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Aqua Moon Candy
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Geeze ok, bullet points then. But first, right, remember this is an audience of people who are either upper crust enough or artistic enough to be invited. Skip on the cliches and platitudes, and don't try appealing to idealism. They're probably waiting for you to get political, too, so don't. Not overtly, anyway. And don't make it too long, they're not here to listen to you.
1. Introduce self. Make some crack about how you're not used to public speaking because you normally work face-to-face, "or face to something, anyway", if you're feeling brave.
2. Demonstrate a bit of the scholar. Talk about the positive history of cultural cross-pollination. How, when different cultures meet, innovations have always followed - artists reaching out to adopt new methods, new symbols, new ideas, and mix them with what they already knew to produce something even better. And that this isn't only limited to art, but to other things - the creation of some of our favourite foods, or on a more practical level, the discovery of new technologies and aptitudes. Maybe mention how historians and anthropologists have commented on the way that, in just a few decades, the native americans of the Great Plains went from never having seen horses to becoming the greatest horsemen on the continent, as if there had been a hole in their culture just waiting to be filled. Say how these kinds of developments are already beginning, and that you expect to see much more, on both sides of the portals.
3. Talk about how easy it is for most people on Earth to see Golboria as one cultural monolith, twisted together out of the four races of Visitors. Say how, though the Kariket did his best to smooth over the differences across his dominion (neutral language here, only slight sense of disapproval in context), anyone who puts thought into sees this can't have always been, and indeed cannot even now be the case; that you've enjoyed seeing the evidence of that with your own eyes and that more evidence is right here, in this gallery today.
4. Say, you can't define art as having a specific purpose, but that one of the things it can do is inspire - inspire not only new art but also ideas, feeling and action. Say you hope everyone here will take away some inspiration with them today (don't suggest what kind of inspiration, just inspiration). For the final, soft touch of a little political crusading, maybe say that after hearing the story behind it you're especially looking forward to seeing Pirgatea's Rebuke, and you're sure any of the Visitors here today would be happy to tell anyone what you mean if asked.
5. Finally, say that speaking of inspiration, here's a lady who's inspired you in too many ways to talk about, your date for the evening - Megumi!
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