ASU

Contributor Update, Pam Houston: Deep Creek, Finding Hope in the High Country

Superstition Review

Today we are happy to share the news of past contributor Pam Houston. Pam’s memoir “Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country” was just published by W. W. Norton & Company in January of 2019. Reminiscing about her life living in the Colorado Rockies, Pam discusses the beauty and pain of human life and her ties to the earth, specifically her 120-acre ranch. The memoir not only includes her essays but also 12 of the author’s own black and white photographs.

The book can be purchased here, and information about her signing event at Bookshop Santa Cruz can be found here.

Congratulations Pam!

Editorial Preferences in Art: Shalanndra Benally

Superstition Review

Through the process of curating art, I would say that I have gained new eyes for looking at different pieces of work. I can admit that I was never one to look at art in the manner of color, context, and composition before. I mainly base what I like on no other context other than just liking the way things look.

I think art as a medium can be something over saturated with the sheer number of artists, but I believe that I have learned so much. Through this journey I was also able to differentiate an artist from a hobbyist.

Looking at art now, I am finding myself drawn to artists that have a lot of work and specifically work that contains the three C’s. The first aspect I like to look for is composition. I really like to take composition into consideration and make sure that it matches the Superstition Review and what the audience would engage with. Secondly, I like to look into the context of the piece. Not simply understanding what the piece looks like, but taking the time to understand what the underlying theme is or what the piece is trying to say. And of course, taking color into consideration with each piece. All of these elements have helped me understand on a different level of viewing and appreciating art.

With that being said, I don’t particularly have a specific type of art I enjoy, I can look at any piece of work from any medium and still be able to apply what I have learned.

Overall, I am very grateful and pleased that I am able to see art differently. And I will continue to utilize what I have learned as I flourish throughout the art community.

Shalanndra Benally is the art editor for issue 23. She is currently in her first semester of her Senior year at Arizona State University studying Digital Culture with a concentration in Design. Currently she is working on the design team for TEDx at ASU, as well as being the sole designer for the 40th annual Ms. and Mr. Indian ASU. She is always looking for new opportunities to show off her artistic abilities and demonstrate her extensive design experience. After graduation she hopes to work in digital media or another creative field.

#ArtLitPhx: ASU Symphony Orchestra

Superstition Review

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Date: January 27, 2019

Time: 4:00pm-5:30pm

Location: Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts, 7380 E 2nd St, Arizona, 85251

Tickets

Event Description:

Jeffery Meyer conducts the ASU Symphony Orchestra in a dramatic program of Eastern European works influenced by events of World War II, featuring Yuhui Li on piano, 2018 Concerto Competition winner. Core repertoire works by Dmitri Shostakovich and Béla Bartók are performed with Krzysztof Penderecki’s avant-garde Threnody and the masterpiece of neoclassicism Concerto for String Orchestra by pioneering female composer Grażyna Bacewicz.

#ArtLitPhx: Tempe Writing & Cover Design Contest 2019

Superstition Review

Tempe Writing & Cover Design Contest 2019

ASU students from all majors and campuses in metropolitan Phoenix (including ASU Online students who reside in Maricopa County) are invited to submit their creative work in the 5th annual Tempe Writing and Cover Design contest.

The contest will accept entries from Jan. 7 – Feb. 18, 2019. Writers may submit one original, unpublished work in either poetry, short fiction or creative nonfiction (including essays and memoir). Entries are read anonymously by members of ASU’s creative writing community and a winner is chosen in each genre for the three entry categories: high school student, college student (undergraduate or graduate) and community adult.

Graphic artists (age 14 and above) are invited to prepare a color cover design for the 2019 issue of Tempe Writers Forum, the publication that shares the winning entries.

Contest winners — in addition to having their work published in volume five of the Tempe Writers Forum and on the library’s website — will be celebrated at a reception at the Tempe Public Library on Wednesday, April 3, 2019. Additionally, the Friends of the Tempe Library will award a $50 prize to all winners.

Want to learn more? Full contest submission guidelines, as well as past issues of Tempe Writers Forum and the works of writers receiving honorable mention, can be found at www.tempe.gov/WritingContest.

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#ArtLitPhx: Borderlands Poetry

Superstition Review

 

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Event Description:

Natalie Diaz and [archi]TEXTS present Borderlands Poetry: A Reading and Conversation with Eduardo C. Corral benefitting No More Deaths/No Más Muertes

Date(s): Monday, November 19, 2018, 6:30 p.m. – 8:30 p.m.
Location: Pima Auditorium, Memorial Union, Arizona State University, 301 E. Orange St., Tempe, AZ 85281
Type(s): Conversation, Discussion, Lecture, Reading
Genre and Form(s): Multi-genre, Poetry
Cost: Free; Suggested donation to No Más Muertes

Live streaming will be available at the date and time listed at https://asunow.asu.edu/asulive

To make a donation to No Más Muertes, visit https://donatenow.networkforgood.org/nomoredeaths?code=asu

To learn more and RSVP, visit http://piper.asu.edu/classes/eduardo-c-corral/borderlands-poetry

About the Conversation
What are the physical and metaphysical conditions of borders and borderlands? How do borders span the imaginary, emotional, and physical landscapes of the human condition? Join a conversation and reading with poet and educator, Eduardo Corral, exploring the imaginative, bodily, societal, political, emotional, physical, and linguistic impacts of borders to us as human beings, our connections, and our artistic bodies of work.

