Throughout the year, the Poetry Initiative will host a range of activities for poets and for lovers of poetry throughout the state. With its many partnerships with organizations and institutions around South Carolina, the Poetry Initiative organizes, supports and promotes events that range from small workshops to high profile events like the annual SC Poets' Summit.
Event: For the Love of Art: A Camp to Explore the Arts (ages 6-12)
Date: Monday, August 3 - Thursday, August 6 (every day)
Time: 9:00 AM - Noon
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
An interdisciplinary arts based camp hosted at the Columbia Museum of Art featuring poetry, studio art, and dance workshops, as well as tours of the Museum’s exhibits. Children are introduced to themes, including the senses, collage writing and visual art, circular and linear movement, and self-expression. Works crafted during this four day camp reflect each child’s interpretation of these themes through their own unique voice.
Sponsored by the University of South Carolina’s Arts Institute, the South Carolina Poetry Initiative in partnership with the Columbia Museum of Art.
Event: PHOTOVOICE
Date: Wednesday, April 1
Time: 5:30 PM - 7:30 PM
Place: Russell House Ballroom
You are cordially invited to a photography and creative writing exhibit focusing on the experiences of students with disabilities at the University of South Carolina. Through photographic images and the written word, Photovoice will offer an insider's view of the strengths displayed by this unique student population, as well as the challenges they face.
If you have questions or need special accommodations, please contact Lauren Hastings at (803) 777-3656, hastings@mailbox.sc.edu.
Event: 2009 South Carolina’s Poetry Initiative’s Single Poem and Book Contest Awards Celebration
Date: Saturday, April 11, 2009
Time: 2:00 PM - 4:00 PM
Place: 80808 Vista Gallery
808 Lady Street
*Free and open to the public.
Poetry and Art join hands at an event that showcases the diversity of the artist’s palette, whether the artist is a studio artist or a poet. The South Carolina Poetry Initiative will be hosting its 2009 Single Poem Contest and Book Contest Awards Ceremony on Saturday, April 11 at 80808 Vista Gallery.
View the featured art exhibit, hear the work of nationally renowned poets, and catch the wave of excitement as this year’s winners of the SC Poetry Initiative’s Single Poem and Book Contest are announced. The event will take place amidst the stellar art of Nikolai Oskolkov and Olessia Maximenko, and will feature food, music, poetry, and a phenomenal multimedia art exhibit. Each artistic endeavor will address in its own way how the human spirit strives to survive, celebrate, and challenge the world in which it exists.
The 2009 South Carolina Poetry Initiative’s Single Poem Contest is co-sponsored by The State newspaper. For full details on the Single Poem Contest and Book Contest and guidelines for the contest, check out the Poetry Initiative’s website or simply Google: South Carolina Poetry Initiative.
The event will also be showcased on the University of South Carolina’s Arts Institute website. For further information contact Charlene Spearen (cmspeare@mailbox.sc.edu) or Rachel Luria (luria@mailbox.sc.edu).
Event: Working With: Women, Nature & Creative Collaborations
Date: Friday, November 21, 2008
Time: 1:00 PM - 6:00 PM
Place: USC Green Quad Learning Center
This event is sponsored by the SC Arts Institute, the USC Green Quad Learning Center for Sustainable Futures, and the USC Departments of English and Art.
1:00-2:15 Writing Workshop with Mary Alice Monroe and Marjory Wentworth
2:30-3:45 Printmaking Class with Mary Edna Fraser and Mary Robinson
4:00-5:00 Roundtable Discussion with Monroe, Wentworth and Fraser
5:00-6:00 Reception, Book Signing, Art Exhibit
Working With: Women, Nature & Creative Collaborations will be a day-long event featuring interdisciplinary arts based workshops and discussions to be funded by the University of South Carolina's Arts Institute. The University of South Carolina's Arts Institute has as one of its goals the commitment to encourage and oversee interdisciplinary projects in the arts by both creating and promoting programs that make arts more fundamental in the lives of USC students and the general public. It is with this in mind that this project will feature the work of three well-known women from the Lowcountry, this event will give students and faculty opportunities to meet, learn from and work with Mary Alice Monroe, a New York Times bestselling novelist, Marjory Wentworth, the Poet Laureate of South Carolina, and Mary Edna Fraser, a well-known artist and printmaker.
