Thi/ma/li

I’m reposting this clip from one of my panels at UN COP26 in Glasgow last November, on ‘systems change for regenerative futures’. I was completely rife with anxiety the night before this session, because I knew I’d regret not getting these stats out, despite the pushback or fear I was certain it would generate. But I wrote them down and read them off anyway on behalf of my friends and colleagues who did not have this kind of access to the Green or Blue Zones at COP. Also for my family who are native to Sri Lanka/ Illankai - a tropical island nation colonized by the Portuguese, Dutch & British (stated in chronological order) - who face enormous vulnerability due to climate catastrophe. And also did it for myself, because I loathe what colonialism and capitalism have done to communities who not only deserve more, but are owed more. Most days it feels unbearable. A 0.5deg lack of commitment may not make a difference to many of us in the global North who presume we will have the resources needed to adapt. But it is life or death for a massive population percentage of the planet, and it is genocide if it is done consciously and strategically. We can talk about all kinds of issues and solutions relating to people and planet, but they all stop dead at white patriarchal extractive capitalism. Bravery, lateral thinking, creativity, compassion and love are all traits we each possess that will help us innovate to the other side of it. In my climate safe future there is no such thing as supremacy, and there are lots and lots of dance parties. Like tons. And everyone is invited. I’m extremely grateful to my co-panelists @janegoodallinst @wanjiramathai @wickesgirl and @patagonia . And in particular to @ecosia and @sophsamd for giving me the platform and the freedom to make this statement on their panel. Even after the UK government banned the video for 3 days (for swearing, 🤔), the team fought hard to get it released and shared. Happy #EarthDay everyone, for real! We are so lucky to live in this exquisitely beautiful time and place! City or sticks, let’s celebrate today and fight hard for every inch of it. With love. 🌾🌾🌾

“Global South Rising” - Thimali Kodikara @oneloudbellow The full episode is available on Cha with Laura + Leah 🍵

Our next guest on Cha 차 🍵 is Thimali Kodikara who is a multimedia artist and founder of impact media consultancy, OneLoudBellow. Thimali achieved global prominence as showrunner of the groundbreaking feminist climate solutions podcast, Mothers Of Invention-co-hosting the show with the first woman president of Ireland and former chair of The Elders, Mary Robinson and comedian Maeve Higgins. Thimali’s direction has brought Black, brown and indigenous women climate leaders to the forefront of the global climate conversation for the first time. And her impact editorial for climate justice has successfully elevated frontline women leaders to boards of directors, onto keynote stage at international fora, and unlocked new funding for their critical yet underrepresented work. 🎧 This episode is available on Cha with Laura + Leah 🍵

Since the start of the g3nocid3, sharing joy has felt trite — despite being the opposite. As we finally recognize that it’s us who are the power and the solution, I’m sharing this latergram from last November — hopefully inspiration for your own path. I was invited by the Brazilian government as a delegate to the Brazil G20 Summit, to speak on my work innovating on global climate justice impact media. The “International Seminar for Climate and Culture” in Salvador, Bahia was a breakthrough moment, as many of us have fought for culture to be recognized by international fora as a critical tool for climate preservation. As Tr*mp was leading in the exit polls, I was on a panel sharing how a decolonial art practice can put us on an authentic and sustainable path towards climate justice. I invoked Salvador’s own West African-derived spiritual practice of Candomblé as a breathing example of this. I was asked what I believe the primary obstruction to climate justice is and was able to clearly state to the room “racism and xenophobia” — at the frontlines, and in my own work life. After I was done, I ran down to the land camp where hundreds of indigenous peoples from across the state were pitched up in front of a ministry building to protest for demarcation of land. We marched onto the highway and stopped traffic. I was asked to host a public workshop days later — a deep dive of my talk. My group was extraordinary — ethnomusicologists, queer political leaders, PhD candidates, a professor of Candomblé. Three or four people came to chat after, in tears. “You don’t understand, Thimali. For someone to come here from the outside and tell us that not only are our beliefs important, they could change the world? That is everything.” The summit took place during Black Consciousness Month, a moment in my personal life that needs ten posts of its own. I saw Sonia Guajajara, a climate justice legend and now Brazil’s first Minister of Indigenous Peoples. I danced with Bahian superstar, Margareth Menezes, who now serves as Brazil’s Minister of Culture. It was an honor. Ahead of COP30 Belem I saw first-hand that the possibilities still exist — and they live in the global South.

