Ep 132-134, April 2022:

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Today on Wisconsin veterans forward. It's still arts month here at the Wisconsin veterans chamber of commerce. And we are still talking about the the awesome power of the arts, visual arts of dramatic arts, musical arts spoken word you know, everything in between. But part of this, part of the reason why it's, this is valuable in veterans, military family members journey towards peace and healing and, and reintegration into society after service is it's rooted in storytelling. It gives these service members the opportunity to tell their story. Now, one way that you can capture those stories is through art, through music or whatever, but also through storytelling through through acquiring an oral history, Wisconsin has a great organization based in Madison called the Wisconsin veterans museum. And this place is incredible. I was just there for the first time, myself, not too long ago, they, their staff is awesome. Everybody there is awesome. And the facility is spec and they do a really good job of telling the story of veterans, Wisconsin, veterans throughout history, and they do it using a variety of mediums. They use visual art, they take extensive oral history like a mile long. It's just a great play. You gotta check it out. But today's guest is the curator of veteran art for the Wisconsin veterans museum. That's a heck of a position.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

She's also a service member herself. And I'm very curious to see we're gonna find out together how her journey took her to become a curator of veteran art and what that really means and what, what is what's entailed in that and how she uses her position and her expertise to share veterans stories, to help them and others on their path towards recovery and reintegration. It's really interesting stuff. I'm excited to get into it. We're gonna get into it right after this. You are listening to Wisconsin veterans forward. Wisconsin's premier audio resource for veterans, military families, veteran own owned and veteran-friendly businesses, Wisconsin veterans forward is brought to you by the Wisconsin veterans chamber of commerce at wiveteranschamber.org. Introducing my good friend. Yvette Pino. How are you?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

I am well, thank you for having me, Adam,

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

You betcha. What is that art behind you?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

This is let's see, which, where do I go? This is a painting of mine. It's called self-portrait Iraq years. So, right, right. When I got out of the military, I went back to art school and, and took a painting class and decided to use, we had to do a portrait, a self-portrait using non-traditional methodology. So those are my boots that I used while I in Iraq painting murals out in Iraq. I'll talk about that a little bit, but

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Sure. Yeah. Well, let's, let's, let's get there. I mean, I how do you become, I mean, did you grow up and you were like, you know, when I grow up, I want to be a curator of veteran art or like, did your journey, how did your journey take shape to bring you to that?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Funny enough, I didn't necessarily say I wanna be a curator of veteran art, but I always tell this story when I was five years old, my, I got a, a birthday card from a, a friend of my mom's and it, it had all when I grew up, I wanna be, and it had all these little options with check marks and at five years old, I checked off my own box that said, and I wrote other, and then I wrote, I wanna be an artist and a book writer. And I, I I have been published and I am an artist. And I think that as you talked about in the intro, the idea of storytelling is really the foundation of the work I do. And so I think even though I didn't know what a curator was as a little kid, that was where my brain was at. It's my goal now to actually help kids who in school understand the roles in the museum world, because we don't, as a kid, we don't know what a curator is. We don't know what a registrar is at a museum or a collections manager, and you might be really well suited for that and not even know that's your journey. So I think I've predicted it.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

That's something we could talk about for a long, long time, cuz you know, I, I kind of, I have a, a history in the arts myself that, you know, when kids are, you know, we, we, we support our kids as they're growing up and, and, and try to give them opportunities in the arts. Cause we know it's enriching, you know, painting and taking piano lessons and doing musicals and plays and whatnot. But a lot of times we society in general, doesn't see that like there's more opportunities out there than just like, well, you're gonna play piano until you're a famous concert pianist. Right. Or you're gonna, you know, the, the end goal for doing musicals in high school is to a movie star. Like there's so much else out there that is in those different worlds and ecosystem. So I, I think that's something that we could talk about for forever and ever. But I think it's the coolest thing that like first off you wrote your own box in. Yeah. <Laugh> instantly, you're like, you know what? I do not wanna be confined by this. I'm gonna put my own box, I'm gonna write other, I'm gonna be an artist and I'm gonna book be a book writer. I think that's awesome. And second you, you made it happen. So if that was your dream, why the military?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