Fundraising for No Más Muertes
This conversation benefits No Más Muertes (No More Deaths), a humanitarian organization based in southern Arizona dedicated to increasing efforts to stop deaths of migrants in the desert. Their mission is to “end death and suffering in the Mexico–US borderlands through civil initiative: people of conscience working openly and in community to uphold fundamental human rights” (No Más Muertes).

About Eduardo C. Corral
Eduardo C. Corral is the author of Slow Lightning, which won the 2011 Yale Series of Younger Poets competition. His second book, Guillotine, will be published by Graywolf Press in 2020. He’s the recipient of Whiting Writers’ Award, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, the Holmes National Poetry Prize and the Hodder Fellowship, both from Princeton University. He teaches in the MFA program at North Carolina State University.

Presented by [archi]TEXTS and the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing at ASU

Original photo credits: Sonoran desert by No Más Muertes; Eduardo C. Corral by Matt Valentine.

#ArtLitPhx: ASU Undergraduate Writers Showcase

Superstition Review

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Event Description:

Join the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing for our second-annual ASU Undergraduate Writers Showcase, Thursday, November 15, 2018 at the Piper Writers House (450 E Tyler Mall, Tempe, AZ 85281) from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m.!

To RSVP or submit your work, visit our website at http://piper.asu.edu/events/2018/asu-undergraduate-writers-showcase. The deadline for submissions is October 19, 2018.

While encouraged, RSVPs are purely for the purposes of monitoring attendance, gauging interest, and communicating information about parking, directions, and other aspects of the event. This event is open to the public and free.

A final line-up of readers will be announced November 1st.

#ArtLitPhx: Poetry of Witness with Andrea Scarpino

Superstition Review

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Event Description:

Poetry of Witness. Poetry as Trace with Andrea Scarpino

Date: Friday, November 16, 2018, 5:30 to 8:30 p.m.
Location: Piper Writers House, 450 E Tyler Mall, Tempe, AZ 85281
Individual Course Cost: $119 Regular, $107 ASU, $99 Student
Two-Course Bundle: $210 Regular, $189 ASU, $175 Student

Poetry of the Body with Andrea Scarpino takes place the following day, Saturday, November 17, 2018 from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Both classes can be bundled for additional savings.

To learn more and register, visit http://piper.asu.edu/classes/andrea-scarpino/two-poetry-workshops

About the Class:
The poet Carolyn Forché describes poems of witness as bearing “the trace of extremity within them . . . the poem might be our only evidence that an act has occurred.” Traditionally, this has meant bearing witness to atrocities like war or genocide, but we will take a more expansive look at the form and how to bear witness to our own lives and to our own stories. This could include bearing witness to homophobia or racism, environmental degradation, or sexual harassment (#metoo), but it could also include bearing witness to difficult relationships, to a health crisis, or to the death of someone we love. In this workshop, we will read and discuss poems of witness, generate our own poems of witness through writing prompts, and workshop our writing together.

About the Instructor:
Andrea Scarpino is the author of the poetry collections Once Upon Wing Lake (Four Chambers Press, 2017), What the Willow Said as it Fell (Red Hen Press, 2016) and Once, Then (Red Hen Press, 2014). She received a Ph.D. in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University and an MFA from The Ohio State University. She has published in numerous journals, is co-editor of Nine Mile Magazine, and served as Poet Laureate of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula 2015-2017. Her upcoming edited anthology is Undocumented: Great Lakes Poets Laureate on Social Justice (MSU Press).

Intern Update, H. Rae Monk: Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at ASU

Superstition Review

H. Rae MonkToday we are proud to announce that past fiction editor, H. Rae Monk, won an Osher Lifelong Learning Institute scholarship. Rae is a student in the new MA in Narrative Studies at Arizona State University, and past fiction editor for Superstition Review’s Issue 19. She is currently working on a project with the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute, which will enable OLLI students to connect with traditional ASU students through shared narratives. The project will encourage students to share true stories about their lives with classmates in order to strengthen empathy and open communication across generational divides

Way to go, Rae!