Event: 2008 Chapbook Awards Ceremony
Date: Saturday, October 11th, 2008
Time: 2:00 PM
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
Corner of Hampton and Main
* We are now accepting submissions for the 2008 Chapbook Contest
Event: Carnival of the Animals
Dates: Friday, October 3, 2008 at 7:30 PM
Saturday, October 4, 2008 at 3:00 PM
Place: Koger Center
General Public $16.00
Faculty/Staff/Military $14.00
USC Students $10.00 in Advance, $16.00 at the door
On sale at the Carolina Coliseum Ticket Office.
Call (803) 251-2222 to purchase or buy online at http://www.capitoltickets.com.
*Sponsored by the University of South Carolina Arts Institute
Music, Art, and Poetry
Event: Fire and Transformation: Two-Part Adult Collage and Poetry Workshop
Part II: Stepping Out
Date: Saturday, October 4th, 2008
Time: 10:30 AM – 12:00 Noon
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
Corner of Hampton and Main
*Workshops are Free and open to the public
Facilitators: Charlene Spearen and Julia Koets
Tea and muffins will feed the restless muses as we build on the previous workshop, Emerging Symbols. Participants will reimagine the now familiar environment of their collages, the work of Dale Chihuly, and the narratives that have shaped the world in which they live. We will step away from the tangible world and carve out new pathways that will allow us to let language and art lead the way. We will reach after fleeting images, different sound patterns, and, yes, peculiar associations as we move into the world of poetic word play.
**To Register Contact: Charlene Spearen (cmspeare@gwm.sc.edu)
Carrie Young (carrie_eleanor@yahoo.com)
Event: Fire and Transformation: Two-Part Adult Collage and Poetry Workshop
Part I: Emerging Symbols
Date: Saturday, September 27th, 2008
Time: 1:30 PM – 3:00 PM
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
Corner of Hampton and Main
*Workshops are Free and open to the public
Facilitator: Dawn Hunter
Symbols profoundly express human nature and are important to our psychological life. Explore the culture, nature, and artwork of Dale Chihuly. This workshop will focus on personal creativity and is organized to enhance self-expression, awareness, design and interpretation. We will work loosely and spontaneously. By working intuitively in the creation of collages, we will re-position ourselves with respect to contemporary symbolism and explore our inherent spirituality.
**To Register Contact: Charlene Spearen (cmspeare@gwm.sc.edu)
Carrie Young (carrie_eleanor@yahoo.com)
Fire and Transformation: Workshop for Children
Date: Saturday, September 27th
Time: 9:30 AM to 11:30 AM
Children ages 8-15 years of age
*Free and open to the public
*Facilitators: Dawn Hunter and Charlene Spearen
Constructing Collages and Telling Stories through Poems
**To Register Contact: Charlene Spearen (cmspeare@gwm.sc.edu)
Carrie Young (carrie_eleanor@yahoo.com)
Event: Transformation and Fire: Two Artists, Two Poets
Date: Friday, September 26th, 2008
Time: 6:30 PM – 8:30 PM
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
Corner of Hampton and Main
*Free and open to the public
*Sponsored by the University of South Carolina’s Arts Institute
Incorporating Art, Poetry, Japanese folklore, and the showcasing of Dale Chihuly’s: Seaforms blown glass exhibit, this event will feature collaborative drawings by renowned artist Dawn Hunter and emerging Carolina artist Natalie Askew. The instillation size drawings will blend together excerpts and entire length pieces composed by poet Charlene Spearen and Carolina senior MFA candidate in poetry, Julia Koets. Joining the group for an evening that will unveil provocative pieces of art will be award winning scene designist, Kimi Maeda. Have a glass of wine, something to sweeten the palate, and tour the artwork contained in the exhibit Transformation and Fire, the Dale Chihuly’s Seaforms exhibit, sit-in on a thought provoking round table discussion, and close the evening with the listening to poems that bring to life Japanese ghost tales that boast of the female spirit’s need to entice, confront, and reveal.