I actually, my, I come from a military family. My dad was in the army and I've just got a lot of family members. You know, my granny had the wall of fame with all the different servicemen pictures. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> I was proudly the first female that made it to the wall. I wasn't the first female in our family to serve, but I was the first female that made it to granny's wall.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Okay.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

So I was really proud of my basic training picture, but I, I had wanted to serve early on and the air force I wasn't at, at the weight they wanted me to be at early on, but I, I moved forward onto a professional career in theater and I was a stage hand and I had a really good career off Broadway, but I wasn't making a lot of money. And so I, I knew to supplement my income and I, I originally went to join the reserves. One of the theaters I was doing overhire workforce. So I'd work through the night building sets in Hartford, Connecticut. And there was a recruiter's office on the lobby floor and the theater was in the basement of this big high rise in Hartford. So I'm working four jobs trying to figure out how to make ends meet.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

And I finally had just kind of had it one day after my third overnight shift and went to the recruiter's office and said, can you help me out? And they, they were gonna help me out a little bit. I was really naive thinking how that would supplement my, because I, I don't know how I thought, you know, joining army reserves was really gonna help out, but knowing what, what I made in national guard further down the road, but I, I signed up and, and had to lose some weight and, and in the interim nine 11 happened. So I, I actually ended up on active duty rather than just reserves and walked away from my theater career.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Okay. So that was probably unexpected. And then, so you

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Definitely the theater world for sure. Yeah. <laugh> yeah.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

So you get, so you get activated, you, you become active, is it AGR active reserve status or, or you just full blown, active duty?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Yeah. I switched paths. I, I told them no more reserves. I wanna go active duty all in. So I switched to signing up full time. And you know, at the time I, I say I walked away from my theater career. It was sort of at a transitional where I couldn't advance anymore without higher education. So there was a little of the stereotypical went in for the GI bill money. But I went in for active duty.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Were you able to do art or at least stay connected to art or theater or those passions while you were in the military? Or, or is it something that manifested later?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

It, it manifested a little later. I did. I think I might have told you the story, but I did sign up because I was at stage hand, I was looking for a role in the military knowing that USO tours and that there were different types of entertainment with the, in the military ranks. And the only thing that was available in my research was the band. And I, there is a technician MOS in the band, but the, the recruiter asked me what instrument I played. And I kept trying to convince them that I was the technology side of it. <Laugh> and I found, I found out around though that, that, you know, all of the band members do their own tech. And so that might be a secondary MOS, but it's not one that you just sign up to be the sound tech of the band. So I, I wasn't able to join and I wanted to do combat documentary.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Okay.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

And that wasn't available to me. I wish I would've known about the Marine Corps as a, a Marine artist role. I think you have to be as anything in the military you get in, and then you get to be a, all those perks are available or, or specialty positions are available. But I, I might have gone Marines just knowing there was actual combat artist role in, in the Marine Corps. It's a very historic,

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

That's really interesting. Yeah. I would assume that there's not a lot of them.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

No, it's like two or three. And they have, like, I think maybe one civilian has done it, but it's a historic program that goes all the way back to world war. I so

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

That's amazing.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

I'm, I, I may be misspeaking on world war. I, I think there were, I anyway, I can verify that, but it's, I just know it's got a long standing tradition that I didn't know about until my current role as the curator

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Engineer. So, so you get out of the military and you're saying, what do I wanna do when I grow up? Like most people when, when we get out of the military and you're like, you know what? I remember that, that note card that I wrote the box in artist slash author, I'm going to art school. Is that kinda how that went down?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Interestingly enough we, you know, I didn't end up getting in the military art role, but I ended up becoming a cook for reasons I can go on into for, we, we don't have enough time today to discuss why I ended up becoming a cook. But while we were in culinary school at a, I T they walked us through this world of culinary arts that I was not aware of. And there's actually competitive culinary arts teams in the military where you see these cooking shows like the, a bake off and chocolate sculpture yeah. Those exist in the military. And there's an annual international competition of military cooks and chefs that compete in the culinary arts. I have

