The WCCW Reading Series is a quarterly literary event organized by Sara Finnerty and Nina Rota. Each event’s readings are thematically linked with the current WCCW quarterly programming.
Quarter Theme: Unschooling
Thursday, November 8, 7:30-10pm
Presented by Nina Rota & Sara Finnerty
Max 50 participants
Free
Please come and see this group of strong writers and performers for an evening of unlearning and new learning.
Frankie Norstad
Amina Cain
Laura Vena
Adrienne Walser
The WCCW Reading Series is a quarterly literary reading series organized by Sara Finnerty and Nina Rota. The readings are thematically linked with WCCW programming which, for summer 2018, is the idea of Unschooling.
*This event is free and open to the public. Everyone is welcome. We will provide drinks and light snacks.
About the Readers
Amina Cain is the author most recently of the short story collection CREATURE, out with Dorothy, a publishing project, and a forthcoming novel in 2019, INDELICACY, from FSG in the US and Strange Light in Canada. Her essays and short stories have appeared in n+1, The Paris Review Daily, BOMB, Full Stop, Vice, the Believer Logger, and other places. She lives in Los Angeles and is a literature contributing editor at BOMB. You can find Amina online at Gentle Nights.
Raised by hippies [drug addicts] up and down the West Coast, Frankie Norstad quickly realized her best hustle in life was comedic storytelling. She has performed with Mortified, The Moth, and at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. She is the host of the Little Miss Addict podcast, boasts poor impulse control, and a tendency to over disclose. She can be found on stages worldwide showing her metaphorical vagina.
Laura Vena is a writer, translator, teacher, animal activist, and editor whose work has appeared in Bombay Gin, Super Arrow, Tarpaulin Sky, In Posse Review, The Dirty Fabulous, Antennae and elsewhere. She is the winner of the 1913 Press First Book Prize by John Keene for her manuscript, x/she: stardraped and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize by Debra di Blasi for an excerpt from the same book. Laura holds an MFA in Creative Writing and Critical Studies from CalArts. She is interested in works of a fantastic nature, as well as those that investigate the ethical and aesthetic considerations of representation. Laura is the Co-founding Editor of the art and text journal Two If By Sea (coming soon), Fiction Editor at Entropy Magazine, and Founder and Creative Director of Blockhead Brigade, an organization that seeks to help Pit Bull type dogs & their families in need.
Adrienne Walser has a Ph.D. in English from USC, is an Assistant Professor of Literature and Education for Bard College MAT in Los Angeles, and works as the Academic Specialist for the Youth Policy Institute. She has work published in Jacket2, Film International, Pastelegram: Projects Exploring Archives and Artistic Process, Art Book Review, and Contemporary Art Review Los Angeles (Carla).
Quarter Theme: Control
Thursday, August 2, 7:30-10pm
Presented by Nina Rota & Sara Finnerty
Max 40 participants
Free / RSVP
Please join this group of amazing writers and performers on a late summer’s evening in Frogtown (Echo Park):
Bridgette Bianca
Shacole Hamlett
B.A. Williams
Melissa Ximena
This event is free and open to the public. Everyone is welcome. We will provide drinks and light snacks.
About the Readers
Bridgette Bianca is a poet and professor from South Central Los Angeles. She received her Bachelor of Arts in English from Howard University and her Master of Fine Arts in Writing from Otis College of Art & Design. bridgette bianca has performed her poetry all around Southern California, including features at the World Stage, the Southern California Poetry Festival, the 2017 Los Angeles Lit Crawl, the Table Lit, the Rapp Saloon, and the un::fade::able Reading Series. She was most recently published on CulturalWeekly.com. bridgette bianca’s work as a writer and an educator seeks to serve the people and moments most forget or ignore.
Shacole Hamlett is a freelance Experiential Producer, Curator and Performance Artist who lives to curate entrancing environments and performances that propel people into the present moment. She found her calling as a public and fine art curator during her time freelancing for Los Angeles’ premier public art organization, Do Art Foundation. She studied dance, acrobatics and circus arts for over 20 years and currently specializse in burlesque, fire eating and performance art activations in fine art spaces. My love for circus and burlesque has inspired me to create, produce and direct my very own circus production and tour entitle Ritual Burlesque for the last 4 years.
Brittany Ambree Williams aka B.A. Williams is a queer writer and performer from East Long Beach, CA. She received her BA in Creative Writing from CSULB and is an MFA candidate writing a novel-length manuscript. When she isn’t writing or performing she is developing a platform which seeks to uplift communities of color, redefine “otherness,” and distribute intersectionality with various modes of art. B.A. is the Literary Director of A R T Realm, and she co-curates and hosts un::fade::able – the requiem of Sandra Bland. Her poetry and prose focus on all things “other” with a heavy emphasis on Blackness, womanhood, and queerness. Her work has appeared in Contraposition Magazine and Rigorous Magazine.
Melissa Ximena Golebiowski is a short story writer based in Los Angeles. She is the National Assigning Editor for Lit Hub where she oversees columns that focus on literary culture and environment in less literary centric U.S. cities and international locations. She is the proud daughter of immigrants.
