Tag: workshops

Sundress Academy for the Arts Presents November Poetry Xfit

The Sundress Academy for the Arts is excited to present Poetry Xfit hosted by Brynn Martin. This generative workshop event will take place on Sunday, November 30th, from 2 to 4 pm EST via Zoom. Join us at the link tiny.utk.edu/sundress with the password “safta”.

Poetry Xfit isn’t about throwing tires or heavy ropes, but the idea of confusing our muscles is the same. You will receive ideas, guidelines, and more as part of this generative workshop series in order to complete three poems in two hours. A new set of prompts will be provided after the writers have written collaboratively for thirty minutes. The goal is to create material that can be later modified and transformed into artwork rather than producing flawless final versions. The event is open to prose authors as well!

A white woman with blonde curly hair stands in front of a gray wall. She wears a light blue t-shirt and a gold pendant necklace while staring into the camera.

Brynn Martin (she/her) is a Midwesterner at heart, but she has spent the last decade living in Knoxville, where she received her MFA in poetry from the University of Tennessee. She is an Associate Editor for Sundress Publications and the event manager for an indie bookstore. Her poetry has appeared in Contrary Magazine, Rogue Agent, FIVE:2:ONE, and Crab Orchard Review, among others.

This event is brought to you in part by grants provided by the Tennessee Arts Commission.

While this is a free event, donations can be made to the Sundress Academy for the Arts here.

The Sundress Academy for the Arts Presents: The Poetry of Technology

The Sundress Academy for the Arts is excited to present a writing workshop lead by SAFTA staff director JoAnna Brooker, “The Poetry of Technology”.This workshop will be held onDecember 9th, 2020 from 6-7:30PM EST. In keeping with both the current pandemic and theme of the workshop, this event will be held over Zoom. Participants can access the event at tiny.utk.edu/sundress, with the password ‘safta’ and this event is free and open to the public.

In modern times, technology has woven itself so deeply into our lived experiences that more often than not, we cannot distinguish truth and authenticity from lies and simulations. Especially in the socially distanced world we currently inhabit, experiences often considered ‘better’ in person are simulated via Zoom and other channels. In this workshop, we will take the subtext of technology’s dehumanization as well as the over-saturation of modern media and rip it apart as human beings. We will engage with these instruments and systems as representations of ourselves in relation to what it means to exist online, for better or worse. 

At the end of this workshop, you will be challenged to treat your text messages and DMs as intimate letters. These too are stories and the better we can understand them and the effect they have on us, the better prepared we are to engage with the increasingly digitized world we inhabit.

JoAnna Brooker is a graduate of the University of Tennessee, where she studied Journalism and English. She is currently a staff director for Sundress Academy for the Arts and her work has been featured in Jet Fuel Review, Hash Journal, Menacing Hedge,and The Knoxville Mercury. She can be found on all social media platforms @cupofjoanna. 

Sundress Academy for the Arts Presents “Finding an Appetite: Poetry, Creative Nonfiction, and Food Writing”

The Sundress Academy for the Arts is proud to present the next installment of their workshop series, “Finding an Appetite: Poetry Creative Nonfiction, and Food Writing.”  This workshop will be led by Katie Culligan and will be held in Room 252 in the Hodges Library from 6 to 7 pm on October 28th. This event is free and open to the public.

Mark Twain said, “Part of the secret of success is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside.” When we begin to consider this active role that food plays in our lives and bodies, we must think about the senses, the land we live on, our families, both nuclear and national, and the labor-system-latticework we all must somehow live in the cracks of. In this workshop, we will investigate together how these considerations, and how food writing in general, can enrich your personal essays and poetry. If you’ve ever grown a mint plant in your kitchen, or waited a table, or eaten a hot dog that your mother cut up to look like an octopus, then you have enough to write about for the foreseeable future. Writers we read together will include those who specialize in both journalism and lyric nonfiction. We will not be reading Mark Twain.

Katie Culligan is a nonfiction writer living in Knoxville, TN, where she is the Fall 2019 Writer in Residence at Sundress Academy for the Arts. She is the recipient of the 2019 Eleanora Burke Award for Nonfiction and the Margaret Artley Woodruff Award for Creative Writing from the University of Tennessee. Recent work appears in Geometry, Noble/ Gas Qtrly, Columbia Journal, American Chordata, and others. She can be reached at katieculliganwriting.com

This event is co-sponsored by the University of Tennessee Creative Writing Program and is free and open to the public.

The Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) is an artists’ residency that hosts workshops, retreats, and residencies for writers, actors, filmmakers, and visual artists. All are guided by experienced, professional instructors from a variety of creative disciplines who are dedicated to cultivating the arts in East Tennessee.

Summer 2018 Fiction Writing Retreat

SAFTALOGO

Sundress Academy for the Arts Announces
2018 Summer Fiction Writing Retreat

The Sundress Academy for the Arts is thrilled to announce its Summer Fiction Writing Retreat, which runs from Friday, June 15 to 17, 2018.  The three-day, two-night camping retreat will be held at SAFTA’s own Firefly Farms in Knoxville, Tennessee.  This year’s retreat will focus on generative fiction writing and include two break-out sessions, “Conflict and POV as Perspective” and “Writing the Travel Narrative,” plus discussions on kicking writer’s block, publishing, and more.

