Basilica Green Benefit Dinner

Rebecca Foon

Rebecca Foon is a musician, activist, producer, and co-founder of Pathway to Paris. In 2014, Jesse Paris Smith and Foon founded Pathway to Paris, a non-profit organization dedicated to turning the Paris Agreement into reality. Together they launched the 1000 Cities Initiative for Carbon Freedom in 2017, supporting cities in developing and implementing cutting edge climate action plans. She has performed and recorded internationally, most notably as co-founder of the modern chamber post-rock and Juno Award winning ensemble Esmerine, as a member of Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra, Set Fire To Flames, a member of Colin Stetson’s Sorrow ensemble, and her electro-acoustic songwriting project Saltland. In January 2020, Rebecca released her first album under her own name, Waxing Moon, with all proceeds going to 1000 cities.

Jesse Paris Smith

Jesse Paris Smith is a writer, musician, producer, and co-founder of Pathway to Paris. She has been performing, composing, and recording music since 2004. In 2014, she and cellist Rebecca Foon founded Pathway to Paris, a non-profit organization dedicated to turning the Paris Agreement into reality by offering tangible solutions for combating global climate change. In September 2019, along with Tenzin Choegyal and Laurie Anderson, Jesse released ‘Songs from the Bardo,’ an album inspired by the Tibetan Book of the Dead, which was nominated for the 2021 Grammy® Awards. She has been a certified Grief Support Coach since 2017. In February 2019, she released her first solo single entitled, ‘Legacies,’ with all proceeds going to Pathway to Paris. Jesse was born in Detroit, and resides in New York City.

Patrick Watson is a singer, pianist and composer. He invents uncanny musical landscapes, harmoniously mixing organic elements and electronic textures, cacophonic rock songs and pristine ballads, all held together by his omnipresent voice. The recipients of Canada’s Polaris Music Prize in 2007, in addition to JUNO and Polaris nominations, Watson and his band have toured on all continents, on occasion playing with full orchestras to bring the rich music to life. Raised and still living in Montreal, Watson has composed several scores for both film and television.

CAConrad has worked with the ancient technologies of poetry and ritual since 1975. They are the author of AMANDA PARADISE: Resurrect Extinct Vibration (Wave Books, 2021), as well as 9 other books of poetry. They received a Creative Capital grant, a Pew Fellowship, a Lambda Literary Award, and a Believer Magazine Book Award. Their play The Obituary Show was made into a film in 2022 by Augusto Cascales. They teach at Columbia University in New York City and Sandberg Art Institute in Amsterdam. Visit them online at https://linktr.ee/CAConrad88

Devesh Chandra has been learning the Tabla since the age of 3. He has learned Northern Indian Classical Music by accompanying his mother, Veena Chandra. Devesh, the youngest of six children, grew up immersed in Indian music. His first spoken words were the syllables of tabla -Dha Dha Tita. Immersed in music at a young age, Devesh is fortunate to have grownu p surrounded by iconic figures of Indian Music. Devesh accompanied his mother on her visits with the late Ustad Vilayat Khan. Ustad Vilayat Khan grew to be a grandfather to Devesh.

Rudy Shepherd’s latest work explores the nature of evil through the mediums of painting and sculpture. This exploration involves investigations into the lives of criminals and victims of crime. He explores the complexity of these stories and the grey areas between innocence and guilt in a series of paintings and drawings of both the criminals and the victims, making no visual distinctions between the two. By presenting the people first and the stories second, a space is created for humanity to be re-instilled into the lives of people who have been reduced to mere headlines by the popular press. Going along with these portraits is a series of sculptures called the Black Rock Negative Energy Absorbers. They are a group of sculptures meant to remove negative energy from people allowing them to respond to life with the more positive aspects of their personality. The series is, on the one hand, a response to living in New York City for the last twelve years and witnessing the madness that takes place in this American microcosm. At the same time, it is also an approach to political art that seeks to push the dialogue started in the late 80s/early 90s forward into 2015 by looking at the problems of society in a more comprehensive way and advancing practices culled from new-age mythology and ancient religions to heal our still divided and troubled country.  (more here)

Jim Krewson has been using airbrush as his main instrument since the age of 14. He hails from Bucks County, PA and is an art school dropout. Currently living in Catskill, NY, he did a previous residency with Basilica Hudson in 2018. He has shown with Zack Feuer’s Retrospective Gallery, Gavin Brown’s Enterprise and Andrew Kreps among others.

TROUBLE is Sam Hillmer and Laura Paris.  Trouble live and work in New York and have been active since 2006.

Sam Hillmer is a Brooklyn-based musician, artist, and curator. He is the founding member of the band Zs and one half of the art duo Trouble (with Laura Paris). He also makes music as Diamond Terrifier.  Recent collaborations include work with David Salle, Tauba Auerbach, Dirty Projectors, Laurel Halo, Arto Lindsay, and Eartheater.  Past projects include H0L0, Trans-Pecos, Wet Ink, and the SEM Ensemble, among others.

Laura Paris is a sculptor, projectionist, and installation artist.  She has shown/performed at Pioneer Works, the Queens Museum, Experimental Media Performing Arts Center (EMPAC), The Cleveland Museum of Contemporary Art, White Chappell Gallery and the Institute for Contemporary Art (ICA) in London, and Vacant Gallery in Tokyo Japan.  Laura appears frequently with her partner and collaborator Sam Hillmer as projectionist for Diamond Terrifier and ZS.  Laura is also active as an arts based community activist in Bushwick Brooklyn where she lives.