Plus an information meeting for traveling to Fort Benning, Georgia to protest the School of the Americas (SOA).

On June 28, under the command of SOA graduate General Romeo Vasquez Velasquez, the Honduran military overthrew the democratically-elected government of President Zelaya. Since then, security forces have brutally repressed dissent through torture, assassination, sexual abuses and the suspension of freedom of speech.

Join us to protest and act to CLOSE THE SOA! In 2008 over 20,000 people came to a vigil at the gates of the US army base at Fort Benning, Georgia to demand the close of the School of the Americas.  Every November since 1994 Central New Yorkers have demonstrated against the US Army’s Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. It is notorious for teaching Latin American military officers tactics to repress their own people in favor of the local oligarchies and US corporations doing lucrative business in their countries.

A film by Robert Greenwald

Rethink Afghanistan, Brave New Films’ ground-breaking new documentary, features interviews with experts ranging from former CIA officers, NGO officials, Afghan MPs to Afghan women’s rights activists. The film has been released in parts online.  See it on the “big” screen as we mark the start of the ninth year of the US occupation of Afghanistan.

Sponsored by the Syracuse Peace Council, as one of our free monthly educational programs. Handicapped accessible.

The photographs of Ruth Putter & Mima Cataldo

photo by Ruth Putter

Opening Reception – Saturday, June 12, 2010 at 7pm

This exhibit by two of Central New York’s leading feminist photographers, Ruth Putter and Mima Cataldo, is an inspiration to present social activists, reminding us that it is critical to understand that the freedoms we enjoy in the USA were not given but rather won by constant struggle, resistance and organizing.

photo by Mima Cataldo

The exhibit covers 35 years of resistance in CNY, including photographs from their time with the women at the Seneca Women’s Encampment for a Future of Peace and Justice in 1982 and new work by both artists.

photo by Ruth Putter

photo by Mima Cataldo

Marjory Wilkins, Early Black & White photographs

copyright Marjory Wilkins

Opening Reception – Saturday, May 1, 2010 at 6pm

Curated by Nancy Keefe Rhodes this is an exhibit of 35 restored and finished prints of both the now extinct 15th Ward and others of historical relevance to both the African American community and the Syracuse community at large. Marjory Wilkins has been an important figure in our community for over six decades, inspiring many through her camera’s view of the world. Her work is described by the exhibit curator in this way, “As documentary photographs they record history, whether recent or remote, that is‘minority’ history – that is, history often, outside of its own community, either ignored or contested by stereotypes.” Her photography has become an invaluable resource to remember a place now destroyed, and a community with a charm and importance almost unknown to those outside of it.

Special Exhibit Events

7pm – Tuesday, May 11 & Th3 Thursday, May 20

“Photo Restoration, History and Art”

A presentation by exhibit curator Nancy Keefe Rhodes

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