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

You're, you're teaching me all sorts of stuff that I didn't know today. That's incredible.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Yeah. So at, at Fort Lee, they walk you through there's a giant, like life size chocolate sculptures of generals and butter sculptures. And I said, I wanna do that. Like, there's my art connection. It was like, oh, this relief, like, oh my gosh, I'll have to creative. So I was on the culinary arts team at Fort Campbell and was scheduled to compete. And we got deployed both times I was scheduled to compete. So the first time the, the entire competition got canceled because everybody deployed direct mm-hmm <affirmative>. And the second time the competition didn't get canceled, but I Fort Campbell came on under orders again. So I got, I got I didn I didn't get to compete, but, but I became a chef and studied culinary arts. And then when I got outta the military, the idea was to become a chef. So I went to culinary arts school and became a pastry chef and worked for pucks with pucks restaurant in St. Louis. And then my arms gave out, I had some really bad conditions in my arms. And I, I had to quit my job because I couldn't hold anything anymore.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Sure, sure.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

So at that led to giving everything up and sitting on my couch, wondering what I was gonna do, and art school saved me.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

So, so art school with the intent and purpose of doing arts curation or arts administration, or what you just wanted to get involved in the arts.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Yeah, I wanted to get back to, to what I has always been my sanctuary. I I've, I've been able to draw since I get hold a pencil, and that was not only my sanctuary for a career path in getting back to the arts, but I, I, I do think it saved my life. It, it, it saved me from falling into a very deep depression. And I went back to community college. So I'm, I'm an really big advocate of community college because it was especially for military members coming out because it was a, a diversity of people of age, rank backgrounds, similar to a military experience. And you have people at community college for all kinds of different reasons and was able to have a really smooth, a much more smooth transition out of the military. And I went to St. Louis community college and discovered printmaking, which was the one medium I hadn't done before. And I fell in military. That's really,

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

That's super interesting. And, and I guess I never considered that. I know a lot of folks when they come back from service, if they use their GI bill to go to a traditional, like a four year university mm-hmm <affirmative> I feel like, and this is obviously just a feeling I don't have any data to back it up, but it seems to me like 80% of the people are okay with it, but they can't stand being around a bunch of 18 year old kids. Yeah. Who don't have the same experience. Like it's like living on a different planet with people that you can't relate to. And again, this isn't a personal experience in mine, but that's just what several people, many people have expressed to me. And I think you're, I think you've got a point that community college, obviously people go to that for different reasons and in different stages of their careers are in a career transition. So mm-hmm, <affirmative>, that may be a better fit for veterans.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

It's an incredible fit for veterans. And I think it helps give you that sort of bridge to entering back to university. One of the things I have learned curating work and learning about veteran art artists over the course of time is that, you know, post world war II, we had this generation of GI bill of, of veterans using the GI bill really for the first time in, in mass and the artists that went back have a really unique experience because art school, you, you know, artists are think a little bit differently in general, right? But like you put an artist who thinks a little bit differently, but also has the life experience of whether it's combat or that military experience. And they just have a different, I think, discipline than what your 18 or 19 year old art student has. And that's, that's not, you know, anything against the kids that are in art school, just different, just different. I love their creativity, but I think post nine 11 veterans are giving the world war II veterans to run for their money in terms of returning to universities in, you know, in large groups to study and they're focused on their degree. They don't, they're not there to party. They're not there to, to have that, you know, young experience, the

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

College experience. Yeah.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Yeah. And so the, what happens is doors get opened up before them because they wanna work and the professors can see that. And so they sort of hand them the keys to the kingdom. And if you're willing and wanting you, you usually can move forward. That's not always the case. You still have to work for it and, and communicate your wants and needs. But I think that there's a lot of us that return back to school with a, a very specific vision in, in how we need to proceed or what we need. It depends on what your goal or focus is. Right.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Well, so, so you finished art school mm-hmm <affirmative> and you said it was St. Louis area. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> what brought you to Wisconsin and how did you connect with the Wisconsin veterans museum?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Yeah, I actually took two years at community college and then my spouse got, we, we got Reed to Madison for okay. For their employment. And so I was, it was perfect timing. It was my two years at community college was complete mm-hmm <affirmative> so I was ready to finish my bachelor's and I had, I had almost finished a bachelor's before I became a professional Stagen. So I just needed to finish my degree mm-hmm <affirmative> and it was perfect timing for transition. I honestly moved to Madison, not realizing the level of institution, like the university of Wisconsin. Madison is a lot of folks were surprised I got in on my first try and I was like, it's a state school. I don't understand what, what the deal is. And then, you know, really quickly I understood the caliber of institution that the university of Wisconsin is. And we are the number one,