There is not a single person, place or experience that has seen to my growth like art life. I do not mean art as commodity – I mean art as LIFE. Being an artist has only taken me home. It saved my life a thousand times over, and brought radical love a million times more. The tortured, the brave, compassionate and kind. They each emerged my family and my cause. We have gestured together in service of beauty and fundamental truth. Because to self-accept is the only legitimate route to freedom. All our gathering points in New York were erased for the white, liberal, middle-class to invest in real estate. They sat beside us and enjoyed our spiritual bounties and labor, but would not protect, participate or invest in us. Our mythologies were an adequate substitute for the real thing. This is not the “technological era”. We are living The Epoch of Artlessness. A disconnection from what is alive and holy, tying us together despite space and time. Those who perform vs. self-accept (see: “colonizer”) destroy what they cannot recognize. My radical objective (because what is good art without an objective?) is to prove, protect and celebrate all that is relatable about the lived experience. To prove is to center realities, to protect is to enable creation, and to celebrate is what it’s all for. When I get scared, I zoom out until I locate peace. This morning I remembered I’m made of stardust and I’ll die one day. I choose the route of my own pilgrimage. Choosing – not obeying – is the skill of being constantly brave. Choosing, is art life. I want you to know I remember when men wrote love songs and sung them in earnest. I have stepped into basement raves dressed for enlightenment. I remember the rooftops of Spanish Harlem – hard mattresses for serenades, sleepovers and sunrise. Ancient friendships redressed for the era. Are we ready to come home? Do we want to know what it feels like to be together again? To resist the infantilization of play? To be the god-like makers of simple joys? Because that is what art life was and what it will continue to be. As long as children are born curious, and the elders air out their fables. Art life. 02/25/2025. Brooklyn, NY.

Growing up as a British person of color, there was a clear but unspoken understanding that we would be fully accepted into every aspect of society, but only if we scraped off or hid away all of our cultural heritage and histories. Our cultures would be accepted as clothing, food, art & music. But not immigrant rights, Black liberation or economic justice. And it certainly wouldn’t be prefaced by our collective British colonial histories. Proximity to whiteness through assimilation was the only pathway to a reasonable income, let alone rightful success, and this continues to be a survival strategy for POC in the UK. While reckoning with self-disgust and cultural dysphoria in my 20’s, I became extremely depressed, unable to identify the root of the problem. But moving to New York City, I was immediately taken in by Black and brown friendships that changed my life. I was seen as a whole person, they recognized my trauma, and I went about decolonizing my life and empowering my ideas until I experienced peace I didn’t think was possible. Last night I was back in the East End of London where I lived 20+ years ago during art school. Three of the UK’s most impressive organizers @farzja , @senthelotus , and @samiadumbuya hosted a dinner for me to commune with London-based POC grassroots climate justice leaders I have respected from afar for years. Eating healthy food with folks doing the work from the ground up, on behalf of everybody in the country, and with their global South families (who continue to survive British colonial aftermath) front of mind, was everything I dreamed of having growing up in the UK. Land rights, government policy, decolonizing design futures and museums, indigenous arts... The feeling is pride and possibility. It is a total honor to watch the hard work, creativity, future visioning, and love within this community. I suspect that most people reading this will never be able to comprehend what it has taken for these everyday heroes to get here. But the folks you see have devoted their lives to our collective safety and happiness. Please follow every one of them and their groundbreaking organizations. This is the work. This is the leadership. 🧡

