Casa Libre en la Solana

6/10 Fundraiser at Hotel Congress Hannah Levin, Host of The Home Stretch on KXCI and Ambassador of Rock, is organizing a musical feast to benefit Casa Libre

5/21 May Fair Weather Reading Series w/Annie Guthrie & Janice Lee
more info...

4/23 Fair Weather Reading Series w/ Alexandra, Lisa Birman & Elizabeth Frankie Rollins
more info...

3/19 Fair Weather Reading Series w/ Teresa Carmody & TC Tolbert
more info...

2/20 Fair Weather Reading Series w/ Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha & Danielle Cadena Deulen
more info...

2/20 Surviving As Choose Your Own Adventure Novel: A Writing Workshop for Queer and Trans People Of Color with Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha
more info...

1/16 Fair Weather Reading Series w/ Joshua Jennifer Espinoza & Hannah Ensor
more info...

11/21 Fair Weather Reading Series w/ Roger Bonair-Agard & Logan Phillips
more info

11/15 Timeless Infinite Light Presents: The Sleeping Together Tour w/Emji Spero, Joel Gregory, & Félix Solano Vargas
more info...

10/31 The Meat on the Bones: a writing workshop with Lidia Yuknavitch
more info

10/31 Fair Weather Reading Series w/ Lidia Yuknavitch & Aisha Sabatini Sloan
more info

5/30 The Nuts and Bolts of Freelancing Workshop a writing workshop w/ Heather Severson and Wynne Brown
more info...

5/20 Edge Reading w/César Degollado & ConDanza Repertoire Company, Jeevan Narney,
and Katherine E. Standefer
more info...

5/2 From Farm to Poem: a 3-course locally-sourced dinner at 5 Points Market & Restaurant to benefit Casa Libre w/ live music played by Samantha Bounkeua and Kate Haverly, and poetry performances by Stephanie Balzer and Sommer Browning
more info...

4/28 Trickhouse Live w/Aisha Sloan, Beth Alvarado, & Lisa O'Neill
more info...

4/26 Ancestral Landscapes: Writing Physical Memory a writing workshop w/ Khadijah Queen
more info...

4/25 Courting Risk a reading series curated by Khadijah Queen with Khadijah Queen, Bill Wetzel, Kristen Nelson, Shelly Taylor, Amy Lukau, TC Tolbert and Naomi Benaron
more info...

4/22 Edge Reading w/Teré Fowler-Chapman, Estella Gonzalez, & Margaret Regan
more info...

4/13-5/18 Penning the Nasty (the tender, the sweet): An Exploration into Writing Sexuality
a writing workshop w/ Kati Standefer
more info...

3/25 Edge Reading w/Xander Felton, Ben Rutherfurd, & Matthew Schmidt
more info...

3/2-3/30 Let it Move Through You: How to Write through Resistance in the Personal Narrative, a writing workshop w/Em Bowen
more info...

3/1 Edge Indigogo Campaign is fundraising to bring writers Ocean Vuong & LaTasha N. Nevada Diggs to Tucson
more info...

2/24 Trickhouse Live w/Elizabeth Denneau, Isaac Kirkman, & Kristen Stone
more info..

2/21 AUTOPOIESIS Winner's Choice Raffle and Artist Reception at Cafe Passe
more info...

2/20-2/22 My Own Small Self: writing childhood from multiple sources a writing workshop w/ Kristen Stone
more info...

2/21 Quiet as Creative Force: dismantling the language of writer's block and the materiality of composition, a lecture & writing workshop w/Ocean Vuong
more info...

2/2-2/23 An Act of Tremendous Limitation a poetry and prose workshop w/Brody Wood
more info...

1/23 Trickhouse Live w/ Susan Briante Emily Carr, & Malachi Black
more info...

12/12 Trickhouse Live w/ Tom Cho, Stephanie Jo Brunson, & Sam Ace
more info...

12/10 Edge Reading w/Javetta Laster, Farzana Marie, & Anton Smith
more info...

11/21 Stjukshon: An Indigenous Reading Series w/Alex Beeshligaii, Ian Ellasante, & Andrea Hernandez Holm
more info...

11/19 Edge Reading w/deborah brandon, Cynthia Schwartzberg Edlow, & Melanie Madden
more info...

11/11 & 11/18 Alternative Forms for Essay and Memoir
a writing workshop w/ Erin Zwiener & Will Slattery
more info...

11/4 Trickhouse Live w/Jo Anderson, Shawn Finn, Joel Gregory, Elizabeth Salper & Emji Spero
more info...

11/1 Trickhouse Live w/William Sedlmayr, Abraham Smith, & Shelly Taylor
more info...

10/22 Edge Reading Series: w/Jia Oak Baker, Roberto Bedoya, & John Myers
more info...

10/14 Trickhouse Live
w/Justin Bigos, Erin Stalcup, Bojan Louis, & Sara Sams
more info...

10/4 Heatwave: curated by Jill Lorenzini (a Manifest Your Dream Contest winning event)
more info...

9/30 Where We're Going We Don't Need Roads
w/Sybil Lamb, Casey Plett, and local authors
more info...

9/26 Stjukshon: An Indigenous Reading Series w/Adrian L. Jawort, Cinnamon Spear, Luella N. Brien, & Pumpkin Vyne Singers
more info...