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Not easy to get into that's

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

For sure. Right. And we're, we're the number one print making institution in the country. We've still hold that rank, which was funded by these leg. Yeah. By these legacy world war II veterans that established a monumental program here in the Midwest. So we still hold the rank of number one. So I literally out of serendipity ended up in a Nu, not a incredible university, but also a incredible printmaking museum excuse me school. And while I was looking for work study I found a flyer hanging up that said veteran work study at the Wisconsin veterans museum. You can use your, you can have veteran work study and, you know, report to the research center at the Wisconsin veterans museum. And I, I was like, what's, what's this museum. And I was really pleasantly surprised by the amazing museum that the, that the Wisconsin veterans museum is.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

It was it's incredible. I should, I shouldn't be so shocked, but we really are one of the, one of the, if not the best statewide veteran museums across the country. And you, you opened up really well with a wonderful introduction. I thank you for that, but it, I, I, I think it holds true. The sentiment holds true. It's a, mm-hmm, <affirmative>, it's an incredible institution. I went and signed up for the veteran work study and what was nice. I could do my veteran work study and that didn't take away from my Scholastic work study. So I could still do federal work study. I was able to work at the chase museum of art as the assistant and curator of education. Yeah. While I came. And then I did time at the, the veterans museum and that opened up the whole new world of curatorial process collections management what the behind the scenes of, of a museum was exposed to me that I, most people don't know all the, what goes on behind the scenes, which is an incredible amount of right. Administrative and organizational support, just to see the like 1% of the museum's collection is on display, you know, 2%.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Oh man, there's, there's so much behind it. I, and so, so for people watching, who may not know mm-hmm <affirmative>, what is an art curator? What does an art curator do?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

My primary role is to research the role of the veteran artist. We are a veteran's museum. So our work is to tell the story. Every veteran is a story with specifically Wisconsin veterans. Now I research veteran artists from around the country, but my primary goal is to seek and find out about all I can about Wisconsin veteran and their art practice veterans and their art practice. And there is a wealth of information out there, but what I found is we, we, we recent, oh, I, I guess I should preface that by a research. And then that research leads to putting together the stories that we wanna tell for exhibition per. So for example, Harold Schmitz, Milwaukee native world war II veteran served in the nine 55th topographical engineer company in world war II. Mm-Hmm <affirmative>. His daughter brought his collection, his sketchbook that she found to the museum and, and we assessed it into our collection.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

And Harold Hasson's passed on, but we, we worked with his family ex for a long, for a two year process to learn about these drawings, learn about his background, learn about who he was, learn about who the nine 55th topographical engineers were. And we were then able to put his artwork on exhibit, like you would think of any art exhibit, but what makes us unique in the way we're learning new ways to tell the veteran story is you can put the piece of artwork, but then you can put it next to the tools that were used by the map makers in the field, the cardiographic engineers to make the maps and show what Harold did while he was in the south Pacific. At the same time he was making these drawings, right? So his drawings may have nothing to do with the war.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

They might just be land these beautiful landscape drawings, but they have so much to do the subject is influenced by your surroundings, right? And that's part of his story. So that's, my job is to figure out where the stories are, how they can be presented in a way that allows for conversations to happen and to create more dialogues you know, maybe other veterans come in and say new Caledonia. I remember my grandfather telling me about every service member that, that was shipped in past the, the lighthouse and new Ionia. This is a drawing that was in Harold's sketchbook, you know, prompted story after story that maybe they never even met Harold, but now we have these new stories of other Wisconsin veterans that pass through that same path. That's what artwork can do, both, you know, we talk, I'm talking about visual artwork, but my role also,

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Yeah. It's not just visual artwork, right? I mean, it's, yeah. If anyone's ever been to this museum, you've seen it. It's not just visual art, but you actually, like, you have a, a, a library of oral history that you've recorded. And then you also have asset acquisition. Like you have uniforms of different branches throughout out history that, that, you know, a Wisconsin service member would have worn during X conflict. And, and, you know, you've, you've got planes inside of the, like, you have all sorts of different assets. Can you tell us about what it's like collecting all of those different disparate items? And, and is it, is it fun? Is it grueling? Is it hard? Is it challenging? Does, do you just happen upon things? Or how does that work?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

