This Moment in America: Artists in the Heartland

(soft music) (soft music continues) (gentle music) - [Narrator] It is not surprising.

When the United States became a nation, much of our art was political.

After all, we were revolutionaries.

Paintings celebrated the events and the leaders who secured our independence.

Today, we are 340 million people.

340 million distinct voices.

Under this big tent we call the United States, artists are telling their stories.

They're capturing this moment in America.

(gentle music) - My name is James Pate, and I'm a visual artist, a fine artist, and a gallery owner, and I'm based here in Dayton, Ohio.

(gentle music) - We're the The Montvales.

We're a singer-songwriter duo.

I'm Molly Rochelson.

- I'm Sally Buice.

- My name is Steven Bognar.

I'm a documentary filmmaker based in Southwest Ohio.

And I feel really lucky every day that I get to do this job.

(gentle music) My dad was a refugee and an immigrant.

He came to the United States from Hungary.

He had fought in the 1956 Hungarian uprising against the Soviet Union, and he ended up in Belgium in a refugee camp.

There, he met my mom, who was a young woman from Belgium.

And the two of them, both immigrants, came to the US, settled in New York City, at first had restaurant jobs.

And then 20 years later, my dad has a PhD, my mom runs an adult daycare center, and me and my brother are growing up in Beavercreek, Ohio, a suburb of Dayton.

- We both grew up in Knoxville, Tennessee, close to the Smoky Mountains.

And there's a long, rich musical tradition there.

- I think it was R.B.

Morris called Knoxville the Bermuda Triangle of the Appalachians 'cause it's kind of a strange little place.

It's a lot of different cultures meet there, it's like Appalachia, but also the south.

and it's also a university town.

- [Narrator] In 2021, The Montvales relocated to Cincinnati.

(traffic droning) - [Sally] We just love Cincinnati.

- [Molly] We live in a really walkable neighborhood with neighbors who care about each other.

- [Sally] And we just felt so welcomed, especially by the music community there.

(gentle music) - [Narrator] James Pate's story began in Birmingham, Alabama.

- My mom passed away and her dad was living in Cincinnati.

I have six siblings, and he came down and got us, didn't want us to get separated and become orphans scattered around.

So I admire him for that.

He brought us up to Cincinnati on a Greyhound bus.

I fell asleep, and when I woke up, I was in Cincinnati.

(laughs) I just gotta hear that rock 'n' roll (gentle string music) - Music is such a part of the fabric of my life and always has been.

My mom is a singer.

She grew up singing around the house and in church and in choir a lot, and always had a lot to say about the transformative nature of singing.

(gentle guitar music) And I started writing little songs by myself really early on, not that I showed to anybody, but it was just kind of a language I feel like I was born speaking.

It felt more natural than anything else I've ever tried to do, and I'm really grateful for that.

(gentle string music) - My mom played hammer dulcimer and mountain dulcimer and fiddle and banjo.

I didn't come around to like playing Appalachian music until I was a teenager.

And even then, I think I got a little bit tricked into it because a family friend was like, "I'll teach you the right way to play banjo."

(gentle string music) And it was the like traditional Appalachian claw hammer way and I learned a bunch of old fiddle tunes.

And then, I was like, "Oh, actually I do love this."

I was very much brought into the fold.

- I didn't really come to Appalachian music prior to playing with Sally.

- I got pulled in and then I pulled her in.

(both laughing) - And I always found myself in a really rich, artistic environment.

- [Narrator] Growing up in Cincinnati, James attended the School for the Creative and Performing Arts.

- Since art had captured my imagination, I figured I would just hone in on the artistic skill and build a skill up to a place where I could, you know, get paid for doing it.

I'd already gained a certain level of maturity, you know, artistically speaking.

So I had a quiet confidence.

- Like many kids of my generation, I saw "Star Wars" and it blew my mind, and I wanted to make films.

And I thought I was gonna be writing scripts and trying to be a little Spielberg, but when I discovered documentary, that all changed for me.

I was 19 years old and I found this book that changed my life.

The book is called "The Americans."

It's a book of photographs by the photographer Robert Frank.

It is a chronicle of America in the 1950s.

Gritty, beautiful, and with such poetry.

