Tag: Los Angeles

Creative Inspiration

Put Some Work into your Art…Literally

WORK PIECELast night at Traxx Bar in Union Station, J. David Gonzalez and I put on a reading for Writ Large Press’ 90 for 90 series, which is basically 90 events in 90 days. It’s an ambitious project that Writ Large Press seems to be handling seamlessly. We invited Hank Cherry, Shawnacy Kiker Perez, Yago S. Cura, and Joe Donnelly to read poems, essays, or stories about work — a subject that has always been on my mind.

For some of my favorite artists, work has been a central theme. Think about Van Gogh’s earlier work: the potato eaters, the men and women working the field like lost saints. Think about the work of Millet (the painting below) who influenced Van Gogh. Think about Philip Levine’s “What Work Is”: the understanding of why men drink gin or stand in line for work at an axle plant. Think about Denis Johnson’s famous story “Work”: two addicts stripping copper wire from abandoned homes. When you know how to work, it can inspire, it can become poetic, it can make words real. Work is such a part of our lives; therefore it naturally becomes a major part of art.

Millet 1

Honestly, the crowd was slim last night for the readings about work. It was mostly the readers and their significant others and the people who showed up to get shitfaced before a ride on the surfliner to San Diego. The late-night commuters shuffled in and some unsuspecting people sat down and ordered drinks and listened to us read. It was a great reading filled with writers I admire. But I wasn’t sure if the people at the bar, the strangers, would give a shit about us.

But what I found was that there were three people who stayed for all the readings. Their names were James, Paul, and Mark, and they would sometimes yell in the middle of a story, shouting a loud cry of appreciation over the recollection of a place they’ve been before, a certain phrase, a certain moment. At the end of the reading, I went and thanked the three men for listening. That’s when a young man named Paul grabbed my hand, and he said, “I never thought I would like this shit, but you guys are speaking truth. All those bangers out there, they’re always trying to be tough, but this is what they should be talking about.” He had tattoos on his arms and a bald head, and he was wearing a cut off and a pair of basketball shorts. There was a brown liquor in front of him, and he had that spaced off look that showed he had already polished off a couple of other drinks before. He was shaking my hand for a bit of an awkward beat too long. Continue reading “Put Some Work into your Art…Literally” →

News

ROXANE GAY ON “AN UNTAMED STATE,” BAD FEMINISM, WORK, BUZZFEED, SURVIVAL, CHANNING TATUM, AND MORE

14152187800_5f9212372f_z

 

Roxane Gay, author of “An Untamed State” (Grove Atlantic), co-editor of PANK, and essays editor for The Rumpus, was in Los Angeles recently, and she stopped to talk to The Working Poet Radio Show before her reading at Skylight Books. Listen to Roxane discuss her “An Untamed State,” Channing Tatum, and why she is so fascinated with stories about survival. If you liked this podcast, you might also enjoy our interviews with Daniel Halpern, editor of Ecco Press, or Richard Blanco. Thanks to the Los Angeles Public Library.

Roxane Gay’s writing has appeared in Best American Short Stories 2012, Best Sex Writing 2012, Oxford American, American Short Fiction, West Branch, Virginia Quarterly Review, NOON, The New York Times Book Review, Bookforum, Time, The Los Angeles Times, The Nation, The Rumpus, Salon, The Wall Street Journal’s Speakeasy culture blog, and many others. She is the co-editor of PANK and essays editor for The Rumpus. She teaches writing at Eastern Illinois University. Her novel, An Untamed State, will be published by Grove Atlantic and her essay collection, Bad Feminist, will be published by Harper Perennial, both in 2014. She is at work on both fiction and nonfiction projects.

Travel

The Bungalow in Santa Monica during the BCS Championship

Last week, countless college football fans showed up in Los Angeles. A lot of them seemed to be at The Bungalow in Santa Monica — an excellent lounge at the Fairmont Miramar Hotel. I took some photos.

20140105_160035_2CaliforniaEntrance 2

JonathanEntrance

Writing

Episode 5: Natashia Deón on Dirty Laundry Lit and her life as an attorney/writer

images-2

On episode five of The Working Poet Radio Show, I talked with the fantastic Los Angeles writer, attorney, and community builder Natashia Deón. Check out our conversation about this Saturday’s show, Dirty Laundry Lit: Clothing Optional, at The Virgil and how she’s reaching people in the community through writing. Plus, she talks about the intersection of being an attorney and a writer. 

Natashia Deón is a Los Angeles attorney, writer, and creator of the reading series Dirty Laundry Lit. APushcart Prize nominee and named as a “most fascinating person for 2013” in L.A. Weekly’s 2013 People Issue, she has recently completed a novel which is currently being shopped by her agent, and is working on her collection of essays,This Is How I Let You Go. Her work has appeared side-by-side with Pulitzer Prize winning writer, Yousef Komunyakaa in The Rattling Wall, has appeared in B O D Y, The Rumpus, The Feminist Wire, You. An Anthology of Second Person Essays, and other places. A 2010 PEN Emerging Voices Fellow, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference scholarship recipient and 2011 VCCA Fellow, Deón has taught creative writing at Gettysburg College, for PEN Center USA, and 826LA. She loves pastor tacos and pretty much anything with Sriracha on it.