9/17 Trickhouse Live: An Integrative Arts and Performance Series
w/Richard Siken, Bill Wetzel, & Ken White
more info...

9/10 Edge Reading Series w/Julie Hampton, Tyler Meier, & Joseph P. Wood
more info...

7/16 Edge Reading Series w/Jade Beall, Beth Braun and the Esperanza Dance Project, & Karen Falkenstrom
more info...

5/21 Edge Reading
w/Gregory Colburn, Justin Petropoulos, & Tygel Pinto
more info...

4/19 The Writers Studio Tucson Presents: The Advanced Workshop Spring Reading
more info...

4/16 Edge Reading
w/ Allyson Boggess, Ian Ellasante, & Ashley Tsosie-Mahieu
more info...

4/11 & 4/12 Collaborations Workshops
w/Jill Darling, Hannah Ensor & Laura Wetherington
more info...

4/12 Trickhouse Live
w/Jill Darling, Hannah Ensor & Laura Wetherington
more info...

3/26 Edge Reading w/Michael Dauphinais, Teré Fowler-Chapman, & Sharon Suzuki-Martinez
more info...

2/22 Casa Libre 10th Anniversary Gala buffet dinner, cash bar, performances, documentary screening, music and celebration
more info...

2/19 Edge Reading w/Cory Aaland, Stephanie Balzer & Farid Matuk
more info...

2/13 Stjukshon w/Karen W. Olson, Mario Matus Villa, & Joshua Cochran
more info...

2/4 Trickhouse Live w/Brody Wood, Em Bowen, Samantha Bounkeua, & Jimmy Carr
more info...

1/22 Edge Reading w/ D. Phillip Clifford, Melissa Goodrich & Sara Sams
more info...

1/15 Trickhouse Live w/David Buuck, Juliana Spahr, & Cynthia Spencer
more info...

12/14 Family Dinner; the intricacies of sustenance a writing & cooking workshop w/ Emily Stern
more info...

12/11 Edge Reading:
w/Ari Belathar, Elena Díaz Björkquist, & Meg Wade
more info...

12/6 Stjukson Reading Series w/Laura Tohe, Kenneth Dyer-Redner, and Malo Jones & The Jonestown Band
more info...

11/20 Edge Reading: w/Susan Briante, Bojan Louis, & dg nanouk okpik
more info...

10/22 Writing Brave and Free: a writing group organizational meeting w/Steve Cox
more info...

10/21 Trickhouse Live
w/ readings by Danniel Schoonebeek & Joshua Marie Wilkinson and music by John Melillo & Johanna Skibsrub
more info...

10/16 Edge Reading: w/Amrit Donaldson, Allie Leach, & Lusia Slomkowska
more info...

10/8 O Balthazar Presents w/Valerie Hsiung, Maria Anderson, Margaree Little, and Farid Matuk
more info...

9/25 Edge w/Drew Burk, Zami Tinashe Hyemingway, & Julie Lauterback-Colby
more info...

9/14 Stjukshon: an indigenous reading series
w/Kristiana Kahakauwila, Jody Thompson, Stephanie Cortes, & John Bird
more info...

7/18 The poem as document: writing place through accumulation
with Éireann Lorsung
more info...

7/17 Edge Reading
w /Éireann Lorsung, Allison Ramirez, & Reva Mariah ShieldChief
more info...

7/1 Hi/Bird: A Summer Book Tour with Arianne Zwartjes and Aisha Sabatini Sloan
more info...

6/19 Edge Reading w/Kimberly Mathes, Steven Salmoni, & Lola Rainey
more info...

6/1 Stjukshon: An Indigenous Reading Series w/ Edward Chato-Seaton, Sterling HolyWhite Mountain & Ashley Tsosie-Mahieu
more info...

5/15 Edge Reading
w/Carmen Calatayud, Tucson Youth Poetry Slam, & Nic Varela/Dani Borg-James
more info...

5/9-5/12 Troubling Tucson: Trans and Genderqueer Poetry Symposium
w/Joy Ladin, Samuel Ace, Dawn Lundy Martin, CA Conrad, D'lo, Ian Ellasante, Hannah Ensor, Rae Strozzo, Rocket, and TC Tolbert
more info...

4/25, 5/2, 5/16, 5/23, & 5/30 Writing the Threshold: Poetry in Transitional Spaces
w/Ian Ellasante
more info...

4/20 Denaturalizing Nature Poetry & The Geography of Ecopoetics:
A Workshop on Thinking and Doing w/Sarah de Leeuw and Eric Magrane
more info...

4/17 Edge Reading
w/Katherine Larson, Sarah de Leeuw, & Eric Magrane
more info...

3/29 Stjukshon: An Indigenous Reading Series w/ Simon J. Ortiz, Bojan Louis & Tygel Pinto
more info...

3/27 Edge Reading
w/Andrea Francis, Marvin Gladney, & Marin Sandy
more info...

3/26 Trickhouse Live
w/Laura Hinton, Johanna Skibsrud, and David Sherman
more info...

3/21 Reading: Imogen Binnie w/Sarah Gonzales, Rocket, & TC Tolbert
more info...

Support Casa Libre and win beautiful artwork by Valyntina Grenier
At the reception for GIVE LOVE at Cafe Passe on March 9th from 6:30-8:30 pm, a $5 ticket will put your name in the hat for one of several items: stickers, intaglio prints, and the grand prize, the winner's choice of one of the artworks on display. Tickets available in advance.
more info...

