BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//Gemini Ink - ECPv6.3.0//NONSGML v1.0//EN
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
X-WR-CALNAME:Gemini Ink
X-ORIGINAL-URL:https://geminiink.org
X-WR-CALDESC:Events for Gemini Ink
REFRESH-INTERVAL;VALUE=DURATION:PT1H
X-Robots-Tag:noindex
X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT1H
BEGIN:VTIMEZONE
TZID:America/Mexico_City
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0600
TZOFFSETTO:-0500
TZNAME:CDT
DTSTART:20230402T080000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0600
TZNAME:CST
DTSTART:20231029T070000
END:STANDARD
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0600
TZOFFSETTO:-0500
TZNAME:CDT
DTSTART:20240407T080000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0500
TZOFFSETTO:-0600
TZNAME:CST
DTSTART:20241027T070000
END:STANDARD
END:VTIMEZONE
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231109T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231109T210000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20230816T204018Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20231024T183925Z
UID:9031-1699552800-1699563600@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Introduction to Playwriting with Mikaela Simon
DESCRIPTION:Thursdays\, Nov 9 & 16\, 6-9pm CST\, via Zoom\nInstructor: Mikaela Simon\nNonmember: $140; Member: $120; Student/Vet/Mil $75 \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE. \n \n  \nExcellent theatre has a way of getting a great story up on its feet. But how do you tell a story on the page so that it comes to life on the stage?  \nJoin New Jersey-based playwright Mikaela Simon in this two-session course which will cover the fundamentals of writing a play.  \nWorkshop participants will learn how playwriting differs from other genres\, what “show don’t tell” means when writing for the stage\, and how to use it to create dynamic storytelling on stage. This course will cover structure\, format\, dialogue\, monologues\, characters\, dramatic action\, and theatricality. Participants will explore these elements and use them to create their own short plays and/or scenes.   \nThis course is open to writers of all genres and skill level\, 18+.  \nStudents will leave this course with: \n\nKnowledge of how to structure and format a play\nAn understanding of playwriting elements and how to use them\nThe ability to apply the concepts to long-form works\, such as one acts\, full-lengths\, etc.\nThe first draft of a 10-minute play or the first few scenes of a larger work\n\nRead Mikaela’s Writer’s Desk Q&A!\n\nMikaela Simon (she/her) is a multi-disciplinary artist based in Jersey City\, NJ. She graduated in 2019 from Drew University with a BA in Theatre Arts. While in college\, Mikaela’s work was performed a number of times in the Plays in Process series\, and she was also a recipient of the Robert Fisher Oxnam Award for Playwriting in 2018\, resulting in a staged reading produced by the Ensemble Studio Theatre. Since graduating\, she has taken on the role of teaching artist for the theatre program at Yavneh Academy in Paramus\, NJ. Mikaela is also a multimedia visual artist\, and is very involved in the Jersey City arts community with her small business (@doodlealldayy). Writing has always held a special place for her\, and she looks forward to getting the chance to share the beautiful craft of playwriting with people who have a story to tell.  \n 
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/introduction-to-playwriting-with-mikaela-simon/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Online Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Mikaela-Simon.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231110T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231110T213000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20230816T211454Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20231103T204605Z
UID:9046-1699641000-1699651800@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Inkstravaganza 2023 honoring Jenny Browne
DESCRIPTION:SOLD OUT\n“Fellow Travelers: Celebrating the Poetic Journeys of Jenny Browne”\n\n\n\n\nCelebrating Jenny Browne at the McNay Art Museum Moroccan Courtyard and Leeper Auditorium\, Friday\, November 10th\, 6:30-9:30 pm\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nAward for Literary Excellence\nJenny Browne \nHonorary Co-Chairs\nDr. Vanessa B. Beasley\, Trinity University’s 20th President\n& Naomi Shihab Nye \nModerator\nDr. Rachel Pearson \nEmcee\nMolly Cox \n2023 Inkstravaganza Committee\nWendy Atwell\, Amie Charney\, Eileen Curtright\, Joey Fauerso\, Meaghan Ritchey\, Claudia Stokes\, Burgin Streetman\, Alexandra van de Kamp\, and Laura Van Prooyen \n\n\n\n\n\nDon’t miss Gemini Ink’s  23rd Inkstravaganza in celebration of the writing arts by joining us on November 10th in honoring Jenny Browne\, as we celebrate her remarkable accomplishments as a groundbreaking poet\, gifted educator\, and community voice for the transformative impact of literature