I think the most difficult challenge we face is the reality is we can't take everything, right. I mean, I think every possession to each veteran is special to them, but you get to a certain point in collections where you, you literally can't keep every single medallion that somebody had or every single object. And so the fun part, but the most challenging part is finding the story that's attached to the object that makes that stand out. Right. And, and doing so respectfully without negating a service member's experience, right. Saying we have a thousand world war II uniforms. I'm, that's not a, a number I'm just throwing. You

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Have a literal thousand.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

No, I mean, we, I, I, that's what I'm saying. No, don't quote me on. Oh, it's not I'm, I, I, I, I'm just saying, like, we have so many of certain objects at a certain point. We won't col continue to collect that unless there's a specific story attached to it, right? Like verifiable story too. I mean, it's history, we're telling history and we wanna tell a genuine story as well. But the thing that is, I think most rewarding now is that we are looking at the collection as a whole and saying whose voices aren't being told whose voices still need to be there. And starting a process of active collecting, which means going out and saying, you know, women should be represented too. The Latinx community should be represented too. And it's not because they don't exist. It's because we need to actively seek out the stories to tell a more diverse story.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

And we are doing that and we're, and we're, we're making great strides. And I think that there's a ton of different outreach opportunities to do that. I, I personally always use the artwork because we, we, we are able to make those connections with people. But yeah, we, I think it's just a fun part is going to our state archival preservation facility, which is where everything is housed, which is brand new. It's only a few years old and we share it with the Wisconsin historical society and to see all the objects you don't see on exhibit in the museum

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

That must be fun.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

It is fun. And it's a little overwhelming sometimes. And I think for me as a veteran, what makes it special, but also a little challenging is that you realize no matter what generation or no matter what gender, oftentimes we have the same stories as others that came before us. And as special as that is to have that connection, you sometimes it's hard for me to realize the cyclical nature of military service, it helps me examine how far we've come, how far we still need to go and where we remain right now in time. And I, I, I that's the beauty of history is that it's ever evolving and it gives us time to reflect and, and make for the future. But also as we are the, the, the responsible parties of the humanities using that to, to exchange in, in stories and in conversations that help us understand these experiences,

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

You know, you, you mentioned the sick nature of military service of conflict, of integration into the military of conflict and war and combat for many of service, and then reintegration into society and reclamation and how it seems in our nation's history. And really in many nations history, it just continues. The, the cycle just continues to move, and we keep, you know, we keep having more service members and we keep having more veterans on the other end who have mm-hmm <affirmative>, you know, who have needs that evolve over time, or have hurdles that they need to overcome that are that over time, but, but really are, are at their roots based in recovering from the horrors of war and conflict,

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Right

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

For you. How did art personally help you? You said that, you know, it helped you survive. You wouldn't have survived without art. How did that help you to overcome, to reintegrate, to recover from the horrors of deployment and war, and how do you see that art arts in general being used for other people like you in the future to get us out, move forward from that cycle? Like you said,

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Right. I mean, I think I'm very fortunate in that, you know, as an artist before I served and that creativity got me through my time and service while I was deployed, I did become the unofficial division artist. I painted murals and giant helipads and whatever they needed painted, I was assigned to paint. But so that got me through my time in, in Iraq and, and it actually the artwork producing artwork in the field led people to come and talk to me. So I was able to engage in conversations and sort of be like the local bar keep people would sort of to just unload while I was painting. And they felt comfortable enough to talk with me, which is what led me to the veteran print project, which I created while I was in undergrad and, and still run to this day and pairing veterans with artists to exchange a dialogue mm-hmm <affirmative>.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

And then the artist makes an addition of prints. That process for me, has allowed me to have something to focus on, but also it is a way for me to communicate my story and to help visualize the experience. And I mentioned before on the exhibit where it opens up new conversations, one of the values of the veteran print project is when we exhibit this artwork, the artwork itself is beautiful. That's a, a really great sentiment. I, nothing against the talent and extraordinary work that comes out of the artists that make these prints. But the conversations that happen when the work is exhibited are priced the veterans themselves communicate with a, a civilian artist. Sometimes it's a veteran artist, it just depends. And they just share a conversation and tell whatever story they want, and it's this exercise in trust. And then when the artwork is revealed the veteran gets to see their story portrayed through another's eyes, which for me, as a storyteller, participating in the project myself has been interesting because we tell our stories in a certain way, and we understand them in a certain way mm-hmm <affirmative>, but how others perceive the story we're telling it can be completely different, and it can be very eye opening to you.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

