Contributor Update, Pete Stevens

Join Superstition Review in congratulating past contributor, Pete Stevens, on his new chapbook, Tomorrow Music. Winner of the Map Literary Rachel Wetzsteon Chapbook Award, Pete’s collection of short stories is rhythmically written, exploring the topic of yearning for more than you have and falling for an illusion.

Tomorrow Music is aptly titled. These stories pound out futuristic polyrhythms, propel us hurtling through time. Pete Stevens has a unique voice and a rich imagination, and the work in this short volume is melodious and vivid and very much alive.

Adam Wilson, author of Sensation Machines

To order your copy of Tomorrow Music click here. Also, be sure to check out Pete’s website and Twitter as well as his past work in Issue 21 and his Authors Talk.

Contributor Update, Claire Fuller

Join Superstition Review in congratulating one of our past contributors, Claire Fuller, on her forthcoming book, Unsettled Ground, out May 18th. The novel follows “an unusual family held together by a string of lies, a small town with too many questions, and a sudden death that threatens to undo them all.” Through this tale, Claire “masterfully builds a [story] of sacrifice and hope, of homelessness and hardship, of love and survival, in which two marginalized and remarkable people uncover long-held family secrets and, in their own way, repair, recover, and begin again.”

Unsettled Ground is a gorgeously written celebration of the natural world as well as a moving portrait of a family struggling against time. Through buried secrets and private longings, the Seeders emerge as multi-layered characters living at the fringes of society. This book is ultimately about redemption—about the unexpected importance of neighbors, lovers, and friends, and the ways in which we can re-envision our lives for the better, even after the unimaginable has occurred.”

Lucy Tan, author of What We Were Promised

A US launch event for the book will be held on publication date, May 18th, online via McNally Jackson. For more details on the event as well as more about Claire’s US book tour, please visit her website

Click here to pre-order your copy of Unsettled Ground. Be sure to also check out Claire’s Twitter and our interview with her in Issue 21.

Intern Update, Sean O’Day: Agave Cura

Here at Superstition Review, we like to stay updated with our previous interns. That being said, we are happy to announce the news of our former Art Editor for Issues 20 & 21, Sean O’Day! Sean’s lithograph, titled Agave Cura, received an award from the AZ Citizens for the Arts, under the artist name Zanereti. Sean is currently continuing his work in print making.

Zanereti’s work can be seen here, as featured on AZ Citizens for the Arts, Artwork page.

More of Sean’s work can be found here on his website.

Congratulations Sean!

Authors Talk: Ana Brotas

Ana Brotas

Today, we are pleased to feature Ana Brotas as our Authors Talk series contributor. She takes this opportunity to discuss her experience with photography and reveal her creative process. She describes her long journey with photography and how she has used the “process of drawing with light” as a form of expression.

Ana reflects on her early relationship with photography, noting that “there was an amazement embedded in this process.” However, as her time working with the artistic medium went on and became digitized she felt that it lost much of its meaning and no longer felt like the same “conscious decision to capture a moment.” This changed when she went through the many photos she had taken over the years and discovered things she had forgot, saying that it was as if she was “browsing through someone else’s memory” to go through her old photos. So, she found new inspiration in the “nostalgia transformed into an archive” which speaks honestly to the unexpected and complex creative process which can take shape in so many different ways.  

You can view Ana’s work in Issue 21 ofSuperstition Review.

Contributor Update, Nicole Sealy: Princeton Fellowship

We are happy to announce the news of past contributor Nicole Sealey! Nicole has been selected as one of the five creatives chosen to be a Mackall Gwinn Hodder Fellow (2019-2020) at the Lewis Center for the Arts at Princeton University. An award-winning poet, Nicole has had poems published or recognized by The New York Times, The Paris Review, NPR, etc. While a fellow at the Lewis Center, Nicole has committed to tackling the erasure of the Ferguson report by the United States Department of Justice and will also engage with the Princeton and literary communities through lectures, readings and other events.

Our interview with Nicole from Issue 21 can be found here, and more information about her two poetry collections and awards can be found here.

Congratulations Nicole!

Authors Talk: DJ Lee

DJ LeeAuthors Talk: DJ Lee

Today we are pleased to feature DJ Lee as our Authors Talk series contributor. She takes the opportunity to talk with her daughter, Steph Lee, about her creative essay “A Syntax of Splits and Ruptures”. The essay covers the period in which DJ and her daughter were estranged, their reconciliation and, in a broader sense, the complicated relationships between mothers and daughters.

The two discuss the difficulty of writing a personal piece about family, but they acknowledge writing can be a way to process family traumas. DJ considers Steph’s reaction to the essay, as she felt the person in the essay is “another form of me.” After reconciling, DJ felt she needed to publicly share their story through her writing, speaking to “people dealing with this kind of loss, especially of a child.”

