Allow me to introduce you to a quite unique person, her name is Iman Lizarazu.
An article about her appeared at the Santa Cruz Sentinel, here you have a portion of it:
Take for instance, Santa Cruz resident Iman Lizarazu, whose life reads like a character from a fanciful French fable. She is a photographer, a painter, a conceptual artist and a vaudeville performer. She’s even a singer, though she admits she can’t sing very well, but does it anyway.
But that’s not even the interesting part.
She was born and reared in the Basque region between France and Spain in a family of winemakers, but also lived in Moscow as a teen, as her father was artistic director of the Bolshoi Ballet. She attended art school in Dresden and Berlin, studied mime with Marcel Marceau in Paris and — you gotta be kidding me — even earned a doctorate in astrophysics from the Max Planck Institute in Munich.
She speaks English, French, Russian, German and her native tongue, Euskara. She studies circus arts, flamenco and dance. She’s performed all over the world from festivals to refugee camps. And she’s performing on Saturday in the European-style varieté show called "Three of a Kind" with clown/comedian Hacki and bubbleman Tom Noddy.
Although later on, she did talk about the politics, mainly, on how she perceives violence:
In 2003, after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Lizarazu ran headlong into controversy when she made some searing anti-war art for an exhibit at the Santa Cruz County Building. Many of her images used eyebrow-raising materials, none more so than body bags used to store corpses, some in children’s sizes.
Lizarazu is effusive about her love for the U.S., but she says Americans are too naive and complacent when it comes to some of the horrors of the world beyond its borders, particularly when it comes to terrorism.
She grew up in time and place when Basque separatists regularly used terrorist actions in a quest for independence for the region. The area as well lived in the shadow of the Spanish Civil War and the long reign of fascist dictator Francisco Franco.
"Terrorism was like an everyday issue in my country," she said. "Americans, after Sept. 11, went through such an incredible shock because they never encountered anything like that. My point was that no matter what system you’re in, or what side you’re on, no matter what you do or where you go, war and terrorism are bad and have to be resisted. Period."
All in all, an amazing person.
As if all what she has accomplished is not enough, she shares the same last name as famous Basque defender for Bayern Munich, Bixente Lizarazu.
* You can read the whole article at Artxiboak.
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