To me, maybe realize what you went through, you might not be processing or, you know, putting it all together or it allows you to also challenge somebody and say, I, I appreciate that interpretation, but I don't. I actually don't see my experience that way. I, I think we, and it, we need to have a conversation about that, right? Like not sure not everybody is broken, or even if I'm broken, don't try to fix me like all of these different elements of the veteran experience, help learning, help, civilians of veterans learn how to communicate with one another. Right. And I think that can go across the board with any human being when we have an experience that's different than our own. How do we talk about it? How do we even start that conversation? And what kind of exercise and trust is that? And that's really what the artwork does for me. Is it, it, it, it helps me create a dialogue. Sometimes it's not always the dialogue I want, but for, for whatever it's worth, it, it, it gives me room to talk or even just room to step, step back and let others talk,

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

You know, the, the arts do fulfill a military purpose and, and at least in the air force, it was called non-kinetic weaponry or non or non-kinetic or diplomatic weaponry. And, and basically the, the definition of it is that it is something that is kind of unexplainable that has the power to transcend of mm-hmm <affirmative> verbal barriers, language barriers, socioeconomic barriers, cultural barriers, political, you know, mm-hmm, <affirmative> strife. All the, the arts are away that disparate, differentiated communities can find common ground. And it really does a great job of bridging that, that gap, whether it's somebody from a different country or somebody, or your next door neighbor who may not be a veteran, or is a veteran, and you're not, and you don't, you know, there's, there's a language barrier there, there's a, there's a cultural barrier, a social barrier there. Arts are a great way to bridge that gap. Like you said, I'm really glad you said that. I wanna ask you about the veteran print project. Can you tell us about that? Cause you said you started that during your, as you were finishing your undergrad and it's something that you're continuing to do now. And I think I saw saw some of those pieces at the museum. Didn't I?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Well, so there were a couple on exhibit. We currently have a, a print exhibit on display at the museum. The, that is artists who served in the military who are print makers, mm-hmm <affirmative> from civil war to present day as part of the Southern graphics international printmaking conference, that was in Madison, in March. That was that, but several of the veteran print project prints were on exhibit. While I was in undergrad, I told you about doing my, a veteran work study at the museum. I was learning about the value of oral history. I was working with another veteran Matthew who's, a Marine Corps veteran who was doing his work study, recording oral histories. And we were trying to get the newest generation, our generation of veterans to tell their story before they forget it. That's a whole nother story about when people are ready to tell their story and, and being that that would

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Be very challenging. Yeah.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Yeah. And not try and force people that people have to be ready to be able to share that. But I was also an art student and I realized that my fellow class members, classmates, you know, we talked about these 18, 19 year old kids in art school. Yeah. They were, they were, you know, at this time this was 2009, you know, I had just done two tours in Iraq. We had been in, or in Afghanistan and Iraq since, you know, 2000 and what three, two we were in two different conflicts for a long time. At that point. I can't believe we're at the 20 year mark of nine 11 last, last year. Crazy. But these kids that I were, I was in school with didn't seem to have any connection or knowledge that we were actually at war. And they were, you know, in art school, we draw things you learn from, from appropriating, other artwork, other imagery.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

And a lot of people were drawing tanks and whatever they could find on the internet. And anytime I would see something that was military related, that was like, oh, you know, the beacon went off. Are you a veteran? Like, did you just get out to you? And they would look at me like I was from on some other planet. And they were like, no, I'm not a veteran. And I realized that there was a disconnect with the imagery that they were drawing to what was really happening in that. And my, the student veteran organiz that I was a part of, we were all starting to realize that we were self isolating. We were only sticking with each other and we were no longer wanting to engage with civilians anymore. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> I, I realized that that wasn't gonna be okay for me long term I, that isolation.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

