started something similar, but they've given it a different name. So it's becoming quite a sort of movement to encourage city dwellers to take care of nature by offering them a space that they can control. Kara DuQuette (42:46): Well, can you tell us where we can find your art? Anne Maddox (42:53): Well, I have a Facebook art page, so that's Anne Maddox Fine Artist. And then I have a Flicker page. I've tried for a website a couple of times, but you're going to outlay quite a lot of money just trying to get something that's functional. It doesn't always translate into getting sales online, unfortunately. Kara DuQuette (43:23): Thank you so much for joining us today, Anne. Anne Maddox (43:26): Thank you. Kara DuQuette (43:27): And it was a pleasure talking with you. Anne Maddox (43:29): Well, I appreciate that. Thank you. Kara DuQuette (43:35): We spoke with Anne Maddox in season one, episode 32. Jen Blackmer (43:39): Kara, this is the part of the show where we usually do an arts calendar. We'll be back with a full list next week, but this week, we thought we'd enjoy some music. Kara DuQuette (43:49): We've recently introduced you to our segment Story Behind the Song, with our first artist, Katie Jo Robinson. You're going to hear their song, Weekend Religion. Jen Blackmer (44:00): Now it sounds like they're joined by a full band, but it's just Katie Jo. (48:28): That's Katie Jo Robinson with Weekend Religion, recorded live for Pop of Culture. Luke Jones (48:35): Support for Pop of Culture comes from Stallings Wealth Management, the innovation connector, and from you. With state and federal money eliminated, you are the difference in keeping local programming on the air at IPR. Become a member today at IndianaPublicRadio.org. Jen Blackmer (48:58): And that's our show. Our general manager is Phil Hoffman. Kara DuQuette (49:02): This week was produced by Luke Jones, who would like to ask who's ever in charge of the thermostat outside to turn it to at least 60. Jen Blackmer (49:11): 65 maybe? Kara DuQuette (49:12): No snow. Jen Blackmer (49:14): We had production assistance from Andrew Montavon. Kara DuQuette (49:18): And our audio fellow is Maya Doss. Our show was hosted by me, Kara Duquette. Jen Blackmer (49:23): And me, Jen Blackmer. Pop of Culture is a production from IPR on the campus of Ball State University. (49:33): Did you not get a full night's sleep last night? Luke Jones (49:34): God, no. Jen Blackmer (49:35): You did the night before though, or no, two nights before when I saw you before on Wednesday. Kara DuQuette (49:39): You can't store it up, though. Jen Blackmer (49:41): Don't you wish? Luke Jones (49:42): God. If I could... Kara DuQuette (49:44): You'd be golden, wouldn't we all?