Don’t Shoot, a poetry reading curated by Samuel Jablon, including poets: Anomalous Who, Steve Dalachinsky, Patricia Spears Jones, Joyce LeeAnn, Bob McNeil with Fred Simpson, Yuko Otomo, Peter Rugh, and Visual Poetics.
Curator: Samuel Jablon (B. Binghamton, NY 1986) is an artist/poet. He moves between different methods of creating, practicing, and doing. For Jablon poetry is always in the background, his practice is rooted in the tension of words and materiality. Jablon’s work has been reviewed in the Wall Street Journal, BOMB Magazine, Art in America, ARTnews, and others. His projects, readings, performances, and exhibitions have been presented at the Museum of Modern Art NY; Socrates Sculpture Park; The Queens Museum of Art; Storefront for Art and Architecture; Smack Mellon; The DUMBO Arts Festival; White Box Art Center; Show Room Gallery; Hunter College; The Children’s Museum of Art NY; The Howl Festival; Lodge Gallery; the Center for Book Arts, and Freight + Volume Gallery. He received an MFA from Brooklyn College, and a BA from Naropa University.
Anomalous Who is the ’90 graffiti name of a contemporary artist and poet.
Poet/collagist Steve Dalachinsky was born in Brooklyn after the last big war and has managed to survive lots of little wars. His book The Final Nite (Ugly Duckling Presse) won the PEN Oakland National Book Award. His most recent books are Fools Gold (2014 feral press), a superintendent’s eyes (revised and expanded 2013 – unbearable/ autonomedia) and flying home, a collaboration with German visual artist Sig Bang Schcmidt (Paris Lit Up Press 2015). His latest cd is The Fallout of Dreams with Dave Liebman and Richie Beirach (Roguart 2014). He is a 2014 recipient of a Chevalier D’ le Ordre des Artes et Lettres.
Patricia Spears Jones is a poet, playwright and cultural commentator. Her 7 books of poetry include Living in the Love Economy and Painkiller. She curates and hosts WORDS SUNDAY, a a poetry/performance series at Calabar Imports, Bed-Stuy, starting March 22.
Joyce LeeAnn is an archivist and an artist (writing / performance art / burlesque). The act of remembering, and the aim to heal and empower is at the center of her intersecting professional and artistic practice. In 2011, she self-published her first archival text, somethymes grief goes for a walk. In 2013, she co-curated The Finding Aid: Black Women at the Intersection of Art and Archiving event at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture; and was a Create Change fellow with The Laundromat Project. Currently, she is pursuing an artistic and archival project to preserve her grandmothers’ narratives, and performing throughout New York City. For more info on her work, visit joyceleeann.com.
Bob McNeil was the Featured Poet at numerous libraries and colleges throughout the tri-state area. In addition, for quite a few years, he has served as host on the Main Stage of the Harlem Book Fair.
Yuko Otomo is a visual artist & a bilingual poet/writer of Japanese origin. Her publications include: “A Rose is A Rose”, “Garden: Selected Haiku (a tri-lingual version)” &“Fragile” (all by Sisyphus Press),“Small Poems” & “The Hand of The Poet” (both by Ugly Ducking Presse, now available as e-chapbooks). Her latest books are “STUDY& Other Poems on Art” (also by UDP) & “Elements” (by the Feral Press).
She is currently a contributing writer for the collective critical writing forum www.arteidolia.com where she posts her critical wiring mostly on visual art.
Peter Rugh writes about crime, culture, the environment, social justice movements, and politics for Vice News and other outlets. He is a graduate of the Jack Kerouac School at Naropa Univeristy. The upcoming film, Defended in the Streets, features interviews Peter conducted with residents of East Flatbush where on March 9, 2013 16-year-old Kimani Gray was shot seven times by plainclothes detectives with the NYPD’s 67th Precinct. Watch the preview and donate at KimaniFilm.com.
Eclectic best describes Fred Simpson’s percussion style, since he is strongly rooted in African, Latin, and Jazz traditions. Fred has given private lessons, accompanied African and Caribbean Culture and Dance classes on a college level and has been a member and guest of various music groups in and around New York. Fred Simpson’s book, Just Another Sunrise, Poems to the Sun, is available on eBook at Amazon.com.
Visual Poetics is the founding member and main producer of Little Egypt (LE) and the Executive Director of their independent record label, East Park Inc. His rhyme style is a blend of conscious spoken-word and story telling. Little Egypt’s first recording, Sunrisewas released in early 2000. They have since released two full-length albums (Straight Out the Sands and The Crown Heights Affair) and several mix tapes and singles while performing extensively throughout the United States and headlining a tour in Poland. Most recently, Visual Poetics released the Happy Mothers Day single and completed a marketing collaboration for the FILA Heritage line in a series of short videos. He is currently working on an EP set for release in February as well as an album scheduled for release in May.