And I realized real life is so much more compelling than any screenplay I could ever try to write, or any kind of little sci-fi scenario I could try to put together.

And from that point on, I was drawn to documentary.

That book made me wanna be in the world.

- [Narrator] The Montvales were also ready to put themselves out there.

- We started busking in Knoxville's Market Square.

- [Sally] It really set up our friendship and it felt like a low-pressure way to play in front of people.

We were just adding to the cacophony.

(gentle guitar music) - [Narrator] But it was more than that.

They were developing a musical skill that was passed on to them, with love.

- I remember like the day my mom taught me to start singing harmonies in the car.

She was like, "This is really fun.

You're gonna wanna be able to do this."

The dark and silent plains of Ohio As far as my tired eyes can see I just keep 'em fixed on the road up ahead And for miles we don't say a thing - [Sally] My brother and dad both love singing.

And one day, similar to Molly's story, my brother was like, "We're gonna teach you to sing harmonies."

Say what you want, but that ain't us - I remember being furious that it was so hard, I was motivated by this competitive energy with my older brother, like, "If he can do it, I have to be able to do it.

(Molly laughs) Down by the river in the snow and the mud (gentle guitar music) Oh Oh Oh Oh, oh, oh - My dad fought in a revolution.

That's him, talking about his peppers.

The first film I made as a so-called, you know, professional, young professional documentary filmmaker was about my dad.

- What does he weigh- - [Steven] Back then, my dad was hard to figure out.

He was determined to prove that he was more Hungarian than any guy in town.

But then he'd watch Monday Night Football, like every guy in town.

He'd sit in that same chair each night and he looked pretty comfortable.

So maybe this Hungarian exile, expatriate stuff was just for show.

(birds chirping) Then he surprised us.

Three decades after he left Hungary, my dad announced he was going back.

It was coming up on the 30th anniversary of the Hungarian Revolution.

My dad was gonna walk the streets of Budapest on the exact day of the anniversary.

(gentle music) Now, this was during an era known as the Cold War.

Back then, our President took a measured approach to foreign policy.

- We begin bombing in five minutes.

- In Hungary, you could be arrested for talking about the revolution, let alone doing what my dad was gonna do.

(gentle music) I was 23 years old, I was clueless, I was very enthusiastic, and I went to Hungary with my dad and like, everything went wrong.

And all the footage I shot was confiscated by the authorities.

(switch clicks) I felt like a failure.

It was a huge mess of a film.

I felt like I was never gonna solve all the storytelling problems.

For many years, my wonderful partner, Julia Reichert and I made films together.

At that time, Julia could have swooped in and tried to save me, you know, 'cause she was a veteran filmmaker.

She had a lot of skills I didn't have.

But she knew I had to earn that film.

She knew I had to flounder and get lost and not quit.

It took years of editing to solve all the problems.

Now, in the end, the film came out in 1996, 10 years after I went to Hungary.

It was lucky to premiere at Sundance.

It ended up on the great PBS show POV, and it was fine.

It was a success.

I had a lot of hunger to learn how to do this.

For an artist, the hunger is what matters.

(gentle music) - [Narrator] James Pate has the hunger and something else.

- Courage.

(laughs) Yeah, yeah.

It takes some courage.

One of the objectives of being an artist is to be distinctive, you know, to have your own voice.

You experiment, you work so that you can make these discoveries that could separate you from your fellow artist, just to have a voice.

I would say that Techno-Cubism is my trademark.

I use a technical pen, same pen that drafters and architects will use.

And after breaking up the form and cubilizing the form, I would then paint and feel the image with lines.

And since it's very structural in its nature, it ends up having this sort of architectural quality about it.

It has a certain look, and you would look at it and you would say to yourself, "Yeah, that's a James Pate."

(gentle music) - [Narrator] That's special place.

Every artist seems to have one.

Front Street, an old Dayton industrial complex is now the city's premier art hub.

It's also that special place for James Pate.

- My space on the second floor, you know, has large windows, so I get a lot of good natural light.

Every time I step into the space, I get that kind of feeling like, this is where I'm supposed to be.

(laughs) This is seriously my sanctuary.

- [Narrator] Sometimes that special place is behind a camera.

- I love filming.