2/26 Trickhouse Live
w/Kindall Gray, John Myers, and Joan Schuman
more info...

2/21 Riders on the Orphan Train: a multi-media program w/ Alison Moore
more info...

2/16 The Sin Eater and Other Stories Book Release Party
w/Elizabeth Frankie Rollins
more info...

1/26 Youth Silent Art Auction:organized by the BASIS Tucson North high school P.O.W.E.R. Club
more info...

1/24 That Forward Trajectory: Poems from the Future w/Sueyeun Juliette Lee (a writing workshop)
more info...

1/23 Edge Reading w/Cybele Knowles, Sueyeun Juliette Lee & Bus Stop Dreaming (Denise Uyehara/Yvonne Montoya/Adam Cooper-Terán)
more info...

1/17 Stjukshon: An Indigenous Reading Series w/ Tom Holm & Mariah Chupitit ShieldChief
more info...

1/16 Finding Love, Spirituality, and The True Self in Nature w/ Christopher Cokinos and Priscilla Stuckey
more info...

11/28 Edge Reading w/Annie Guthrie, Lisa Levine, and Karen Rigby
more info...

10/17 Edge Reading w/Clarissa Bueno, Hannah Ensor, and Matthew Conley
more info...

10/16 Trickhouse Live
w/Brian Blanchfield, Jen Hofer, & Molly McCloy
more info...

Sundays: Dive-in Movie Nights float in the pool, eat popcorn, drink cheap beer, and watch campy double-features
more info...

8/16 Anna Joy Springer and Janice Lee a reading and book signing
more info...

7/18 Edge Reading w/Elizabeth Brown, Sarah Kortemeier, and Lawrence Lenhart
more info...

6/13 Edge Reading w/Debby Jo Blank, Lisa M. Cole, and Jessica Langan-Peck
more info...

5/29: Trickhouse Live w/Sarah Gonzales, Serena Tang, and Michael Rerick
more info...

5/17: Trickhouse Live Special Event with Amaranth Borsuk, Jessica Moore, Michael Rerick, Algae and Tentacles, The Destroyer, & friends from the ether!
more info...

5/16: Edge Reading w/Kaia Chesney, Hypnotic Dance Crew, and Tucson Youth Poetry Slam
more info...

5/12: Short Prose Forms Reading and Book Signing w/ Rebecca Brown and Kate Bernheimer
more info...

5/11-5/13: Short Prose Forms: a writing weekend w/Rebecca Brown
more info...

5/5: Melissa Buckheit Noctilucent Book Release w/ Rebecca Seiferle
more info...

4/18: Edge Reading w/Naomi Benaron, Logan Phillips, and Maria-Elena Wakamatsu
more info...

4/24: Trickhouse Live w/Rebecca Iosca, Marisa Muro, and Elle Tivine
more info...

4/27: Mujeres de Palabra: poetry by Jessica Helen Lopez & Sarah Gonzales
more info...

4/14: Poets & Writers
Readings/Workshops Grant Program Informational Meeting
more info...

4/23-5/14:Documentary Poetry: a writing workshop w/Brandon Shimoda
more info...

3/29: Farewell Reading w/Beth Alvarado, Aisha Sabatini Sloan, and Arianne Zwartjes
more info...

3/21: Edge Reading w/Mark Haunschild, Daisy Pitkin, and Shelly Taylor
more info...

3/20: Trickhouse Live w/Logan Michelle Byers, Josephine Edmondson, and Rebecca Hamlin
more info...

3/8: Border Justice Reading w/ Leon De la Rosa-Carrillo and John Washington
more info...

2/21: Trickhouse Live:
An Integrative Arts and Performance Series w/Khara Ellasante, Ernesto Somoza, and Rae Strozzo
more info...

2/20-4/16: Counterfeiting: A Craft Seminar and Writing Laboratory w/Kristi Maxwell and Michael Rerick
more info...

2/15: Edge Reading Series w/Sam Ace, Sama Alshaibi, and Mark Lee
more info...

2/10: I'll Drown My Book: Conceptual Writing by Women(this reading is at the UA Poetry Center)
more info...

1/24: Trickhouse Live: w/Sama Alshaibi, Marvin Gladney, and Pedro Sorto
more info...

1/19: Write Like a Child:
Writing Fiction From the Child's Point of View w/ Amina Gautier
more info...

1/18: Edge Reading Series w/Amina Gautier, Alison McCabe, and Rodney Philips
more info...

12/13 Trickhouse Live: An Integrative Arts and Performance Series
w/Vicki Brown, Jillian Courtney, and John Melillo
more info...

12/14: Read Between the Bars Fundraiser Movie Night with a screening of Zero Percent
more info...

12/16 to 12/19: Pure Logophilia: a poetry weekend with Maureen Seaton and Sam Ace
more info...

12/17: Pure Logophilia: a poetry reading and book signing with Maureen Seaton and Sam Ace
more info...

12/2: Book Release with Kate Bernheimer and Laynie Browne w/ music by Greasy Light Orkestra
more info...

11/26: Bohemia Day of Giving reception w/Leila Lopez, Kristi Maxwell, Selah Saterstrom, and Jennifer Denrow
more info...

