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Here’s a little Instagram video I made to honor the Cancer moon coming to cross my ascendant into my 1st house...
Booking a private session with me is easy and I really love my clients. Go to truthseekerastrology.com and click on SCHEDULE A SESSION in the top left hand corner. Fill out the short questionnaire and I'll handle the rest!!
NEW CLIENTS - Never booked before? Well, mention this video and get 10% off when you book your first session!
LISTEN: My December 16th Interview on G-Town Radio’s “The (Not So) Hidden Agenda”
Last weekend I had the pleasure of being a featured guest on The (Not So) Hidden Agenda, a live radio show where host Dr. Stephanie Heck interviews local artists, authors, musicians, actors, politicians, professionals, and activists about their work in the local community and beyond. Interviews focus not only on each guest’s current work, but also on who they are as individuals and what path led them to have and to pursue their passion. The goal of this show is not just to talk about what each person is doing (ie, their “art”), but to uncover their story. In other words, the (not so) hidden agenda is to reveal the story behind the art!
Check out the podcast episode of our conversation, and tune in LIVE to hear Dr. Stephanie Heck and her guests every Saturday from 4:00-5:00pm on G-Town Radio, The Sound From Germantown!
We know that checking that Sun sign horoscope every day in your favorite magazine, newspaper or email, can be so fun and entertaining. However, there’s so much more to your astrological make-up than just your Sun Sign! At the time and place you were born, the Sun and 9 other planets were engaged in a dance sequence designed just for you. No other person has your natal chart and no one ever will. In this interactive three-part workshop series, we’ll help you decipher the choreography of the natal chart. Using the tarot, mythological references and other relevant frameworks and guides, we will unlock the power, mystery and magic of natal astrology. This workshop series will be co-facilitated at Learn Reiki Philadelphia in Old City, Philadelphia, by Tieshka Smith of Truthseeker Astrology and Heather Gilstrap of Midlantic Wellness Center. Refreshments will be served. Part One: Exploring the Inner Planets Saturday January 6, 2018 (1:00 - 2:30 pm) Part One of this three-part series begins with an introduction to the inner planets – the Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus and Mars. We will delve into the meaning of each planet, through a discussion of each planet’s mythological and other archetypal references, corresponding tarot cards, and an overview of essential dignities (signs that the planets rule, signs where they do especially well and where they struggle to express themselves). Part Two: Exploring the Social and Outer Planets Saturday, January 6, 2018 (3:00 - 4:30 pm) Part Two of this three-part series continues with an introduction to the social planets – Jupiter and Saturn; and the outer planets (Uranus, Neptune and Pluto). We will delve into the meaning of each planet, through a discussion of each planet’s mythological and other archetypal references, corresponding tarot cards, and an overview of essential dignities (signs that the planets rule, signs where they do especially well and where they struggle to express themselves). Part Three: Reading The Natal Chart Sunday, January 7, 2018 (1:00 - 2:30 pm) Part Three involves "reading" the natal chart, which happens through an artful and intuitive synthesis of what we know about the planets, the signs and houses they occupy, the key angles of a chart, and how energy is expressed through planetary aspects (we'll discuss the major ones: the conjunction, sextile, square, trine and opposition). We'll use the chart of a well-known public figure as reference. We’ll also demonstrate how tarot can be an effective and insightful tool to support and enhance the intuitive reading of a natal chart.
ATTENTION!! Use the discount code SATURN2017 to get 20% off the price of individual session tickets! OFFER EXPIRES DECEMBER 20, 2017 AT 11:59PM ET!!
The following are the unedited notes I used for a talk I gave earlier this week at Widener University. I was invited by the Women’s and Gender Studies department to be a featured speaker during Women’s History Month. The title of my talk was “The Photographic Journey of a Sista Who Is Not Alright, But Fights Anyway.” Thank you to the faculty, students and staff who attended and had such thoughtful comments to share afterwards over dinner.
My name is Tieshka Smith…I am glad to be speaking here today.
I was born in Chicago, Illinois, a town founded by a Black man. Many years later, I ended up in Philadelphia, the birthplace of American democracy.
I am a 44-year-old black woman photographer trying to make sense of 21st century America.
I love the United States of America. It’s the only home I know.
Unfortunately, this country, America, the only country I know, doesn’t really love me back.
Why? It’s quite simple, and this is probably not much of a shocking revelation to any of you here today.
America doesn’t really love me back, because it doesn’t recognize or acknowledge my humanity. It views my brown skin tone as a threat. It brands me an enemy of the state, less than human, deserving of its scorn. It sees me as a target, ripe for exploitation.
When America makes mistakes, and man, it has made some big ones, it finds in me a ready scapegoat. Black women are too loud, too single, too welfare-y, too fat, too...everything, and too...nothing.
I’m angry. Confused. Disappointed. Tired.