Quarter Theme: Health/Care
Thursday, March 22, 7:30-10pm
Hosted by Sara Finnerty & Nina Rota
Free
Please join us as these four Los Angeles area writers and performers present an evening of work on the theme of health and care: Karen Palmer, Cara Lopez Lee, Traci Kato-kiriyama and Umi Hsu.
Karen Palmer
Cara Lopez Lee
Traci Kato-kiriyama
Umi Hsu
About the Readers
Karen Palmer is the author of the novels All Saints and Border Dogs. She has been awarded a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, a MacDowell fellowship, and grants from the Colorado Council on the Arts. Her essay, “The Reader Is the Protagonist,” originally published in Virginia Quarterly Review, was recently selected by Leslie Jamison for inclusion in Best American Essays 2017; her short story, “Virtuoso Mio,” received a Pushcart Prize and is anthologized in The Bedford/St. Martin’s Introduction to Literature. Other writing has appeared in The Rumpus, the Denver Post, Five Points, The Manifest-Station, and Kalliope. Karen has taught at UCLA Extension and at Lighthouse Writers in Denver, Colorado, and is currently working on a memoir.
Cara Lopez Lee is the author of the memoir They Only Eat Their Husbands (Conundrum, 2014). She has collaborated on more than 20 books, including Unexpected Prisoner, the memoir of Vietnam POW Robert Wideman. Her stories have appeared in such publications as The Los Angeles Times, Manifest-Station, and 50-Word Stories. She performs in L.A. storytelling shows like Two Truths and a Lie, Tell It! and Unheard L.A., and recently won L.A.’s Moth StorySlam. She taught for Denver’s Lighthouse Writers Workshop. She was a TV journalist and a writer for HGTV and Food Network. Cara and her husband live in Ventura.
traci kato-kiriyama is a multi-disciplinary artist, writer/author, actor, arts educator & community organizer. Since 1996, she has performed and written for theatre tours, productions, artist residencies, and performance collaborations in hundreds of venues throughout the country. Traci is one half of the award-winning PULLproject Ensemble with actor/aerial artist, Kennedy Kabasares. She is the Co-Founder and Director for Tuesday Night Project, presenter of the Tuesday Night Cafe Series now in its 18th year and the longest-running Asian American mic series in the country
Umi Hsu (pronouns: they/them) is a strategic designer and public humanist who engages with research and organizing agendas for equity in arts, technology, and civic life. Hsu leads design strategy and digital initiatives at the City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs. A former ACLS Public Fellow, Hsu advises Arts for LA, LA Counts, Cultural Research Network, Center for Cultural Innovation, and Society of Ethnomusicology and teaches as an adjunct professor at ArtCenter College of Design and University of Southern California.
Quarter Theme: Rethinking:
Thursday Dec 7, 7:30-9:30pm
Hosted by Sara Finnerty & Nina Rota
Free
Please join us for a chain of Los Angeles literary luminaries. Starting with Dana Johnson, each of our writers has chosen a reader who, in turn, has chosen the next reader.
Dana Johnson
Désirée Zamorano
Bonnie S. Kaplan
Ryka Aoki
The WCCW Reading Series is a quarterly literary reading series organized by Sara Finnerty and Nina Rota. The readings are thematically linked with WCCW programming which, for Fall 2017, is Rethinking.
*THIS EVENT IS FREE and we will provide light snacks.
Quarter Theme: Coalition
Thursday, May 18, 7:30–9:30pm
Hosted by Nina Rota and Sara Finnerty
Free
Please join this group of amazing writers and performers on a lovely spring evening in Frogtown:
Janice Lee
Rachel Kann
Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo
Julia Ingalls
*THIS EVENT IS FREE and we will provide light snacks.
*If you are driving, there will be an overflow parking lot open just before the iron gates, on the left. There will be signs indicating where you can park.
Quarter Theme: Co-Struggle
Thursday, February 9th, 7:30pm
Free
Please join us to hear four dynamic writers who work in film, theater, poetry, nonfiction and fiction, and also work with local community groups.
Mady Schutzman
Maya Washington
Olga García Echeverría
Meg Whitford
Quarter Theme: Civics
Tuesday, November 1st, 7:30pm
Free
Please join us for readings by the following award-winning poets, novelists, performers, and activists whose work covers subjects from mourning and loss to LGBT issues. We encourage you to ask questions and join in the conversation. We will provide snacks and drinks.
Ashaki Jackson
Melissa Chadburn
Elisabeth Houston
Jessie Bliss
Samantha Cohen
Quarter Theme: Magic
Thursday, July 28 2016 7:30-9pm
Free
The WCCW Reading Series is a quarterly literary readings series organized by Sara Finnerty and Nina Rota. The readings are thematically linked with the WCCW programming, so the July 28th performance will be on the theme of MAGIC.
Jessica Cellabos
Wendy Ortiz
Amanda Yates Garcia
Diana Wagman
*THIS EVENT IS FREE and open to the public!
*If you are driving, there will be an overflow parking lot open just before the iron gates, on the left. There will be signs indicating where you can park. See you tomorrow!