11/16: Edge Reading Series w/Charles Alexander, Naim Amor, and Shannon Cain
more info...

11/5: What would Emily Say? An Unbridled Translation Workshop Kore Press Big Read Workshop with Elizabeth Frankie Rollins and Kristen Nelson
more info...

11/1: Dinner and Dancing at La Cocina w/Entertainment by Lisa O'Neill, The Awkward Moments, and The Fourkiller Flats
more info...

10/19: Edge Reading Series w/Layli Long Soldier and The Esperanza Dance Project
more info...

10/28: Trickhouse Live in collaboration with Casa Libre and the UA Poetry Center, present a film screening by Ed Bowes
more info...

10/11:Trickhouse Live
w/Joshua Marie Wilkinson, Brandon Shimoda, Dot Devota, and Solan Jensen
more info...

9/14: Edge Reading w/Stephen Harutunian, Nancy Powaga, & Richard Tavenner
more info...

7/20: Edge Reading w/Tony Luebbermann, Lisa O'Neill, & Ann Seiferle-Valencia
more info...

6/20: Edge Reading with Jesús Ángel García, & Taylor Johnson
more info...

5/24: Dinner and Dancing at La Cocina (a fundraisr for Casa Libre)
more info...

4/23 Writing with Scientific Thought a writing workshop with Deborah Poe
more info...

4/13: Edge Reading with Tung-Hui Hu, Liza Porter, & TC Tolbert
more info...

3/20: Trickhouse Live with Sommer Browning, Noah Eli Gordon, and Amber Nelson
more info...

3/23: Edge Reading with Maya Asher, Teresa Dawn Driver & Joni Wallace
more info...

3/7: Kore Press Poetry Reading with Laura Newbern, 2010 1st book Award Prize winner
more info...

Writing for Your Life with Rita Maria Magdaleno
March 1, 2008
9 am to 12 noon
$50
The intentions of our writing workshop will be:
1) To gain new ideas for creating story from one’s life
2) To clarify new goals for your writing & your life

We'll focus on writing a story that's been trying to surface. Also, we'll see how this narrative connects to something larger: a full collection of stories, a personal memoir, or a book of narrative-based poems. Each participant will discover a tangible story-line and put forth a concrete plan for the work that he or she has been dreaming. This workshop will be an occasion to move forward with your writing goals in 2008.

Edge: a Reading Series of Emerging and Younger Writers
Shannon Cain and TC Tolbert
Thursday, February 28
7:30 p.m.
Suggested Donation: $3

Poets & Writers
Readings/Workshops Grant Program
Thursday, January 24, 2008
5:30 p.m.
Free
Please RSVP to Cheryl Klein cklein@pw.org no later than January 14

Poets & Writers, Inc., the nation’s largest nonprofit literary service organization, is expanding its Readings/Workshops grant program to Tucson. Since 1970, the Readings/Workshops program has supported literary events by paying fees to writers. These events have taken place at a variety of venues including: libraries, bookstores, cafes, universities, homeless shelters, senior centers, prisons, parks, and theaters.

Writers and organizations that sponsor literary events are welcome to attend. We hope you will forward this email to other writers and literary/arts professionals who you think would find the program relevant.

Reading and Book Release Party
Thursday, October 25 from 7:30 to 10 p.m.
This reading is FREE and OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

Come celebrate the latest issue of you are here: the journal of
creative geography

Now celebrating its tenth anniversary, you are here is published by graduate students at
the University of Arizona and features poetry, fiction, essays, photography and other creative endeavors that explore our sense of space and place.

The event will include artwork and readings by contributors, including Casa Libre's own Kristen Nelson. Artwork by contributors will be on display.

Kate Greenstreet
Poetry Reading and Booksigning
Wednesday, October 24
7 p.m.

Kate Greenstreet is the author of case sensitive (Ahsahta Press, 2006) and three chapbooks, Learning the Language (Etherdome Press, 2005), Rushes (above/ground press, 2007), and This is why I hurt you (Lame House Press, forthcoming). Her second book, The Last 4 Things, will be out from Ahsahta in 2009. Visit her online at kickingwind.com.

Soul Work(s)
October 20, 2007
1-4 PM Saturday Poetry Workshop taught by Cynthia Hogue
$ 50

Description
This workshop is inspired by (but not limited to) the occasion of the publication of H.D.’s wild and mystical novel, The Sword Went Out to Sea, which is also a pacifist text. We will focus on participants’ own poems and questions, but use sample poems for our discussions because we can examine the techniques that poets use and then practice them ourselves. (For a different approach to the mystical work, perhaps we’ll look at an ironic poem by Tony Hoagland, or a visionary poem by Louise Gluck, or a Buddhist poem by Jane Hirshfield). Discussions will be derived directly and organically out of participants’ works and interests, so that class members can explore specific issues pertinent to you as poets writing in a new century.

Rebecca Seiferle will be reading from her new poetry collection, Wild Tongue (Copper Canyon, 2007). Her third poetry collection, Bitters (Copper Canyon, 2001) won the Western States Book Award and a Pushcart Prize. She is also the author of The Ripped-Out Seam and The Music We Dance To (both from Sheep Meadow Press.) Her translation of Vallejo's The Black Heralds was published by Copper Canyon in 2003, and of Vallejo's Trilce by Sheep Meadow in 1992. She was awarded a Lannan Literary Fellowship in 2004. She is the online editor of The Drunken Boat, www.thedrunkenboat.com, and her webpage is www.thedrunkenboat.com/seiferle.html. She lives in Tucson and teaches English and Popular Culture at The Art College.