I love the process of being behind a camera, and looking for the angle, and trying to be there when something happens and where the light is perfect.

And I love getting up pre-dawn.

I'll go looking for dawn shots, or sunset shots where an angle, a street, an alley I haven't seen before.

It's exhilarating when you get lucky and you find it.

There's a brake for emergencies But that never worked out - [Narrator] And sometimes that special place is everywhere.

- [Molly] We have been touring all over the United States for like the last three years.

(door thuds) I love the rhythm of life on the road.

- [Sally] I think we've both always been pretty restless and excited to have new experiences.

- It feels like a really important part of the creative process, to me, to like go out there and see things and talk to people and sort of like report back through art.

Oh, oh, ooh Oh, ooh - [Narrator] While the touring can be exhilarating, the creative process is fraught with chaos and mystery.

- You can spend a lot of like mornings banging your head against the wall trying to write.

(gentle guitar music) It can feel like it's not going anywhere until eventually, a song comes out of nowhere.

(gentle guitar music) I've been a believer since I was a child Caught up in neon and heartbreak and dreams - Sometimes it feels like a trap to be like sitting actually with my guitar for too long.

Like, I do a lot of like getting up and like walking and going other places.

Like, it almost feels like I have to like play hard to get with it a little bit or something.

It's like I have to like give it space and then come back.

It's the most chaotic process ever.

Every single song is different.

It's the most mysterious process in the world, maddeningly so.

Keep in time That beautiful Tennessee Waltz - [Narrator] Chaos just seems to be part of the equation.

- Something's always going wrong.

And I love that about it, because it's very alive.

And there are moments when enough things go right that like magic can happen on camera, and someone, some truthful, human, beautiful moment happens on camera.

- I never cried leavin' a job before in my life.

- [Interviewer] What was the hardest thing?

- Saying goodbye.

To everybody I work with.

Just huggin' all your friends and sayin' goodbye.

- [Interviewer] What would you say to them?

- I love you.

- You make the movie from all those rare, good moments, but you remember all the times you screwed up far more.

You know, and so I carry my failures with me as like traveling companions, to remind me of all the things, you know, are the batteries charged?

Did you clean that lens?

Are you in the right place?

Did you call that person?

(phone ringing) That person call you back?

That's the challenge and the joy all in one.

(traffic droning) - We were both raised in East Tennessee by southern parents.

And my experience in high school was pretty much being surrounded by folks with really different beliefs than me.

I felt very like fortified at home by family that really taught me to value everyone and like value human rights.

- Art is a really great way to channel those feelings.

- And Molly wrote a song called "Bad Faith" about abortion a few years ago.

And we put it out after the Planned Parenthood in Knoxville, Tennessee got burned to the ground by a arsonist.

Well, the State of Tennessee Gave you extra time to think About that choice you made the second you found out So you waited and you prayed For it all to go away Anything but this to cry about - And people have warned us, "Oh, don't play that song in this conservative area."

Or "Be careful what you say."

They're yellin' from the sidewalk Or they're buildin' signs along the interstate - In terms of like talking about abortion on stage, I was thinking about how common sense in America can tell us don't talk about anything controversial.

And often that means not talking about anything until it's far too late.

- It's easy to see who benefits from us not talking about politics and who gets thrown under the bus.

- [All] Abortion!

Safe and legal.

Abortion.

Safe and legal.

- Julia used to say, "We're citizens with cameras."

And we felt like the stories of working people, blue-collar people, whatever you wanna call 'em, they matter, and they need to be told.

When General Motors announced they were gonna close the GM plant in Dayton, Ohio, the great truck and bus plant, Julia and I were lucky to make a film called "The Last Truck," which is on HBO.

And that film chronicles the last six months of this once great factory in Moraine, just south of Dayton.

And those jobs were good union jobs that funded a blue-collar middle class in Dayton, Ohio.

- [Interviewer] Do you know what's next for you?

- No.

- It really didn't sink in, until I gave up my badge.

- [Narrator] Those jobs mattered so much.

- This has been my life, you know.

I'm a factory worker.

I'm proud of it.

(gentle music) - [Narrator] We realized this is a chance to try to ask profound questions about where's the American dream?

Is the American dream still attainable, or is the game rigged now against working people?