It’s my birthday. This day falls on the Vernal Equinox, is the International Day of Forests, marks the cusp of the oldest and youngest signs of the Zodiac, and my name means “small garland of flowers”. 🪷🌳🪻🌳🌸🌳🌺🌳🌷🌳🌻 I always thought I’d accidentally fallen into this work, but I guess the joke’s on me. This year my friend @claudiaillustration and I made a spontaneous trip into the Hudson Valley to nap in bright sun on spongy moss, stomp on crunchy, Weetabix-sounding pine cones, listen to a cacophonous frog chorus, and gawp at the radical perfection of first snowdrops and daffodils, before journeying on home. One of the reasons I love New York to my bones is that seasons still come exactly on time, and look and feel just as they did in picture books.

I’ve been a field producer for Getty Images New York for more than a decade. It’s been the most New York City job you could imagine. I’ve found myself front row, backstage, and first-up on red carpets in all of the most beautiful and legendary venues in this city. Unlike my justice work, it’s represented the end of my personality that loves drama, beauty, and nostalgia. The vapid superficiality has been the most boring part, but has also made this work one of my favorite anthropological studies on the human experience. I’ve learnt a lot about idolatry, and what we’ve chosen to value as a society. I learned to be bigger than a celebrity’s aura to hone their respect and attention before it’s dragged off in another direction seconds later. And it’s harder than you think. I’ve interviewed hundreds of actors like Robert De Niro, Meryl Streep, Denzel Washington, Viola Davis, and George Clooney. Directors like Steven Spielberg, Spike Lee, Kathryn Bigelow, and Danny Boyle. Musicians like Pharrell Williams, Janelle Monae, Missy Elliott, and Lizzo. Leaders like Stacey Abrams, Maxine Waters, Gloria Steinem, and the late greats John Lewis and Harry Belafonte. My first interview was with Rachel Brosnahan, who told me I had beautiful hair and put me at ease. The most unforgettable meeting was with Stephen Hawking. The most intimidating was with Michael Shannon (but I made him laugh). The most philosophical was with Gabriel Byrne. The interviews I almost had but didn’t were with Michelle Obama and RBG. And I even interviewed Chris Rock and Will Smith a few days before last year’s headline news. The rudest, creepiest, and most drunk/high interviews I’ve done? Well, ask me next time you see me. 😜 I used to think it was hella cheesy to ask for selfies, but in recent years I’ve deferred to, *fuck it*. Because, frankly I grew up in Surbiton, yeah? Also I needed proof for the kiddos. So here are a few fun ones from over the years. Any famous people you wanna know about? Writers? Royalty? Astronauts? War criminals? Sending love and luck to my awesome Getty family in LA who will be working their asses off into the early hours. Happy Oscars night everyone!✨

Last August, I spoke on a panel regarding climate storytelling at the Edinburgh TV Festival. BBC Chairman #RichardSharp happened to be in conversation with the great @davidharewood on the same stage our panel was due to be on next. So I watched with my co-panelist and friend, actor @fehintibalogun . Harewood bravely described how he couldn’t grow his career in the UK because the British film & TV industry was broadly uninterested in hiring people of color. And that after limited success in the UK, moving to New York was where he was able to thrive. Sharp’s response was that he would like to create more opportunities for POC at the BBC, but was delighted that British actors of color were finding work outside the UK. *Fehinti & I glance at each other in deep POC side eye* Before our panel goes on, Sharp walks into the green room bringing the energy to forced attention. “Interesting talk”, I decide to tell him. “Did you think so?”, he asks. To me he sounds like he knew he hadn’t answered Harewood’s questions adequately. “There’s a whole lot more you could do though.” I like the feeling of audacity I have when I know I’m right. “Okay. Leave your card with my assistant and we’ll set up a meeting.” Oh hell yeah. Let’s do this. Sure enough his assistant immediately reached out to connect. But after I shared my bio [“feminist”, “Black/brown/indigenous”, “climate crisis”, “Bernie Sanders” — mmm, not your Priti or Suella shade of brown] I received radio silence. I sent follow-up e-mails that remain unanswered. I knew I was lucky to have this opportunity, but I was qualified to have it. I presumed I’d have to fight tooth and nail to hold down my side of the argument. But what happened was more on-brand for this fragile variegate of British conservatism. Sharp stood in front of the TV industry, to whom he is accountable, claiming to want to do better. And in the very next motion, in private, did the opposite. No excuse made. I was just.. ignored. The BBC is a beautiful public asset we MUST defend while reminding it’s gatekeepers they work in service of British people, and not the Tory party. In solidarity with @garylineker . 🌿