Cynthia Hogue will be reading from The Sword Went Out to Sea, by Delia Alton, a first edition of H.D.’s WWII visionary novel, and from her own work. Cynthia has published five collections of poetry, mostly recently The Incognito Body (2006). She also is the co-editor of Innovative Women Poets: An Anthology of Contemporary Poetry & Interviews (2006), and She is currently the Maxine and Jonathan Marshall Chair in Modern and contemporary Poetry at Arizona State University. She will be teaching a workshop, Soul Work(s), at Casa Libre on Saturday afternoon.

Tuesday, September 25, 2007, 6–7 p.m.
FREE Presession in Casa Libre's library
Come to this introductory session to learn about the class, ask Anna and Bonnie Jean any questions you may have, and get a sense for the kind of exercises involved in the class.

Phoenix Invasion: a reading and reception
Friday July 27, 2007; 7:00–8:30 p.m.
Free and open to the public
Come to Casa Libre’s last event of the summer and hear the work of The Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing Group residents and Arizona State University MFA students:Mathew Brennan, Michael Green, Claire McQuerry, Beth Staples, and John (Jake) Young.This reading is sponsored by The Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing at Arizona State University.

2nd Annual Summer Suite Sponsor Soiree & Fundraising Event
Art Auction, Poetry Reading, Live Entertainment, Food and Drink

Saturday, June 23, 2007;6 p.m. to Midnight;Tickets on sale now at Casa Libre : $15 in advance & $20 at the door. Ticket price includes admittance, refreshments, and a chance to win a one-night stay in a writing suite.
Open to the public

Please join Casa Libre for a night of poolside reveling as we honor and celebrate current and new Suite Sponsors with a poetry reading featuring 3 fabulous local poets, art exhibits and silent auction in our 5 writing suites, raffles, live music, catered food, beer and sangria. Enjoy a relaxing evening of poolside live music, poetry readings, and local artists’ receptions and mini exhibits in each of our five suites. Refreshments, including Sangria and beer (I.D. required), and finger foods, will be provided as part of the $20 cover charge ($15 if ticket purchased before event). The staff and board of Casa Libre hope you will attend our event to help us celebrate our organization’s growth and our current and future Suite Sponsors who have made it possible. We will be promoting our Suite Sponsorship Program throughout the evening; each guest will have an opportunity to become a Suite Sponsor, which involves either a one-time donation or monthly donations that start at $10. For more information on becoming a Suite Sponsor visit our donate page. Each contributing artist has donated a piece of work for a silent auction which will continue throughout the night; all proceeds of the auction go directly to Casa Libre. There will also be a $5 raffle drawing to win gift certificates and prizes from many local establishments. After the scheduled events end, the pool and hot tub will be available for use until midnight; there will be no lifeguard, and no children are allowed in the pool area. Please bring your own towel and swim gear. Doors will close at midnight sharp!

Food and Service Provided by Scott Wheeler, chef of Temple of Music and Art's Gallery of Food & Chef/Curator of Lifestyles of Art & Leisure
with servers Erin Bradley, Hamilton Kellogg, and bartender Mike Bagesse

The Musical Entertainment

Pearl Handled Pistol

The pairing of Tucson-based musicians Mike Bagesse, guitar, and Emilie Marchand, vocals, delivers to its audience the unique opportunity to luxuriate in a delicate yet powerful intersection of musical past and musical future. Marchand, a New Yorker by birth, and

Bagesse, a native Arizonan, are a husband and wife duo who seamlessly blend their talents and aesthetic influences to create an atmosphere evocative of moody eras long retreated into dreamy nostalgia, while fiercely pushing forward the boundaries of their equally visible punk influences. Having shared the stage both individually and as a team with a wide array of performers that include Calexico, Neko Case, Exene Cervenka, Dick Dale, Howe Gelb, Lydia Lunch, Liz Phair, and Cat Power, Marchand and Bagesse pay homage to a diverse collection of musical predecessors and contemporaries such as the Cowboy Junkies, Marlene Deitrich, PJ Harvey, Peggy Lee, Loretta Lynn, Tom Waits, and Kurt Weill cabaret. Marchand and Bagesse are classic yet modern, coiffed yet jagged. They are reverently entrenched in the traditions of blues, jazz, country, and folk, while forcefully asserting their own distinct brand of punk edginess. Their music blends Bagesse's deeply crafted and fervent guitar with Marchand's dark, impassioned, and insistent vocals to tell stories that are laced, sometimes cryptically, but always feverishly, with mourning, memory, and a sweet - if slightly savvy - flirtation with hope.

