Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Thursday, April 18, 2013

Join us at the Houston Indie Book Festival

Gulf Coast Journal






Houston Indie Book Fest is Here!
Join us this Saturday, April 20th, for the Houston Indie Book Festival and Menil Community Arts Festival, hosted on the Menil Campus through a collaboration between Gulf Coast, Da Camera of Houston, Inprint, Houston Center for Photography, Southwest Alternate Media Project (SWAMP), the Rothko Chapel, Writers in the Schools, and The Menil Collection, and sponsored by the Texas Commission on the Arts, Siccardi Gallery, New Leaf Real Estate, and Texas Tea.

To help celebrate the start of the festival, we hope you'll also join us at Boheme, tonight at 5 p.m. for a Cultured Cocktails event. A portion of the bar proceeds during happy hour (5 p.m. until 7 p.m.) go to benefit the festival. You can RSVP to tonight's event here.

The 2013 festival will be on Saturday, April 20, from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. at Menil Park. The event is completely free and open to the public, and features readings, panels on writing and publishing, music, yoga, film, and visual art, as well as nationally-distributed literary journals alongside new and used booksellers, publishers, small presses, literary organizations, and writers. RSVP to the event here and sign up to learn more about the festival by joining HIBF on Facebook and Twitter.
Saturday, April 20th: Events Calendar

Readings on the Menil Bookstore deck:

12PM – Blooms, part of Houston Young Writers Reading Series
Presented by Writers in the Schools, participants in their Houston Young Writers Reading Series will read original poems, stories and essays inspired by nature, community, family, history, and art.

1PM - Indie Editors Take the Mic
Founding editor of Owl Eye Review Austin Tremblay joins independent author and poetry editor of Gigantic Sequins Sophie Klahr and co-editor of The Cupboard Adam Peterson as they read their original works.

2PM – Mat Johnson, presented by Inprint
Author of Pym, Drop, and Hunting in Harlem as well as the comic books Incognegro and Dark Rain, Mat Johnson is a recipient of the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, the John Dos Passos Prize for Literature, and is a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers selection. In addition, he teaches creative writing at the University of Houston.

3PM – Derrick Brown and Jason Bayani, presented by Write Bloody Books
Derrick Brown is a noted slam poet and original member of the group The Poetry Revival, and Jason Bayani is author of the poetry collection Amulet and is a member of the Asian-American slam poetry trio, The Proletariat Bronze.

4PM – Bootown Theater
The non-profit theater company Bootown, creator of the popular series Grown-Up Storytime, will be performing a family friendly show that's sure to get the audience laughing.

Readings on the east end of the Menil building:
11AM – 7 Steps to Bring Your Book into a Publisher's Hands
Luci Smoker, author of Distortion and Retribution will teach writers the perfect strategy for getting their work noticed.

12:15PM – Children's Storytime: The Deep Blue Forest
Geraldo Olivo, author of The Deep Blue Forest and The Adventures of Papa Roo and Little Roo will perform a puppet show and an interactive dance session.

1:30PM – Small Press, Big Rewards: Publishing Beyond the Mainstream
A panel session featuring independent publishing houses will discuss the advantages of working with an independent vs. mainstream publishing house.

3:00PM – Glass Mountain presents: A Reading with Aaron Reynolds
University of Houston creative writing professor Aaron Reynolds will give a reading along with his editors from the nationally-distributed undergraduate journal Glass Mountain.

4:30PM – Publishing in Literary Magazines: From Slush Pile to Superstar
A panel session featuring current and former Gulf Coast editorial staff members, will discuss publishing in literary magazines.

Workshops:

Yoga at the Rothko Chapel
• 11AM – Hatha yoga with Mary Oppermann
• 1PM – Kids yoga with Laura Calcaterro
• 2:30PM – Acro Jam yoga and partner-based acrobatic yoga with Jeff Newton

Writing Tours of the Menil with Writers in the Schools
• 1PM and 1:30PM – Writers in the Schools will host 30-minute creative writing tours at the Menil Collection designed for the whole family. WITS writers will lead participants on a tour of Menil galleries and use specific works of art as inspiration for fun creative writing exercises.

Music:

11AM – Thomas Hulten Hot Viking Dixieland Band
Presented by Da Camera of Houston, Thomas Hulten is principal trombone with the Houston Grand Opera and the Houston Ballet, and affiliate artist at Moores School of Music and the University of Houston. Hulten has performed with some of music’s most influential modern artists including Ray Charles, The Temptations, Natalie Cole and Barry Manilow.

4:30PM – line upon line percussion performs Hughes Dufourt’s Erewhon
Presented by The Menil Collection, line upon line is committed to seeking new ways for percussion instruments to advance contemporary music. Based out of Austin, they have been called “the premier new music percussion ensemble in Texas and the South” by Austinist and have been featured at SXSW, Fast Forward Austin and the International Festival-Institute at Round Rock. Adam Bedell, Tim Briones, Cullen Faulk, Andrew Fuhrman, Eric Peterson, Matthew Teodori will be performing Hughes Dufourt’s massive percussion sextet Erewhon.

Film:

SWAMP will be screening selections from the 35th season of THE TERRITORY, their short film showcase series broadcast on Houston PBS, Channel 8, in the Byzantine Fresco Chapel (4011 Yupon St) at 1:30PM and 3:30PM. THE TERRITORY is the longest running public television showcase of independent film/video in the country. The half-hour 13-part Texas PBS series showcases new directions in film, video, and digital media.

Food:

Food trucks will be serving up a variety of gourmet delicacies in the Menil parking lot on West Alabama all day.

All Day:

Houston Center for Photography
19 students from 13 Houston-area schools are represented in the annual exhibition, Collaborations X Print Sale, the final project of a semester-long “Collaborations” course taught by HCP instructors. Each student’s prints are for sale, with nothing over $100.

Menil Bookstore and Information Booth
Start your day here to pick up a map and a schedule, as well as a beverage courtesy of Texas Tea. Then wander through the Menil Bookstore and browse their tremendous selection of books and gifts.

Menil Collection
Enjoy the contemplative and tranquil art museum that is at the heart of the festival. Featuring exhibitions Forrest Bess: Seeing Things Invisible, and Untitled (Structures): Leslie Hewitt in Collaboration with Bradford Young, as well as the permanent collection. In addition to the exhibits, the Menil will present, Voices of the Menil, a cellphone audio-walk that will provide listeners a chance to tour the campus and hear stories from John and Dominique de Menil, among others, who were instrumental in the creation and development of the museum neighborhood.

Rothko Chapel
Founded by John and Dominique de Menil, the Rothko Chapel is a modern meditative environment inspired by the mural canvases of American abstract expressionist Mark Rothko.