In 2007, I co-founded (with Fu Guosheng and Siddhartha Joag) the Songzha Art Project (formerly "Border Statements Collective"), a community art project that provides no-cost arts education to ethnic minority communities on the China-Burma border. Impacted by high rates of outward migration, intravenous drug use, HIV/AIDS infection, drug-trelated incarceration, and preferential policies that benefit Han majority Chinese, young people in these communities grow up without parental and community sources of support. Bringing local and international artists to these communities through short-term volunteer artist teaching residencies, we conduct art-as-harm-reduction workshops through local schools and community centers. For more information, and to get involved, please see: http://www.theborderartsproject.org/02/Info.html

Songzha currently also works with 500 youth living in Kachin Internally Didplaced Persons camps in Mynamar and Jingpo ethnicity youth living in China. The project is seeking teaching artists to participate in monthly workshops in both places. A small stipend and room and housing are available. For more information, please send an email!