Tom Walbank and the Ambassadors

Born in 1969, Englishman Tom Walbank discovered blues at fifteen after seeing John Lee Hooker briefly on film. Studying the harmonica styling’s of Sonny Terry he spent many a year performing in the bars of Edinburgh Scotland with Steve O’Conner. Tom spent five years in the San Francisco Blues scene, after which he continued his journey to Tucson Arizona where he started playing and plying the welcoming Pueblo scene with Mr. Doug Smith Ensemble, also known as the AMBASSADORS. Tom Walbank has opened for include Rod Piazza, Tommy Castro, Exene Cervenka, Dick Dale, Bob Log 3, Holly Golightly, Robert Belfour, T Model Ford, Paul Jones, Calexico, Giant Sand, and Neko Case. Tom and the Ambassadors were the winners of the 2005 Arizona Blues Showdown, winners of the Tucson music awards 2006 Best Musicianship award, and Best Blues Band readers’ award. Blues Review Magazine says of Tom: “Slide guitarist, harp player and singer Tom Walbank’s journey has taken him from England to Scotland, San Francisco and now to Tucson, but his raw blues place him sonically somewhere between the delta and Chicago…His [blues] are as doomy as any Lightnin’ slim cut.”

Guest Poet Bios

Rebecca Seiferle Rebecca Seiferle's fourth poetry collection, Wild Tongue, is forthcoming from Copper Canyon in Fall 2007. Her previous collection, Bitters (Copper Canyon, 2001), won the Western States Book Award and a Pushcart prize. Her previous collection, The Music We Dance To (Sheep Meadow 1999) won the 1998 Cecil Hemley Award from the Poetry Society of America and poems from the collection were included in Best American Poetry 2000 and in The Extraordinary Tide: New Poetry by American Women , edited by Erin Belieu and Susan Aizenberg. Her first book, The Ripped-Out Seam (Sheep Meadow Press, 1991) won the Bogin Award from the Poetry Society of America, the Writers' Exchange Award from Poets & Writers, and the National Writers' Union Prize, and was a finalist for the Paterson Poetry Prize. Her poetry, translations, and essays have appeared in over twenty-five anthologies, and her poetry has been translated into several languages. In 2004 she was awarded a Poetry Fellowship from the Lannan Foundation.

Her translations of several Cuban poets are forthcoming in The Entire Island, edited by Mark Weiss, from the University of California Press in 2008. Her translation of César Vallejo's The Black Heralds was published in 2003 by Copper Canyon Press, and her translations of Alfonso D'Aquino and Ernesto Lumbreras appeared in Reversible Monuments: Contemporary Mexican Poetry (Copper Canyon 2002). Her translation of Vallejo's Trilce was a finalist for the 1992 PenWest Translation Award. She has regularly reviewed for The Harvard Review and Calyx , and is the founding editor of the online international poetry journal, The Drunken Boat.

Morgan Lucas Schuldt is the author of the forthcoming collection of poems, Verge, and Otherhow, a chapbook. A graduate from the University of Arizona’s MFA program, Morgan is also the editor of the literary magazine, CUE: A Journal of Prose Poetry. He teaches in the English Department at the University of Arizona where currently he is working towards his PhD in English Literature.

Rita Maria Magdelano was born in Augsburg, Germany. The daughter of a Mexican American father from Aguascalientes, Mexico and a German war bride mother, she grew up in Marcos de Niza, south-side Phoenix, Arizona. Magdaleno holds a Master of Arts in English & American Literature. She is a poet in the schools for the Arizona Commission on the Arts. She teaches creative writing at Pima Community College. Also, she has been a visiting writer at the University of Augsburg and the University of Bamberg, Germany. Rita’s first collection of poetry, Marlene Dietrich, Rita Hayworth, & My Mother , was published by University of Arizona Press, 2003. She co-edited They Opened Their Hearts: Tucson’s Elders Tell WWII Stories to Tucson’s Youth (Voices, Inc.). Her poetry & stories appeared in Fever Dreams: Contemporary Arizona Poetry ( University of Arizona) and Walking the Twilight: Women Writers of the Southwest (Northland Publishing). Magdaleno has received Creative Writing Fellowships in both fiction & poetry from Arizona Commission on the Arts.

Contributing Artists

Albert Kogel was born in 1949 in New York, New York. He has a BFA and MFA from the University of Arizona and was further educated at Freie Kunstschule in Munzigen, Germany. His work is regularly exhibited at the Davis-Dominguez Gallery in Tucson. He has had exhibitions at the Joseph Gross Gallery, The Tucson Museum of Art, Pima Community College, Central Arts Gallery, Rotunda Gallery, Yuma Art Center, America West Gallery and has appeared in Group Exhibitions at Thirteen Moons Gallery in Santa Fe, NM, the Wilde-Meyer Gallery in Scottsdale, the Casa Grande Museum, 803 Gallery In Tucson, East Ashland Gallery and Mars Gallery in Phoenix, at Northern Arizona University, in Eight West Biennial Wester Colorado Art Center in Grand Junction, Co, and the Hilltop Gallery in Nogales, AZ. His work can be found in the collections of the Tucson Museum of Art, the University of Arizona, Streich Lang, PA, and the Museum of Texas Tech University. He is Professor of Fine Arts (Painting and Design) at Cochise College where he heads the art department. His work is known for its dark wit, and its psychological intensity. His most known works are his portraits, which include those of his dog Sabi, where where he carves and paints flat pieces of wood, combining them, to create works which have simultaneously the qualities of paint and woodblock prints.

