Life in the First Person: women's Stories Uncovered

Life in the First Person: Women’s Stories Uncovered

 

A novelist. A storyteller. A poet. A freelance writer. A performance artist. A creative nonfiction writer. A blogger.

What do they all have in common?

The first person.

Their experiences and their points of view are different, but their pronouns are the same.

Find out what comes after “I.”

Come out to hear life in the first person with Gigi Amateau, novelist; Denise Bennett, storyteller; Tarfia Faizullah, poet; Julie Geen, freelance writer; Shelia Gray, performance artist; Valley Haggard, creative nonfiction writer and Alex Iwashyna, blogger.

Life in the First Person: Women’s Stories Uncovered will serve as the grand finale in the event series, Beyond Barbie: Piecing Together Today's Woman running in conjunction with Susan Singer’s art opening, “Not Barbie: A Celebration of Real Women,”  on Thursday, November 3, at 7 PM at Crossroads Art Center. Tickets can be purchased online at www.SusanSinger.com or through  Crossroads Art Center or at the door.   

Featuring:

Gigi Amateau is the author of the young adult novel, A Certain Strain of Peculiar, a 2010 Bank Street College Best Children’s Books of the Year. She also wrote Chancey of the Maury River, a William Allen White Masters List title for grades 3-5. Her debut novel, Claiming Georgia Tate was selected as a New York Public Library Book for the Teen Age.  She recently completed 200-hour yoga teacher training. Visit www.gigiamateau.com.

Denise Bennett tells personal stories, her original versions of traditional stories and sacred stories often interlaced with harp and vocal music.  She is a member of the Tell Tale Hearts Storytellers Theater in Richmond. Master storyteller Elizabeth Ellis has said of her, “Denise Bennett is a storyteller and a musician of exceptional talent. Her work is timeless, and flawless. Her work reminds us of the love that dwells in the deep heart's core.” Visit her at www.storiesbydenise.com.

Tarfia Faizullah is a graduate of VCU's creative writing program, and the former associate editor of Blackbird: an online journal of literature and the arts. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in The Southern Review, Crab Orchard Review, Ploughshares, Poetry Daily, Diode, Bellingham Review and elsewhere. She is the recipient of an AWP Intro Journals Project award, the Ploughshares Cohen Award and a Fulbright scholarship.

Julie Geen writes a monthly column for belle magazine and is a contributor to Style Weekly. She has published essays in anthologies, most recently “Tarnished: True Tales of Innocence Lost.” Along with raising children, dealing with pets and her own mind, she teaches creative writing classes through Hanover Parks and Recreation. Currently, she is turning one of her screenplays into a novel, and from there probably into a face book post. She blogs at juliegeen.com.
 

Shelia Gray is a graduate of the VCU Crafts Department, focusing in metal smithing, textiles and glass. She is currently involved in creating wearable art and costumes, as well as performance art and body painting for fashion shows, events and special projects. She’s writing a mixed-media graphic novel which incorporates sculptures and performance pieces. A self-employed gardener, she has winters off to do what ever she likes. 

Valley Haggard, the executive director of Richmond Young Writers, teaches creative writing to kids at Chop Suey Books and creative nonfiction to adults at Chop Suey, Black Swan Bookstore and the Visual Arts Center. On the board of the James River Writers, she has written for Style Weekly, Belle, Rhome, V Magazine and Skirt and has published chapters of her memoir in The Writer’s Dojo and Tarnished: True Tales of Innocence Lost. Visit her at www.richmondyoungwriters.com or www.valleyhaggard.com.

Alex Iwashyna went from a B.A. in Philosophy to an M.D. to a SAHM (stay at home mom), writer and poet before thirty. She spends most of her time on LateEnough.com blogging about life, parenting, marriage, culture and her inability to wake up in the morning and not hate everyone. She also writes for Richmondmom.com, teaches at the Visual Arts Center and manages enough freelance work to guarantee sexy circles under her eyes.

Heather's pictures and Shelia's make up - the real and the even more real me!

Heather Addley arrived first and we immediately started taking pictures.  I had the curtain and the lights set up.  And I was dressed for the shoot.  I'd decided to wear a tight-fitting chemise-type shirt primarily so I wouldn't get make up on my clothing once Shelia got there.  Heather was quick - she took a couple of preliminary  shots to set the camera up then began shooting.  My intention with these pictures is to radiate my authentic soulful self to show that beauty has nothing to do with make up or artifice but actually comes from within.  I believe there is nothing make up or clothing or hair cuts or jewelry can do to make a person beautiful who can't access it from within her/himself.  

You can judge for yourself how you think they turned out.

A few minutes later Shelia Gray arrived and began setting up her supplies.  I had originally asked her to do "glamour" makeup, but she felt like someone else might be able to do that better, so I asked her to make me up like a feline instead.  Why?  you might very well ask...  Well, when I was doing the work with Karen Morris a couple of weeks ago, I had an image of myself as very feline.  Strong, sleek, muscular, fierce yet not ferocious, powerful, ready to strike but not needing to.  I wanted to experiment with that image.  It was a bit tricky because I couldn't articulate it since it wasn't clear enough to me yet.  I thought the make up and pictures could help me a bit with that.  They have.  I can picture it better now.  These pictures capture a little bit of what I was going after, but I may have to do it again to get exactly what I was looking for.  

I can say, it was really fun having Shelia put the make up on.  It felt good being so attended to.  I also really liked letting myself go in front of the camera.  I took a few minutes first to find the energy I was looking for then began posing.  I am fairly shy by nature, so this was a stretch, but I decided I wouldn't have a better chance than this to access that spirit, so I let myself go for it.  It felt good.  Like what I want to do with my painting.  Just let it go and enjoy the flow.  It's a lovely thing!

Photographing Gaye and Being Photographed Myself

Tonight I'm going to be on the other side of the camera lens and I can feel the anticipation.  I spent the afternoon photographing a very cool woman (aren't they all?), Gaye Adegbalola.  She's a singer and musician, a teacher and a writer and all around very cool woman.  A friend of mine told her about my project and asked if she would be willing to pose for me.  I'm so glad she did!  We got some very fun, goofy pictures as well as some powerful images.  Stay tuned for paintings of her in the not-too-distant future.









And now after 3 hours or so photographing her and learning about her,  I'm going to be photographed.  Heather Addley is going to do the honors.  I had an idea for a piece and needed some help with it so I asked her and Shelia Gray to help me out.

Here's the deal - you know the Before and After pictures you can find in any magazine?  What I tend to notice is the wide disparity in the background, lighting, clothing, and expression of the model in the two images.  I want to play with that.  I'm going to have Heather take a picture of me before I don any makeup.  I'd like her to use beautiful soft lighting.  I'll wear attractive clothing.  I'll smile as beautifully as I can manage.  I'll let myself be soft and pretty.

Then I'll have Shelia make me up as well as she can, truly trying to make me as pretty as possible, getting rid of the bags under my eyes, covering up skin blemishes, accentuating whatever it is make up is supposed to accentuate these days, glam my hair - all that good stuff.  Then I'll ask Heather to photograph me again, but this time using harsh light and an unflattering angle, and I'll wear less attractive clothing and won't smile.  I'm curious to see how it'll turn out.  I am hoping it'll be a fun spoof on the Before and After shots but that it will also make a serious point that they aren't particularly credible.

Or perhaps I'll end up looking so gorgeous when Shelia is done with me that I'll end up wearing make-up every day from now on!

Stay tuned!!