Event: 2008 Poets Summit: Servicing South Carolina Poets
Date: Saturday, September 20th, 2008
Time: 9:30 AM – 4:30 PM
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
Corner of Hampton & Main
Open mic, complimentary lunch, and free & open to the public.
"I do believe that when I encounter any group anywhere, that poetry is a vital force of the lives gathered there in the room."
- Naomi Shihab Nye
The fifth-annual Poets Summit brings together great poets and great audiences from around the state of South Carolina for a celebration and exploration of the power of poetry. On September 20th at the Columbia Museum of Art, beginning at 9:30 a.m., poets and poetry-lovers can come together to listen, write, share, and learn.
Award-winning and best-selling poet Naomi Shihab Nye is this year’s featured poet who will be hosting a workshop* at 10:00 a.m. and will be presenting a reading at 1:15 p.m., followed by a Q& A and book signing. Joining Naomi Shihab Nye will be another exceptional poet: Aracelis Girmay. The day’s agenda will also feature a reading and round table discussion by several poets who’ve been awarded residencies throughout the state. The summit will conclude by giving the audience a chance to share their own poetry at an open mic reading. South Carolina Poetry Initiative Director, Kwame Dawes, is particularly excited about this year’s visiting poets and the event’s agenda, stating:
“With the Poetry Initiative’s new push to solidify its statewide service to poets and lovers of poetry, this year’s summit, featuring Naomi Shihab Nye, one of the most dynamic and popular poets writing in the US today, and Aracelis Girmay, perhaps one of the most gifted poets to have emerged in the last decade, should prove an exciting gathering of South Carolina poets and those who enjoy poetry. Our hope is to especially encourage teachers and students from around the state to participate in this exciting event.”
*Due to the anticipated high attendance, we are asking that you register for Naomi Shihab Nye’s workshop. For more information and to register for the morning workshop, contact Rachel Luria at luria@mailbox.sc.edu or call 777-5492.
Workshop Agenda
9:00 AM : PI Committee Caucus Meeting
10:00 AM : Workshop lead by Naomi Shihab Nye
11:00 AM : "Still on the Job"
News about the Initiative
11:45 AM : Reading and book signing by Aracelis Girmay
12:15 PM : Lunch/ tour Dale Chihuly's blown-glass exhibit
1:15 PM : Reading and book signing by Naomi Shihab Nye
3:00 PM : Open-Mic
Introduced by winners from the 2008 Poetry
Initiative Single Poem Contest.
Event: AFTER SHOCKS: The Poetry of Recovery for Life-Shattering Events, Edited by Tom Lombardo
Date: Thursday, September 18th, 2008
Time: 7:00 PM
Place: Charleston County Public Library
68 Calhoun St., Charleston, SC
Book signing and reception will follow the reading. Anthologies will be available for purchase.
Please join us for a reading to celebrate the publication of an important new poetry anthology, which includes 152 poems written by 115 poets from 15 nations. Featured are three U.S. Poets Laureates, a Pulitzer Prize Winner, a Whitbread Book of the Year winner, a Whitbread Poetry Award winner, two Lannan Award winners, and two Forward Prize winners.
READINGS BY AREA POETS will include Paul Allen, Linda Ferguson, Richard Garcia, Barbara G.S. Hagerty, Kurtis Lamkin, Ed Madden, Susan Meyers, Marjory Wentworth, and Tom Lombardo, editor.
The reception will feature music by Kurtis Lamkin and Paul Allen.
"This anthology is of national and international significance. It is a collection that crosses and embraces all boundaries—culture, class, gender, and race. It takes us into the hardest places human beings have to go—the failures of personal relationships, loss of loved ones, genocide, racial oppression, addiction, loss of innocence, marginalization, and more. And, yet, each section moves, finally, toward a place of hope and dignity and resilience."
- Cathy Smith Bowers, Author, The Candle I Hold Up to See You
For more information, please visit http://www.poetryofrecovery.com.