Sama Raena Alshaibi was born in Basra, Iraq to an Iraqi father and Palestinian mother. Her work negotiates the shifts between personal and family history, creating a context to understand the impact of war and exile through family stories serve as more than an historical archive and authoritative record. Sama's mother and her family were displaced to Iraq nearly 60 years ago as a consequence of Al-Nakba. For over 23 years now, the members of her mother and my father’s families have been fleeing Iraq one by one. The effects of three wars have dissolved the family collective will to stay in our country. Today, only a handful of family members remain, trapped in a violent conflict, unable to find a country to let them in. Statement from Sama: "In my work, I use the first person narrative to perform individual and communal memories that help inform my audience of our collective identity, one that restores our humanity and resists the injustice of our past and present. My work honors the lives of the “characters” I perform, such as mother and grandmother, whose strength and wits contributed to the survival of the family and defies stereotypes of the oppressed and weak Arab woman. My creative research also extends into areas of collective trauma and how the role of memory containers (such as art) and memorials are used as vehicles to resist the effacement and obliteration of that history. As a Palestinian-Iraqi, my identity is rooted in a violent and traumatic past that is still being afflicted; to situate that history in the present not only provides context to my audience, but also connects me from my safety zone in the US back into the red zone of Iraq or Occupied territories of Palestine. Even when I’m performing events past, such as our escape from Basra in 1981 in my film "Goodbye to the Weapon", there is a sense that this story is ongoing; there are only circles, no lines to a path out."

Jennifer Joan Oas was born the daughter of the feminist artist, Joan Bemel Oas in 1973 and began experimenting with mixed media art & oil/ acrylic painting during her teen years. Shortly there after, she moved to black & white film photography, eventually making the evolution into color digital photographic works in addition to her film portfolio. She brings her color palate and fine art esthetic into her photography, focusing primarily on portraiture and elements of color shading and light. Jennifer strives to exposes the personality of her subjects without pretense, giving her portraits their own story and their own voice, seen & heard through the camera’s lens. Jennifer is also a poet, and is currently working on the 34 Blocks to go series; a coupling of woman’s portraiture and poetry, Feminist Aesthetics; a collection of images depicting women & strength across the globe, and the House with no Windows series; a reflection of architectural elements and light. Her artistic photographic works and paintings may be found in private collections, magazines, and the Smithsonian Online Gallery Collection. Her commercial works may be found in magazines, business publications/marketing, and books. Niina Haas and Jennifer Oas also work together to form and support M.O.U. (Memorandum of Understanding), in Tucson. They formed the Non Profit Organization in America called the Sambhali International to help poor women in India get jobs and education; you can find out more at The Shambhali Trust website.

Eric Magrane The language that Eric Magrane writes for his mirror-poems and poetry installations often draws upon his experience of wild places and his interest in the elemental qualities of light, water, air, and time. He believes language itself to be a reflective and refractive medium, and putting it on mirror and glass makes it literally so. He has been an Artist-in-Residence at Isle Royale National Park and at Buffalo National River and received his B.A. from Goddard College and his M.F.A. from the University of Arizona. He has taught poetry and writing as well as environmental education. A few of his current projects include the Haleakala Series, which combines sandblasted mirrors with digital prints from Maui’s Haleakala National Park; the beginning stages of an environmental art/poem installation in the foothills of the Chiricahua Mountains; and blown glass poem vessels. You can see more of his work at www.ericmagrane.com.

Liza Smith was born and raised in Tucson, AZ. She has been drawing ever since she was a little girl. Her favorite subjects include women, dogs, and the natural world. She has a degree in printmaking from the University of Arizona and earns a living cleaning houses under the moniker "The Clean Bee." Liza lives in barrio El Hoyo with her husband, Jeff, and their two cats, Minerva and Mamoku.

Nicole Raisin Stern is an accomplished artist, a teacher of arts and language, and a creative writer. Nicole speaks Spanish, French, and Japanese, and has studied some Chinese, Hopi, Italian, Hebrew, and Pali. Originally from Wilmette, Illinois, Nicole moved to Flagstaff, Arizona in 1979 to attend Northern Arizona University. She has also lived and worked in Boston, Santa Fe, Boulder, Monterey, Athens, Georgia; Aix-en-Provence, Paris, and Annecy, France; Salamanca, Spain and Kyoto, Japan, and has traveled extensively by bicycle throughout Canada, the western USA, Alaska, China, Tibet, and Japan, and by boat throughout the American and British Virgin islands. Nicole’s everyday life infuses her art-making. Her lifelong affinity for East Asian and Southwestern cultures, languages, and environments finds expression in painted scenes of quiet ritual teas, a desert home inhabited by lizards, cacti, hummingbirds, and snakes, or a Japanese-y ocean scene with flying carp streamers and tea. Currently, Nicole enjoys watercoloring what’s in front of her, though she is equally at home creating art with Japanese sumi ink and brush, acrylics, colored pencil, paper cut outs, sewn paper puppets, paper collage, handmade books, and pottery. Nicole lives in Tucson, Arizona with her beloved dog and cat, Yuki & Jesse.

Paul Mirocha grew up in St. Paul, Minnesota and graduated from the University of Minnesota with an interdisciplinary degree in Fine Art and Biology. After relocating to Tucson, Arizona he worked for thirteen years as a graphic designer and illustrator for the Office of Arid Lands Studies at the University of Arizona. Since 1990, Paul has illustrated over 20 children's picture books and pop-ups, and his illustrations have appeared in interpretive exhibits, scientific and popular publications, and books of adult and young adult fiction and contemporary nature writing. He continues to design books, posters, brochures, and other printed communications, often designing and illustrating the same piece. Recent work has involved multimedia and web design. Paul also exhibits his personal drawings, prints, and photographic work. He lives in Tucson with his two artist daughters, Anna and Claire, surrounded by the Sonoran Desert, where many of his dreams come from.

