La Peña Political Art Series Presents:
Artivists in Action
Saturday March 21, 2009
$7 adv. $10 dr. - 8pm
For advanced tickets click here.
Join us for a roundtable of poetry sharing between poets/activists with Yosimar Reyes, Leticia Hernandez, Nina Serrano and MamaCoAtl.
From song & poetry to recetas de cocina (food recipes), from fierce protest to heartfelt prayers for the recovery of our Indigenous Soul, the La Peña Political Art Series presents three generations of Bay Area poets & ARTivist for an evening of
Love in the Times of Change: ARTivists in action.
Yosimar Reyes, Leticia Hernandez-Linares,Nina Serrano, & MamaCoAtl.
Border breaking and word twisters, meanders and trespassers ARTivists gather at La Peña, the East Bay temple of Revolutionary reARTiculations, for an evening of performic poemarios, spoken word and other super spanglish manifestARTions that reveal the Sacred as the ultimate reEvolution. Curate by MamaCoAtl, the gathering tonight represents 3 generations of California wordsmiths. Join us for a roundtable of poetry sharing between poets/activists. From song and poetry to recetas de cocina (food recipes), from fierce protest to heartfelt prayers for the recovery of our Indigenous Soul. This program is part of the La Peña's Political Art Series - Surveying the Relationship Between Artists and Social Movements (see below).
Yosimar Reyes
From the Mountains of Guerrero, Mexico comes Yosimar Reyes, a Two-Spirit Poet/Activist Based out of San Jose. His style has been described as "a brave and vulnerable voice that shines light on the issues affecting Queer Immigrant Youth and the many disenfranchised communities in the U.S and throughout the world." Yosimar's distinct style has managed to get him to perform form the Bay Area to New York City. He holds the title for the 2005 as well as the 2006 South Bay teen Grand SLAM Champion and has been featured in the Documentary 2nd Verse: the Rebirth of Poetry. Yosimar finds inspiration while waiting for the bus and sharing palabra with his Abuelita always breaking it down hood and speaking from a community spirit. He currently lives in East Side San Jose.
Leticia Hernandez-Linares
A Salvadoreña spoken word artist, educator and artist in general, Leticia was born and raised in Los Angeles' Hollywood and grew up with a lot of Chicanos and Black folks. Her exposure to music and Mexicano culture from a young age was a strong influence in her development as a writer. Leticia writes about discovering her history, about telling the stories of the women around her, about all the folks she was around while growing up. In 2002, Leticia released her first book of poetry called Razor Edges of My Tongue, Calaca Press 2002. Leticia has represented many voices and ancestral stories of women in the growing Latin@ literary arts movement throughout California as well as nation-wide.
Nina Serrano
A poet, writer, storyteller, and independent media producer, Nina poems are widely anthologized, most recently in the literary anthology, Under the Fifth Sun: Latino Writers from California and the three anthologies of peace poems Farewell to Armaments. She has won international film awards and served as an Alameda County Arts Commissioner. Serrano, former director of the San Francisco Poetry in the Schools program, is a co-founder of the Mission Cultural Center for Latino and produces regular radio programming on KPFA 94.1 FM in Berkeley. "She has lived a relatively long time compared to a butterfly and a relatively short time compared to a rock. There is much she still does not know about the two basic issues: life and death." More information about Nina can be found here:
MamaCoAtl
Barrio Funkstress, community organizer, single Mother, Poet, Healer, and Scholar. You can find her blessing city corners with copal in hand, drummers, feathers y toda la cosa, or you can catch some of that border-crossing lingo live and in Spanglish on KPFA. MamaCoAtl is a case study; avid researcher of the dynamics of emancipation, she explores sound, ritual, cultural activism as power sources for public health. She organizes International Day for the Elimination of Violence toward Women and Girls, a San Francisco proclaimed holiday on November 25th. MamaCoAtl is of Yaqui ancestry, an Amerindian. She has traveled and collaborated with many artists, healers and performers from all over the Americas, creating concerts on sites of nature like the river Mother of God on the border of Peru, Brazil and Bolivia in 2005.
La Peña Cultural Center
A favorite stop for activist pundits, imaginative artists, late-night poets, avid tourists, and South American gastronomy connoisseurs, La Peña is a local cultural center with a national reputation and a world vision. La Peña promotes peace, social justice and cultural understanding through the arts, education and community action. Since 1975, La Peña has served as a community gathering space for people of diverse cultures; provided opportunities for artists to pass on specific cultural traditions, to create and perform work, while interfacing with and supporting diverse social movements. La Peña is located at 3105 Shattuck Ave. in Berkeley. For more information call 510-849-2568.
La Peña's Political Art Series
Surveying the Relationship Between Artists and Social Movements. This extraordinary series offers artists an opportunity to share how they use art to inspire community action and document history. The series includes live performances, visual art exhibit, songwriting workshops and residency activities for teaching artists and educators at La Peña. The following show in the Series is Melanie de More's Pounding for Peace on Friday, April 03, 09. 8pm
Special Thanks
to our generous funders: Alameda County Arts Commission, Berkeley Civic Arts Commission, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Ford Foundation, Gerbode Foundation, James Irvine Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, National Performance Network, Nonprofit Finance Fund, San Francisco Foundation, Vanguard Foundation, Walter and Elise Haas Fund, William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, Zellerbach Family Fund. and thanks to our many generous individual donors.
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