(gentle music) - As an artist, we've got these outlets to sort of vent these feelings.

With the hope that we could influence some change.

(gentle music) I produced this series of charcoal drawings, of the subject of black-on-black crime.

And it was called a Kin Killin' Kin, and it was a metaphor for the KKK, the Ku Klux Klan.

Because I had so many conversations in the African American community where it's like we're doing the Klan's business, because the Klan used to be the one that would hunt us down and want to kill us.

So I set out to imagine how that would look in a literal sense.

And so I dressed up perpetrators in traditional Ku Klux Klan outfits.

And I just had the perpetrators just sort of going at it.

So I was sort of throwing a tantrum, you know, through these pieces.

I was so hurt and upset about it to where, you know, that was the only thing I could do to express it.

I wanted youth to look at those images and hopefully just reflect on their own lives.

It managed to tour around the country for I think eight or nine years.

Some people were feeling a little embarrassed by it, if though I was airing dirty laundry or something like that.

And I'm more or less trying to go to the laundromat.

- I spent a year teaching English in France, like not long after college, and my brother brought his daughter to come visit me, and I got to take her to the ocean for the first time, my niece.

She was a tiny toddler then, and it was really sweet getting to like watch her fall in love with this big wild place.

Hey there, Lou When I look across the desert all I see is you And in my eyes You go on forever, so I guess that's why It's gotta turn out all right - [Sally] At the time I wrote this song, I was looking at one of many series of threats to public land and thinking, I really hope all of these places are still around for her as she grows up and the next generation.

I'm really not sure how it's going to turn out all right, but I'm committed to keeping that vision that somehow it will and I'm committed to doing my best.

- We thought we would never go into that factory again.

Seven years later, Cao Dewang, the chairman of Fuyao, the largest automotive glass manufacturer in the world, bought that old, dead GM plant and brought it back to life as the Fuyao Glass America factory, making windshields for all the big car manufacturers.

And Julia and I were invited to make a documentary about the rebirth of that factory, and that film became "American Factory."

That film was lucky to premier at Sundance, where it got picked up by Netflix.

And a year later, the film was lucky to win the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.

And that was a huge honor, a huge honor.

(gentle music) - [Narrator] Sometimes inspiration can come from the simplest thing.

- Ayo's Chair, it's a sort of a male-driven piece, and it's my son, Ayo, when he was three years old.

And to this day, you know, he's a prolific reader, you know, at 10 years old.

And so he was sort of perched upon a chair reading and I took a picture of it, and not knowing that I would produce it and have it lead on to a piece of work that has won a couple of best-in-shows in jury competition.

The legs of the chair, it occurred to me, could be figures.

So I ended up putting four male figures, one African American, one Native American, one more Asian-looking, and then another who's like a police officer.

And then the crossbars of the chairs is their hands being locked together.

So the statement behind the piece is, I just have a hope and an expectation for society to treat my child as theirs, the way that I would treat their child.

- [Narrator] But hopes and expectations are not always fulfilled.

In the background, artists are memorializing George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Emmett Till.

(gentle music) (soft music) - So this country, 250 years, still trying to figure it out, still have a lot to learn, obviously have done some exceptional stuff, but just like I would critique myself, I would say, you know, we've gotta do a better job.

- It's a really scary time to be in America.

We are just like trying to find ways to look out for our neighbors and we have to unlearn this myth that we are separate from one another.

That people in power have tried so hard to make us believe.

- It's like incredibly heartbreaking and tough to watch, but it also shows us that people know how to take care of each other and that neighborhoods and communities really can come together.

- Right now, we're in a time of billionaires.

And it is just a game that's been rigged against ordinary people.

In the 1950s and '60s, we had labor unions all over the country that gave good paying jobs, and had job protection for people.

Look where we are now.

It's like factory jobs don't pay what they used to.

You can't afford a home anymore.

There's economic pressures on everybody.

Going back to my mom and dad, the values that they came to this country with were about fairness.

And a lot of immigrant parents tell their first-generation kids to be a good American, you gotta work hard and you gotta give.

You can't just take.

There's too many takers in this world.

I try to ask myself now, how am I gonna use my privileges to help this country be better?

'Cause that's the job.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (soft music) (soft music continues) (bright music)