I was 21 yrs old when I embarked on a 1.5 month, East Coast road trip with friends. 9/11 happened halfway. We were trying to get to Mexico, but when the borders closed we were stuck in New Orleans for 7 days. In retrospect this was protection from the universe because most of that trip was my eye opener to American racism. Until that point I thought racists were hilarious and pathetic, and felt so sorry for them. NOLA was the safest, most magical place I could have been. I found myself in a celebration of life over free rice n’ beans at Vaughan’s. I was invited to get up and sing with Trombone Shorty as the sun set on the day. (I didn’t, I was too shy.) I will save all the psychedelic details of this trip for my book. But 3 weeks later I came back to London via New York, which now stunk of burnt plastic and sadness. Disoriented and unable to be around people who didn’t understand what I’d experienced, I quit art school for a year and moved to New York for 3 months to try on my love of photography. A friend suggested I meet @baxxbailey who needed help on a photo shoot in SoHo. I excitedly rocked up to a huge, sunlit loft above what is now Best Buy on Broadway. She opened the door and said, “You’re okay with partial nudity, right?” I was like, *um, witf have I just walked into??* and also, *I’m a good South Asian girl so obviously not*. But instead I said, “Sure!” because she was a rare bird native New Yorker, evidently the coolest person I’d ever met, and I didn’t want to come off a prude. A calligrapher painted Brooke’s poetry on me, and did the same to more of her friends that day. She published them in a stunning book, and that was the start of our decades-long feminist friendship. With our friends, we forged an historic art and music community from our apartments and radical underground spaces in Williamsburg & Bushwick. Folks you’ve likely seen on stages and in galleries all over the world by now. Messy and liberating pre-cursors to my NYC move 2 years later. I’m feeling a whole lot of love for my younger self, my current self, and my wondrous life journey between. Happy Valentine’s Day, y’all. Life is hard. Don’t compromise on living out your love story. 🧡

Great chat at the Edinburgh TV Festival yesterday! A mad amount of ground covered with wonderful panelists in a very short hour! Extra shouts to my new favorite human and partner in climate storytelling crimes, @fehintibalogun I was invited to re-join the jury to redesign the #edtvawards new #ClimateImpactAward this year. It was a stunning improvement from the “Green Award” submissions we received last year. Proof that the UK TV industry is finally on its way! I am grateful to the awards organizers and my fellow jurors for recognizing the importance of including climate justice in submissions criteria. As we work to end plastic usage and protect green spaces in the UK, let’s not forget that above all we’re here to make sure humanity not just survives but thrives into the next century. Time to get to work! 🌿 📸 @teganjaimie #stephengarrett #fehintibalogun #danmcdougall #craighunter #lucyeasthope #edtvfest

🎧 This week’s episode with Thimali Kodikara (@oneloudbellow ) is LIVE! 🎧 Saadia (@kh_saadi ) and Thimali talked about the elephant in the room: climate change. Their conversation covered everything from the feminist perspective of climate change to how whitewashed climate policy is. 🎧 Listen to the full episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts! . . . . #immigrantlypod #podcastersofinstagram #podnation #womenpodcaster #pocpodcast