And so the print project was a, a way to marry all my different loves together, get more people to do oral histories, get the print makers in the local print community that I was working with to get a new project and to get these artists to understand the veteran experience. That's why it's not the veteran creating the artwork. That's why the it's a, a printmaker meets a veteran, they share a conversation and then the print is made and the veteran is just sharing their story right on. That's important to me because it's about the conversation.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Right, right. That's incredible work, incredible work that you're doing. I, is there anything else you wanna share about what you're up to with with the veterans museum or anything that's, that's coming up in the future that you're excited about in the, in the veteran arts world?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Yeah, so we, you know, we talked a lot about the visual arts today, but like we mentioned, it's not just about the visual arts. We talk about music theater. We are working with piece of Crispian based outta Milwaukee. They do workshops with Shakespeare for veterans. They're coming to Madison June 4th. And we're hoping to create a long term relationship where, you know, through the museum, we can start using those workshops, the, the Shakespeare workshops across the state. Very, very cool. I know your vet vets light up the arts is coming up in may. And we're excited about that. And my ongoing role with the research looking at I'm doing a lot of research on music based practices because of that overlap of cultures that I find happens within the music community. And it's an interesting research I'm really, really in that, into that right now, and also into photography and specifically Koda Chrome prints the photographs that were done in Koda Chrome because we do have a few collections of these amazing photographs printed on Ko Chrome. So,

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Hmm. I don't even know what that is, what what's Koach Chrome.

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

So Koro is the, the color photography you might see in the like late fifties through early eighties. They no longer produce it. So you can no longer get Koach Chrome developed. It's from Kodak Kodak at Chrome Chrome, mm-hmm <affirmative> Chrome. And it's the, it's got this really specific hue. You probably might see it on a filter now, but it's a little faded, but like filter coat Chrome. Yeah. Beautiful ambers, beautiful blues. And the way they play off each other when you see a coat of Chrome print, you, you and you Koro is, you know exactly what it is. It's a very identifiable type of film and processing,

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Man. It, it sounds, I feel like we could have a five hour long conversation about this, but I, I, I tell you what, for anybody listening check out that Wisconsin veterans museum, if, if you're in Madison or if you're anywhere nearby or make it in, make a trip, make a pilgrimage out there, it really is a fantastic place. Any other closing thoughts, any things that you wanna convey here before we, we round third?

Yvette Pino - WI Veterans Museum:

Yep. Well, I say thank you again. And May 6th, this gallery night in Madison. So we'll be open late on a Friday night, May 6th. We'll be doing some live print making in the storefront window. Oh, nice. And then we have a monthly drink and draw. So if you go to our website at the Wisconsin vet, w vets, museum.com, mm-hmm, <affirmative> I teach a drink and draw of the every second Friday of the month virtually. So we have folks from around the country that actually around the world that join us for our drink and draw event, which is I teach a drawing tutorial. And, and we just have some fun with our,

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

Well thank you for, for, for sharing your story and what it is that you do. And for joining us I'll ask you to hang on the line for just one minute, so I can chat with you after the show. Good stuff, guys. Everybody watching check out the Wisconsin veterans museum. They're an awesome organization doing great, great things. The location is great. It's right there by the capital. All of their exhibits are spectacular. And like I said, all the people there are awesome, definitely worth a trip out there. And vet sharing her experience. There is just just, just the coolest and, and man, there's a lot of talent in our military. There's a lot of talent in our military. The whole idea that this stereotype that we're some sort of veterans or some like robotic, you know, worker B homogenous, hive, mind sort of thing.

Adam Braatz - WVCC:

But as wrong, there's a lot of diverse. There's a lot of diversity in the military to begin with. There's a lot of diverse talents and skill sets among the people who serve. And I would, I would love to, to work towards eliminating that stigma. Cause I think that stigma prevents people well, stereotype that's what stereotypes do they prevent? Peop they put up a barrier between people. They put up a barrier of understanding between people. So, you know, some of those veteran stereotypes, man, they gotta go. And people like like the PE folks that we've talked to at it's for all Wisconsin, Wisconsin veterans, museum, feast of Crispian, all of these awesome people are doing incredible and important work that, that, that, that disintegrates, those barriers that alleviates those stereotypes, which enables dialogue, which fosters healing and growth, which saves lives and livelihoods. This isn't some frilly ancillary like, oh, it's nice that veterans can paint like literal life saving stuff. No hyperbole. It's not an exaggeration. Appreciate y'all tuning. Thank you for listening to Wisconsin veterans forward brought to you by the Wisconsin veterans chamber of commerce. Please visit us at wiveteranschamber.org. Don't forget to subscribe to this podcast, leave a rating and review in whatever platform you're listening through.