Event: Friends of Ed Madden Book Launch
Date: Friday, August 22nd, 2008
Time: 6:30 PM – 8:00 PM
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
Corner of Hampton and Main
*Free and open to the public
*Ed’s book: Signals was the winner of the 2007 South Carolina Poetry Initiative’s Book Contest. We are going to toast the book, maybe “roast” the poet a bit, hear Ed read some of the stunning pieces from the book as well as a reading by the winners of this year’s Single Poem Contest.
Event: Poetry School 101
Dates: August 1st, 2nd, and 3rd, 2008
Times: August 1st, 6:30 PM to 8:00 PM (Reception)
August 2nd, 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM (Lunch provided)
August 3rd, 2:00 PM to 3:30 PM (Light reception)
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
Corner of Hampton and Main
50.00 Columbia Museum Members/ 60.00 Non-Museum Members
Scholarships available (based on need)
August 1st: Reception and Reading by Thom Ward, Poet and Editor from BOA Editions.
August 2nd: Thom Ward hosting workshops:
1. “Getting that Book, Chapbook, Poem Published”
2. “Telling It Slant: The Prose Poem”
August 2nd: Poet Linda Ferguson hosting a workshop:
“Personal Narratives and the Poem”
August 2nd: Roundtable with Kwame Dawes:
Organizing Your Manuscript
August 3rd: Poet Sheila Tombe hosting a workshop:
“The Shapes of Poems”
August 3rd: Light reception and open mic
**To Register Contact: Charlene Spearen (cmspeare@gwm.sc.edu)
Carrie Young (carrie_eleanor@yahoo.com)
Event: For the Love of Art : Excavating a Poem Summer Camp for Children
Date: July 21st, 22nd, 23rd, 24th, 2008
Time: 9:30 AM to 12:30 PM
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
Corner of Hampton and Main
Fee: 60.00 per student/50.00 Columbia Museum Members
*Scholarships slots are available based on circumstances of need.
* This camp will engage participants in exciting movement, art, and creative writing workshops and offer several guided tours of the museum’s art collection.
**To Register Contact: Charlene Spearen (cmspeare@gwm.sc.edu)
Carrie Young (carrie_eleanor@yahoo.com)
Event: Movin' with Poetry: Children's Poetry Workshop
Date: Saturday, March 29th, 2008
Time: 10:00 AM – 11:30 AM
ages 8-12
Place: Children's Room Manager
Richland County Public Library
1431 Assembly Street
Columbia, S.C. 29201
Poets from the South Carolina Poetry Initiative will feature a hands-on poetry workshop as a means for blending eye, word, and story. Using such tools as books in verse, illustrations, art supplies, and pen and paper, young bards will experience how the imagination can be moved into spaces that explore both the real and make believe world!
Event: United in This Way: Master Class Led by Poet Li-Young Lee
Lunch and Master Class with Poet Li-Young Lee
Date: Friday, March 28th, 2008
Time: 11:30 AM- 1:30 PM
Place: Alumni House
University of South Carolina
1731 College Street
Corner of College Street and Barnwell Ave
(Across from USC’s Capstone Building)
Space is limited to 30 seats
Reserve Space by Contacting Charlene Spearen:
Tel: 777-5492 Email: cmspeare@mailbox.sc.edu
Event: United in This Way: Reception and Reading Featuring Poet Li-Young Lee
Date: Friday, March 28th, 2008
Time: 6:30pm- 8:30pm
Place: Columbia Museum of Art
Corner of Main and Hampton Streets
Between two unknowns, I live my life.
Between my mother's hopes, older than I am
by coming before me. And my child's wishes, older than I am
by outliving me…
—Li-Young Lee
The evening’s agenda will feature a reception and public reading by world acclaimed poet Li-Young Lee; book signing to will follow. Lee’s books will be available for purchase. On display will be works of poetry and art inspired by specific pieces written by Li-Young Lee.
Pieces will have been created by University of South Carolina graduate and undergraduate students majoring in the Fine Arts: poetry, dance, and art. As a precursor for what will be a stellar reading by one of the most exciting poets of the 21st century, the audience will be treated to an exciting original dance choreographed and presented by University of South Carolina students majoring in Dance. Dancers will be in full costume and presentation will have been inspired by specific poems created by Li-Young Lee.