A weekend pass includes one-on-one and group instruction, writing supplies, food, drinks, transportation to and from the airport, and all on-site amenities for $250.  Tents, sleeping bags, and other camping equipment are available to rent for $25.  Payment plans are available if you reserve by April 17, 2018; inquire via email for details.

The event will be open to writers of all backgrounds and provide an opportunity to work with many talented, published fiction writers from around the country, including Mary Miller and Jeanne Thornton.

unnamed-1Mary Miller is the author of two collections of short stories, Big World (Short Flight/Long Drive Books, 2009) and Always Happy Hour (Liveright, 2017), as well as a novel, The Last Days of California (Liveright, 2014), which has been optioned for film by Amazon Studios. Her stories have appeared in the Oxford American, Electric Literature’s Recommended Reading, McSweeney’s Quarterly, American Short Fiction, Mississippi Review, and many others. She is a former James A. Michener Fellow in Fiction at the University of Texas and John and Renée Grisham Writer-in-Residence at Ole Miss. 

Jeanne Thornton is the author of The Black Emerald and thornton_author-photo_smallThe Dream of Doctor Bantam, the latter a Lambda Literary Award finalist for 2012. She is the co-publisher of Instar Books and the creator of the webcomics Bad Mother and The Man Who Hates Fun. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in n+1, WIRED, WSQ, CURA, and other places. She lives in Brooklyn. Find her online at:  http://fictioncircus.com/Jeanne.

Space at this workshop is limited to 15 writers, so reserve your place today at:
https://squareup.com/market/sundress-publications

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The Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) is an artists’ residency that hosts workshops, retreats, and residencies for writers, actors, filmmakers, and visual artists. All are guided by experienced, professional instructors from a variety of creative disciplines who are dedicated to cultivating the arts in East Tennessee.

Web: http://www.sundressacademyforthearts/                     Facebook: SundressAcademyfortheArts

OUTSpoken Opens Workshop Registration for LGBTQ+ Writers

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OUTSpoken Opens Workshop Registration
for LGBTQ+ Writers

OUTSpoken is a fifth-year program from the Sundress Academy for the Arts (SAFTA) that will take place in April of 2018. Our goal is to create a platform for the LGBTQ+ community of Knoxville, Tennessee and its surrounding areas to record and perform the experiences of sex- and gender-diverse individuals in the South

Registration for the OUTSpoken workshop series is now open. On-site participants will be a part of two workshops over the course of two weeks in order to create, edit, and produce a piece of art to be performed during SAFTA’s OUTSpoken events in April of 2018. Workshop attendees will work with professionals in performance, prose, and poetry to compose and tell their own stories.

Workshops will be held on January 20th and 27th and run from 1PM to 3PM at the Sundress Academy for the Arts.  Cost for the workshop is $20 for one and $30 for both. Discounts are available for students. If you are unable to attend because of cost, we do have limited scholarships available. Scholarship applications are due by January 10th and should be submitted to erin@sundresspublications.com for consideration.

We are also doing a BOGO special this year! Order tickets for yourself and give a ticket to a friend for free. Please note if you are claiming this option in your order so our team can properly prepare for the correct number of workshop attendees.

As LGBTQ issues gain greater visibility, it is crucial that we explore the complexities of sex and gender diversity respectfully. That said, we realize that unity cannot and must not be silent, and that in order to create a meaningful dialogue, we must acknowledge and listen to the stories, experiences, grievances, arguments, and counterarguments of all sex- and gender-diverse persons.

Register today at: http://www.sundresspublications.com/outspoken/

 

SAFTA Presents… OUTspoken on June 28!

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We are excited to announce the premiere of OUTSpoken, a theatrical review written and performed by the local LGBTQ community and its allies.

OUTSpoken began with a series of writing workshops, where community members developed their experiences into poems, monologues, narratives, or other literary forms. We also received many submissions online from writers and artists around the country, which were then revised and transformed into performance pieces.

Some participants worked with local actors to bring their writing to life, while others will be performing their writing themselves. It is our sincerest hope that this project will help create a platform to record, perform, and illuminate the experiences and struggles of the Southern LGBTQ community, as well as celebrate sex- and gender-diversity in East Tennessee and beyond.

The event will include performances by Adam Crandall, Donald Rickels, Molly Kessler, Sean Kelley, Amber Autrey, and Raven Mason, and will feature the writing of T.A. Noonan, Erin Elizabeth Smith, Andrew Emitt, and more!

OUTSpoken will take place on Saturday, June 28th, at 7:30pm at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church. Tickets can be purchased in advance from the SAFTA website for $10 or at the door for $15. A percentage of the proceeds will go to support the East Tennessee Chapter of GLSEN (Gay, Lesbian, & Straight Education Network).