Jaci Aaronson: Brought to the Americas by her biological Father, Jaci was heavily influenced by her Great Grand Mother who welcomed her by throwing her into the air and exclaiming, "Vat is das?!?" Jaci's Father, Jack Aronson had grown up in orphanages since the age of two, and the only family that he had contact with on a regular basis was his Grand Mother Rebeka. Rebeka was born in 1889 in the Austrian Empire, referred to now as ROM, Rebeka remembered the great old days of 'Dirty Gypsy Whore'. When she died at the age of 100 in 1989, Jaci was one of seven living blood relatives of Rebeka left on Planet Earth. Now having added three more Urchins to Rebekas lineage, Jaci spends her down time indoctrinating the wee ones in the ways of ill mannered underwear models with a penchant for messing with the Mall Santa. Jaci is an impatient painter. she works with many stolen materials and doesn't try hard to paint clean. She values economy of impact. Which means to her that if it takes time and paint to get a reading of r sitter across, so be it. She'd just rather it didn't. Her first influences were isolation and miscommunication. Most likely because of massive language barriers. Now she paints for pleasure and adventure. She is a terrible Painter to commission. Some of her patrons have been waiting for their paintings since 1998. She feels very badly about this. Really.

Maria Seiferle graduated from Arizona State University with her BFA in Photography in 2006. Her solo photographic exhibition, "Si, Se Puede" in 2006 at the Step Gallery in Tempe explored the "sociopolitical issues facing Arizona Chicanos as discerned by the murals and public works of art created by and for this community." Her photographs also appeared previously in the juried Undergraduate Show and the juried R.E.S.C.U.E Show at ASU. Her work is diverse in scope, ranging from landscape panoramas, street art and murals, to foreboding night images.Maria's central interest is in exploring a different "landscape," where the lens captures the internal or implied "landscape" of cultural assumption, political suggestion, or subjectivity.

Kellie Parkinson is currently attending Arizona State University and is pursuing a BFA in Mixed Media. She is a photographer and a mixed-media artist. Her sculpture has previously been exhibited in a collaborative group exhibit at Gallery 37, a public arts project for downtown Avondale, AZ. Born and raised in Phoenix; Kellie's photographic work is a visual exploration of the often under-examined details of the urban landscape. Avoiding her least favorite time of day--high noon--Kellie has spent years prowling the Phoenix sprawl searching for the unglimpsed and unobserved moment. She is equally devoted to her mixed-media work, most recently focusing on creating one-of-a-kind artists books. In these pieces, Kellie uses a combination of organic materials, found-images from science text books, digital prints, etc., to explore subjectivity.

Rebecca Seiferle- Broadside
Melissa Buckheit - Broadside
Blake Shell - Digital Print

Poetry Workshop with Rebecca Seiferle: Response to and With
Six Thursdays, beginning June 7, 2007 ending July 12, 2007; 6 to 8 p.m.
$150 - $50 deposit to hold seat

This workshop will focus on writing that responds to and engages with another source--whether music, visual art, other texts, news articles, etc. We will look at ways in which engaging with another source can focus writing, whether that source is directly engaged with or implied, and the challenges of this--in terms of how much content or description to include, whether content is even necessary, how voice changes as a result, how to honor the other source as an independent reality. We will look at particular examples of writing, and a writing exercise will be given each week. You are invited to bring pre-existing work that fits within the topic and which has given you fits in terms of revision or completion.

Moments of Being: Writing Memoir with Rita Maria Magdelano
Saturday, June 9th 2007;9 am to 12 noon; $45 registration fee

Participants will learn how to shape a memory / life-story into a dramatic narrative, one that's compelling to others. Topics will include: How start your memoir or get new ideas to "keep going"; What unifies a story; & How to develop thematic conflict. Participants can expect “writing time" & sharing within a supportive group.

University of Arizona Prose Series & Casa Libre present a Reading with K.L. Cook
Friday, April 13, 2007 at 7 p.m. in Casa Libre's library
K. L. Cook is the author of Last Call (2004), a collection of linked stories that won the inaugural Prairie Schooner Book Prize in fiction. His recent novel, The Girl from Charnelle (William Morrow 2006, Harper Perennial 2007), was named a 2006 Southwest Book of the Year, a 2006 School Library Journal Best Adult Book for High School Students, a Mississippi Press/Gulf Coast Live Best Book of the Year, and an Editor’s Choice selection of the Historical Novel Society. His fiction and essays have been published or are forthcoming in numerous journals and magazines, including Glimmer Train Stories, Poets & Writers, Threepenny Review, American Short Fiction, Shenandoah, and Witness, as well as two recent anthologies: When I Was a Loser and Now Write: Fiction Exercises from Today’s Best Writers and Teachers. Cook is a professor of creative writing and literature at Prescott College and a member of the graduate faculty in fiction at Spalding University’s Brief-Residency MFA in Writing Program. His website is www.klcook.net.