I’m angry that I allowed myself to be indoctrinated to believe all the crap that spewed from the mouths the people I trusted – my parents, my teachers, ministers, and others – all of whom said that success and love and happiness and peace of mind would be mine if I worked hard, stayed in school, held on to my virginity until I found the right one and trade it in for lifelong fidelity and honesty from a young man (of course, that didn’t happen, and of course, it had to be my fault).
I was told that the best path for me as a woman was to get married, have some kids, make a home, work my way up in the world, and gave back to my community. Did they know better, or did they do and say the same things that their parents and trusted adults said to them?
It’s neither here nor there for me today.
The fact of the matter is this: America lied.
After all of my blood, sweat and tears, I have nothing to show for it but a failed marriage (of course that had to be my fault too), strained relationships with my children, student loan debt, stretch marks, high blood pressure and questions. Lots of questions.
Yes, I have questions. Like, why haven’t I had a good night’s sleep in 20 years? Or, why do my best ideas for presentations like this, come together at the very last minute (trust me, it never, ever fails)? Deadlines take me back to my days of being an undergrad...all nighters are no fun. I’m sure you can attest to that.
Seriously though. The main question that keeps me up at night, the one that I have tried to answer over the last seven years that I have occupied space in this world as a human being, as a woman, and as a working artist is this: Why would a country like America, which extols values of exceptionalism, achievement, elect somebody like Donald Trump?
What does it say about us, as Americans, that this man – a man with no political experience (which, by the way, was said about President #44 – he had the sense to know that he would be criticized in that way and at least tried to get some political experience under his belt) - was able to parlay a false narrative around his “accomplishments” as a real estate developer and reality TV show star into “winning” enough Electoral College votes to become leader of the entire free world?
This man whines incessantly about how many people showed up to his inauguration, while carrying on about fake news...he has the nuclear codes, y’all. If you haven’t let that sink in yet, you should.
And why would do people who blissfully lived in an alternate universe (thinking that police brutality aka one frightening form of unchecked state power was no big deal) up until November 9, 2016, expect that now that they’ve finally woke up, ready to fight, that somehow, people like me, who have been fighting, speaking out, working hard to resist, as best we could, unchecked state power for years, have enough reserve mental, psychic and physical energy to fight pernicious and evil forces like Donald Trump?
To be honest, to do battle with Donald Trump is to do battle with America itself.
Let me repeat that. To do battle with Donald Trump is to do battle with the very essence of what America stands for.
Why should I do battle with people who support Donald Trump? 53% of those who voted for him were White women! On top of that, something like 12-18% of his voters were Black Men! Many of his voters were White college educated men and women. They voted for him in secret as to not be ostracized or shamed by their more “progressive” family members and friends.
So to be perfectly honest, I don’t even know what a Donald Trump voter looks like. There could be people in my own circle who said that they voted for Hillary Clinton and could be lying to my face. To be really honest, all of this makes me not want to fight, and on top of that, makes me extra anxious and stressed out, because the enemy that can do the most damage is the one that you can’t see.
Why should I fight alongside people, who, until very recently, had no problems maintaining their deafening silence in the face of state sanctioned brutality and inhumanity, all to prop up a lie?
Why is it human nature, to hold on to the status quo until it is absolutely, fundamentally necessary to be disattached from it, kicking and screaming, because Rome is burning and the men in our lives took things too damn far?
I have a lot of questions.
The question I want to pose to you today is this: In light of this, and in spite of this, why can’t black women and white women get our shit together? How come it took a scoundrel like Donald Trump to understand that our shared liberation is bound together? Why can’t you see yourselves in me and those who look like me?
I don’t have the answers to any of these questions. But I can show you what I learned over the last seven years, through my photographs, photographs of people in a place that gave birth to freedom and democracy, that someone forgot about people who looked like me.
Philadelphia – the City of Brotherly Love and Sisterly Affection - is full of contradictions and wonder and pain and struggle and joy and humor and irony. But Philadelphia, if I may be honest, is the boil on America’s ass. It represents America’s failure to ensure that its democratic ideals – all men and women are created equal – could be realized by everyone. We have a level of deep poverty here unrivaled anywhere else. Our school system is a cesspool of incompetence and corruption. We’re completely okay with the police stopping and frisking Black people on the street, even when we know that we’re violating their civil and constitutional rights. I can tick off many more examples of Philadelphia’s failure to live up to America’s democractic ideals, but I’m sure you get it.
At any rate, I’ve said this in my writing and I try to convey it in my photography: If Philadelphia can’t get democracy right, then America is doomed.
Today, I will share what I learned over the last seven years, lessons that led me to liberation and understanding, photographs that I hope will spark something within you that willl motivate you to make a new friend, consider a new idea, do something outside your own comfort zone, anything that will free you from your own mental shackles. We all have them, it’s what happens when you live in a society that is okay with exerting unchecked power over you and me, and telling you that it isn’t.
At this point, I’m not showing you my work in the hopes that it will change your mind. I’m not asking you to love me or my work. I’m not even asking you to like me or my work. I’m asking you to see me, the way that I see myself. I’m asking you to see Philadelphia, our birthplace of American democracy and the resilence that runs deep on its streets.