Behind My Eyes by Li-Young Lee
A highly anticipated collection from one of the most powerful voices at work in America today. Combining sensitivity and eloquence with a broad appeal, Li-Young Lee walks in the footsteps of Stanley Kunitz and Billy Collins as one of the most beloved poets in the US. Playful, erotic, at times mysterious, his work describes the immanent value of everyday experience. Straightforward language and simple narratives become gateways to the most powerful formulations of beauty, wisdom, and divine love.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Event: United in This Way: Transfigured by Music
Date: Saturday, March 29, 2008
Time: 6:00 p.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Place: School of Music
University of South Carolina
Room 006
Assembly Street next to the Koger Center
*Light Reception and Event is Free and Open to the public.
Reception and brief talk led by Li-Young Lee discussing his poetry, Asian influences, and establishing elements of music in his work. This event is a precursor to a major public Gamelan Galak Tika concert which will be held in the School of Music’s Recital Hall. Concert begins at 7:30 p.m.
Event: A Cabaret of Words: A Poetry Reading Series
Date: Tuesday, April 1st, 2008
Time: 6:30 PM - 8:00 PM
Place: Richland County Public Library
Bostick Auditorium, Main Library
Assembly Street
Columbia, SC
*Event is Free and Open to the public
Lights. Action. Music. Featuring award winning poets and a multitude of voices,
the South Carolina Poetry Initiative will treat you to a night of words consuming words as poets from around the state showcase their talent in this writers series.
*Book Signing to follow Reading
Laurel Blossom is a prize-winning poet and her most recent book is Degrees of Latitude, a book-length narrative prose poem exploring the geography of a woman's life (). Earlier books include Wednesday: New and Selected Poems, The Papers Said, What's Wrong, and Any Minute, a chapbook, which was nominated for the Elliston Prize. Her work has appeared in a number of anthologies, including 180 More: Extraordinary Poems for Every Day (Billy Collins, editor) and in national journals including Poetry, The American Poetry Review, Pequod, The Paris Review, The Carolina Quarterly, among others.
Susan Meyers is active n the poetry societies of South Carolina and North Carolina, and is currently serving as president of Her book length collection, has been published by the after being selected by Terrance Hayes for the SC Poetry Initiative’s Poetry Book Prize. Keep and Give Away is also the winner of the Brockman-Campbell Book Award and the SIBA (Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance) Book Award for Poetry. Her work has appeared in The Southern Review, Crazyhorse, Tar River Poetry, Verse Daily, and other literary journals. Recent prizes include first place in the Yemassee and South Carolina Review poetry contests.
Steve Gardner (Co-edited with William Wright The Southern Poetry Anthology: South
Carolina, Texas Review Press, 2007)
Sarah Newman (University of South Carolina Second Year MFA Student)
Bhavin Tailor (University of South Carolina Second Year MFA Student)
Event: Poetry Initiative Director Kwame Dawes is named 2008 Elizabeth O’Neill Verner/Governor’s Awards for the Arts Recipient
Date: Wednesday, April 16th, 2008
Time: 9:15 am
Place: House Chambers at the Statehouse in Columbia
*The ceremony is free and open to the public
Event: South Carolina Poetry Initiative’s 2008 Chapbook Contest
The University of South Carolina's outreach organization, the South Carolina Poetry Initiative, is proud to announce its third annual chapbook contest. This contest seeks to introduce a series of five chapbooks to South Carolina’s book reading public. The South Carolina Initiative produces all five books by selected poets as a work of art, presenting each publication with a distinctive design, with beautiful print values, and as part of an exclusive numbered series. The publications will garner statewide attention for poetry through readings, a book launch, and other promotional activities. The winning chapbook series will be selected and edited by Kwame Dawes. Manuscripts will be published by Stepping Stones Press and will be distributed by the South Carolina Poetry Initiative.
Click here for contest guidelines and information.
Click for 2007 chapbook contest results.
© 2003.University of South Carolina.