#ArtLitPhx: Book Release/Reading: Nobody is Ever Missing with Cody Wilson

Superstition Review

#ArtLitPhxDate: Monday, June 4, 2018- 6:30pm to 8:00pm

Location: Crescent Ballroom, 302 N 2nd Ave, Phoenix, AZ 85003
Cost: Free

Local poet Cody Wilson reads from his newly released chapbook, Nobody Is Ever Missing Monday, June 4, 2018 in the lounge at Crescent Ballroom (302 N 2nd Ave, Phoenix, AZ 85003) with special guests Jesse Sensibar and Jennifer Battisti.

Readings begin at 6:45pm. Book signing and frivolity after. To pre-order, visit https://tolsunbooks.com/books/.

While encouraged, RSVPs are purely for the purpose of attendance monitoring and gauging interest. You do not need to bring your registration or RSVP to the event. You do not need to register or RSVP to attend. This event is open to the public and free.

Hosted by Tolsun Books in partnership with the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing at Arizona State University.

About the Book:

“Cody Wilson has a great feel for the details that speak of what hides below the surface. There’s a deeply human mix here – he celebrates, worries, remembers, and looks ahead – and a feeling that he’s trying to enact the multitude of woundings and survivals that have shaped who he is. This book is a beautiful reminder of the joy and risk surrounding us every day.”
—Bob Hicok

“Cody Wilson’s debut collection of poems, like grief, finds harmony in the evening’s melody. Nobody Is Ever Missing is an asthmatic lungful of secrets that settles in the negative space that embraced loved ones who were reduced to the dust that makes breathing difficult.”
—Shawnte Orion, author of The Existentialist Cookbook

Nobody Is Ever Missing reminds us of a difficult yet brilliant truth; oftentimes light can only be realized after it reaches into the darkness. Navigating itself far away from the sentimental, multifaceted lines reflect out from Cody Wilson’s debut chapbook as he explores love and loss and the other palpable experiences that make life into living.

About the Author(s):

Cody Wilson teaches English in Arizona, where he lives with his wife. They are expecting their first son this summer. He has an MFA from Queens University of Charlotte, where he served as poetry editor of QU. He enjoys making things with his hands, including wooden furniture, shadow puppets, and gestures of approval or disapproval. He has recent poems published in Juked, Juxtaprose, Southampton Review and forthcoming in Emrys. 

Jennifer Battisti, a Las Vegas native, studied creative writing at the College of Southern Nevada. Her work has appeared in the anthology, Legs of Tumbleweed, Wings of Lace, and is forthcoming in Where We Live, an anthology of writing and art in response to the October 1st tragedy, as well as The Desert Companion, Minerva Rising, The Citron Review, FLARE, Helen: A Literary magazine,The Red Rock Review, 300 Days of Summer and elsewhere. In 2016 Nevada Public Radio interviewed her about her poetry. She holds a leadership position on the Las Vegas Poets Organization and is the administer and a participating teaching artist for the Alzheimer’s Poetry Project in Nevada. Her first chapbook of poetry, “Echo Bay,” was published in 2018 by Tolsun Books.

Jesse Sensibar is unafraid to die but terrified of dying alone. He loves big bore handguns with short barrels; the clean, uncluttered lines of old outlaw choppers, old pawn jewelry, and small fuzzy critters with equal abandon. He has a soft spot in his heart for The Virgin of Guadalupe, tide pools, house cats, quiet bars, innocent strippers, and jaded children. He has worked as a mechanic, heavy equipment operator, strip club bouncer, repossession agent, tattoo shop owner, private investigator, tow truck driver, snow plow operator, wildland firefighter, and college English teacher. He received an MFA in Creative Writing and an MA in English from Northern Arizona University. He currently resides in Flagstaff, AZ and Tucson, AZ.

#ArtLitPhx: Desert Nights, Rising Stars Writers Conference

Superstition Review

The Desert Nights, Rising Stars Writers Conference is three days of craft talks, panels, workshops and presentations at Arizona State University. With more than 50 sessions from over 25 faculty members in multiple genres and fields, the goal is to provide writers with opportunities to make personal and professional connections, advance their craft, and deepen their engagement with the literary field. View the full conference schedule here.

About the conference from the host, The Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing:

“We are committed to creating an accessible and inclusive space for writers of all backgrounds, genres, and skill levels. Conference faculty and programming encompass many genres which can often go under served in the literary field, including Young Adult, Science-Fiction/Fantasy, Crime Fiction, Translation, Graphic Novels, Hybrid, and more.

Special topics like climate change, social justice, and other contemporary issues also feature prominently.

Publishing, editing, agents, and other aspects of the business of publishing are included as well.

Beyond sessions, attendees can also participate in receptions, discussion groups, after-hour socials, and other opportunities to connect with fellow conference-goers, develop relationships, and build community.”

The 2018 Desert Nights, Rising Stars Writers Conference will take place from Thursday, February 22 through Saturday, February 24. Writers of all backgrounds and experience levels are encouraged to attend. Register here.