I’m also asking you to see what you will inherit and how much work needs to be done and how the old ways don’t work so don’t go into the world and try what has already failed. That’s called insanity.
I’m asking you to see the people who live and love and live some more even when society tells them that their lives and emotions are worthless, irrational, out of bounds, and that the world would be a better place if they just disappeared.
I’m asking you to face your fears. Your arrogance. Your selfishness. Your pride. Your shame. I’m asking you to humble yourselves.
Because time is running out and the longer we resist the need to clean our collective dirty laundy, the need to heal our wounds, to talk through and course correct the direction in which America is going, you will lose women like me. You cannot win this fight alone, those of you who are newly woke and on fire, who maybe have marched for the first time and are social media warriors.
I can’t speak for other sistas ( I realized this the other night as I was doing my evening workout) , but I can speak for myself and believe my photographs are a proxy for the voiceless. This sista will keep fighting for the women and girls in my photographs but I don’t have much left for those who have enjoyed the luxury of not really having to fight, until now. I’m tired of speaking up when others have opted to stay silent while blood, drawn by law enforcement, ran red in the streets, when Dejerrica Becton was tackled – for no reason – by a cop who had a chip on his shoulder, who was called to the scene by a White person, whose colleague took a black young man off camera and beat him bloody for no reason...
What my journey has taught me, is that many of the sisters I know – White and Black and all of the shades in between – know and understand that our men are broken and by extension, the systems they’ve created to maintain their privilege as men are broken. They and their systems of opporession are broken and fragile and toxic and despite it all, we love them anyway. But they really don’t love us, some of our men. They will – and have – come together as a community, mainly online, finding common ground because of their shared masculine identity, lashing out at “the women.”
They have no problems setting aside their racial differences if that means strength in numbers to fight what they perceive is an existential threat to their very existence: Feminism, womanism and equal rights and treatment of those who identify as women. These men truly believe that a man like Donald J Trump can “Make America Great Again.” They think it’s okay that our 45th President once said it was okay to grab a woman by the pussy, or at the very least, what he said was no big deal.
My journey as a woman took me into the depths of these realms and when I came up for air, I realized that we as women were cowed, shamed, into submission. We bargained away our freedom for a false sense of security and comfort. Is it worth it?
As I take you through my photographic journey, I want you to see what I see: women and girls of color, poor women, women who were invisible to you (and to me, too) until it became necessary to get your numbers up for a fight to preserve your sense of security and comfort.
Ask yourselves, is your sense of security and comfort worth it if those at the bottom who fight, whose lives are very acts and testaments to resistance and resilience, will never have access to the same level of security and comfort you enjoy? What are you willing to sacrifice?
What is your vision now that you know for sure that Donald J. Trump and his minions care nothing about your security and comfort? He has made his priorities unequivocably clear.
Think about these questions as I take you on my photographic journey...
[Run through slides of images from Jersey City/Germantown/BrewerytownBroad and Erie/Racism is A Sickness/American Awakening]
…I wrote in December 2010: “I believe dreams are the stirrings, rumblings and nudges from the restless corners or my subconscious mind…gently reminding me that I’m still alive and have so much more left to do and see...”
We must be mindful that in order for the American dream to live on, it must evolve and change.
It is my hope that you are all able to recognize and embrace your dreams, despite the nightmare we find ourselves in. It is my wish that you all seek and work toward the liberation of every single woman you know and don’t know...because when the least of us aren’t free, none of us are truly free, and America can’t continue to live a lie.
Thank you.
Today’s presentation about #RacismIsASickness went very well and was met with a number of heartfelt, thoughtful comments. I’m glad that I did it.
Thank you to Iris Cutler and the rest of the team at the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI), housed at Temple University Center City, for inviting me to come speak about my project.
Kimberly Bonner and I had a great conversation about the Racism Is A Sickness project earlier today. Check it out on Periscope.
PHOTO: Spring Cleaning, April 19, 2015.
PHOTO: Spring Cleaning, April 19, 2015.
When I posted this yesterday, I said that there is someone always cleaning somewhere in Germantown. I was standing in a corner store waiting to pay for my food, and this older gentleman comes up and starts sweeping. I’m sure he was doing it for a few dollars in his pocket, but you can’t tell me that the only people who want a cleaner Germantown live above Chelten Avenue. We all want a…
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YOU'RE INVITED TO THE SOULS OF BLACK FOLKS SHOWCASE, MAY 19TH!
YOU’RE INVITED TO THE SOULS OF BLACK FOLKS SHOWCASE, MAY 19TH!
Theater artist and founder of The Art Church in West Philadelphia, Cara Blouin, has guided a group of artists through a number of discussions based on the idea of the ‘two-ness’ inherent in being a Black American and in many other American experiences as introduced in W.E.B. DuBois’ The Souls of Black Folk. These artists have created photography, visual arts installations, performance, and…
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