Michael Rippens (Courtesy Sidestreet Projects)
Side Street Projects artist-in-residence Michael Rippens is launching his Care Talk Radio Show on dublab, celebrating his Care Talk project, an interactive storytelling forum that amplifies the voices of caregivers working on the front-lines of a global pandemic.
The Care Talk Radio Show will air as two radio shows on Sunday, January 10, and Sunday, January 24, 12 to 1 p.m., on the LA-based online-only radio station. Dublab has been broadcasting since 1999 as a nonprofit station dedicated to the growth of music, arts and culture.
Michael Rippens is a multidisciplinary artist whose work explores issues of economic inequality, identity, class and accessibility, as well as the basic human desire for belonging and connection with others. Through public performance and social engagement projects, he orchestrates unexpected, personal interactions that create empathy, build community, or simply put a smile on someone’s face.
Originally from South Pasadena, Rippens currently lives and works in the Leimert Park neighborhood of Los Angeles.
Rippens started Care Talk as part of his residency at Side Street Projects. Care Talk is an interactive storytelling project that amplifies the voices of caregivers working on the front-lines of a global pandemic.
The project utilizes a telephone voicemail system as a physically-distant platform for sharing stories. Caregivers and home care aides are invited to call the hotline number (626) 427-7293 and record their personal experiences of living and working during the COVID-19 pandemic.
As more voicemail stories are shared, the Care Talk website, www.caretalkproject.com, will serve as an expanding public archive of these recordings. Additionally, visitors can contribute written messages to the project via the website’s contact form.
Care Talk is inspired by Rippens’ mother’s immigration story and her life-long commitment to helping others.
His mother immigrated to Los Angeles from the Philippines in the early 1970s and studied nursing at Pasadena City College. She worked as an RN in the Intensive Care, Cardiac Care, and Behavioral Sciences units at Huntington Memorial Hospital for over three decades. Eventually, she left the hospital to start up and manage a small caregiving agency which she operated for many years from a desk and telephone she had installed in her kitchen.
Care Talk pays homage to the many hardworking and dedicated caregivers that she worked with, most of whom were also Filipinos, immigrants, and women of color.
In The Care Talk Radio Show, Rippens will include messages left by the public on the Care Talk Hotline, caregiver interviews, special guests, and live listener calls.
You can still be part of the show by sharing your story today, or by calling in live during the show, through the Care Talk Hotline number, (626) 427-7293.
To listen to the live radio shows, visit www.dublab.com and check the schedule for The Care Talk Radio Show.