DJ also considers the inspiration she found in the earthwork sculpture, Spiral Jetty, built by Robert Smithson in the Great Salt Lake. The art piece, significant to the pair, became an important element in the piece as she constructed the essay “to have a spiral form, to sort of fold back on itself like the relationship between mothers and daughters.” She also considers the idea of “something very beautiful and precious and special being under the surface.” Not only does she find meaning in this inspiring art piece but uses numbers to connect the fragments of her essay in order demonstrate the “ruptures in peoples lives” and how “a fractured relationship” can be made whole.

You can read DJ’s work in Issue 21 of Superstition Review.

Authors Talk: Sunny Nestler

Authors Talk: Sunny Nestler

Sunny NestlerToday we are pleased to feature author Sunny Nestler as our Authors Talk series contributor. The artist takes the time to discuss their recently self-published artist book Undergrowth in which five drawings previously published in SR are featured. They consider the creation of the book with their collaborator, A A Spencer, as they talk about the artistic and creative choices that went into developing it.

Accompanied by audio meant to elaborate on the drawings, Sunny describes the “imagined parallel universe” which the art illustrates, representing a “journey through the hairy underbelly of desert”. The imagery of the book is uniquely interspersed with text by other creative minds in collaboration with the art. In speaking of his own relation to the artwork, Spencer considers the presence of “a lot of time and a lot of space” which seemed particularly “immeasurable”. This contributed to the work of “visionary fiction” which he produces as a companion to Sunny’s art. Sunny also discusses the drawing Tectonic Microgrowth which shows “various snapshots of growth”, speaking to the overall theme and purpose of the artistic work.

You can view Sunny’s work in Issue 21 of Superstition Review.

Authors Talk: Sarah Morejohn

Today we are pleased to feature artist Sarah Morejohn as our Authors Talk series contributor. In this podcast, Sarah discusses her five drawings: “Blue-Green Anise Mushroom,” “Crystallizing Almond Mushroom,” “Freezing Pine Spike,” “Pink Earth Tonguled,” and “Strawberry Blite,” that were featured in Issue 21 of Superstition Review.

Sarah describes these pieces as “dreams and diaries; repetitions that catch the flow of thought.” She illustrates how each drawing “is made with small, intricate dotted lines” on a piece of printmaking paper, and that “the drawings have a center, with shapes growing or navigating outwards from that center.” All of the drawings, she states, “were inspired by snow crystals,” based on a recurring dream of catching snow crystals in her hand after a hometown blizzard.

“I have been naming my work after plants and mushrooms that are primarily found in Oregon,” Sarah declares, adding that she often uses guidebooks for inspiration. “I will find a common name or likeness that resonates with the drawing,” Sarah continues, and will name the piece after it’s finished. She concludes by referencing “a phrase that I once wrote in an old sketchbook of mine: ‘Drawing is matter set into motion,’ and responds that “I must have meant that imaginatively.”

You can view Sarah’s five drawings in Issue 21 of Superstition Review.

Authors Talk: Paula Izydorek

We listed the wrong URL for Sunny Nestler in our newsletter. Please view her author’s talk here.

 

Today we are pleased to feature artist Paula Izydorek as our Authors Talk series contributor. In this short video, Paula discusses five paintings from her series titled (Self) Worth, as well as her overall artistic proclivities.

Paula declares that one thing she truly enjoys about (Self) Worth is that “the image itself repeats, but the composition changes based on the wood grain,” or the materials of production. While each painting is a self-portrait, they are not exclusively portraits of Paula alone; as she states, “I like to have the viewer put themselves in the place of the face that’s in the abstract composition, and to review your own self-worth.” That way, she emphasizes, viewers can identify with the story being expressed, and “connect with the image based on their own personal experience.”

As she concludes, Paula expresses her desire that each viewer will be able to “identify with the energy around the subject, rather than get lost in the subject as a portrait.” That way, she stresses, viewers will be able to use the work as a gauge to “evaluate…where you want to be with regards to your self worth.”

You can view five paintings from Paula’s (Self) Worth series in Issue 21 of Superstition Review.

Authors Talk: Anna Geary-Meyer

Today we are pleased to feature author Anna Geary-Meyer as our Authors Talk series contributor. In this podcast, Anna discusses the process of creating her short story, “Natural People,” which she says was “born through a writing exercise.”

Anna describes how one day, in a writing workshop sponsored by The Reader Berlin, she was given an assignment to write on the mythical “Adaro” creature. Based on her having worked in several different startups at the time, she “ended up fashioning this…merman-like spirit into a hyper-exercised, hyper-optimized boss character,” who acts as a negative force in the life of the protagonist. This, she says, relates to the overall theme of animals in her story, and the degree to which they’re found throughout the piece.

Anna states that the “crux of the story is the main character’s realization that, to find a home in the world, she has to make one herself,” and that,  while “I didn’t write with this theme in mind, it’s where I was at as a person.” She continues that the main character “could only really begin to find a home in herself and her environment…when she accepts this feeling of being lost”, which occurs both literally and metaphorically. Eventually, Anna concludes, the main character is able to “find a rhythm in her own body.”

You can read Anna’s story, “Natural People,” in Issue 21 of Superstition Review.