in our lives. \n\n\nJenny Browne is the author of four collections: Fellow Travelers: New and Selected Poems (2019)\, Dear Stranger (2014)\, The Second Reason (2007)\, and At Once (2003). A prolific poet and dynamic literary citizen at home and abroad\, she served concurrent terms as City of San Antonio Poet Laureate (2016-18) and Poet Laureate of the State of Texas (2017) and\, in 2020\, was Distinguished Fulbright Scholar in Creative Writing at the Seamus Heaney Centre\, Queens University\, in Belfast\, Northern Ireland. Other awards include a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Poetry and the Cecil Hemley Award from the Poetry Society of America. She has been an integral part of the Trinity University faculty for 15 years\, having joined the Department of English in 2007\, where she currently teaches courses in creative writing and environmental studies\, as well as co-directs Women and Gender Studies. In 2004\, she received a prestigious three-year James Michener Fellowship from the University of Texas in Austin\, where she received her MFA in Poetry. \nJenny Browne learned to walk on the grounds of Fort Sam Houston. After moving with her family to Maine and the Midwest\, she graduated from the University of Wisconsin in 1993. She continued her travels and lived in Alaska\, West Africa\, El Salvador and the South of France. These formative experiences with other cultures and landscapes shaped her commitment to literature as a means of opening minds\, cultivating imagination\, and creating empathy for people and places beyond one’s own skyline. \nFor most of her adult life\, Browne has brought communities together to strengthen literacy and celebrate literary arts. From 1998-2004 she worked in local schools\, libraries\, and community centers with support from the Texas Commission on the Arts\, the City’s UrbanSmarts Program\, ARTSSanAntonio\, and Gemini Ink. She created and designed a K-12 curriculum integrating writing\, environmental education\, and the poetics of place that was piloted in Gulf Coast schools. From 2000-2003\, she founded and directed the Good Samaritan Center’s Literary Arts Program on San Antonio’s Westside. \nOver the years\, Browne’s work has created platforms and opportunities for people to engage in writing and to explore ideas and identities across cultures\, economic backgrounds\, and ages. She continues to build local\, regional\, and global partnerships and worked with Borderland Collective to create Narratives of Resettlement\, a two-year-long creative collaboration with refugee families. \nIn 2012\, Browne traveled with the U.S. Department of State and the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program on two cultural diplomacy tours\, teaching poetry in the Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya and the U.S. Embassy in Sierra Leone. She also completed a semester-long sabbatical in the Atacama Desert of Chile\, and Oaxaca\, Mexico\, and continues to return to Belfast\, Northern Ireland. \nWhen she is not teaching or traveling\, Browne writes in a hundred-year-old house in the historic La Vaca neighborhood where she lives with her husband\, photographer Scott Martin\, and their daughters Lyda and Harriet. \n\nAbout our Teaching Artist of the Year\, Joyous Windrider Jimenez!\nJoyous Windrider Jiménez\, a Gemini Ink teaching artist since 2016\, is a poet\, teatrista\, mixed-media visual artist\, and video creator. She melds performance and visual elements to articulate her healing journey and emotional literacy. Since 2009\, she’s showcased her work both in San Antonio and online\, with a recent publication in Puro Chicanx: Writers of the 21st Century by Cutthroat\, A Journal Of The Arts and The Black Earth Institute.  \nAs a teaching artist since 2012\, she has worked with notable organizations such as SAY Sí\, Gemini Ink\, the Magik Theatre\, San Antonio Wolf Trap\, the McNay Art Museum\, the San Antonio Museum of Art\, and Blue Star Contemporary’s MOSAIC program for youth. Her teaching experience spans diverse demographics\, from preschoolers to retired adults\, and includes cancer survivors\, incarcerated youth\, mental health warriors\, title I students\, and foster care children. Her students have achieved recognition through public exhibitions\, performances\, publication\, and awards\, including Scholastic Arts & Writing Awards. \n 
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/inkstravaganza-2023/
LOCATION:McNay Art Museum\, 6000 N. New Braunfels Ave.\, San Antonio\, TX\, United States
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/homepage-header-copy-2.jpg
ORGANIZER;CN="Alexandra van de Kamp":MAILTO:avandekamp@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231115T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231115T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20230907T210539Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20231115T232153Z
UID:9173-1700074800-1700080200@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:The Big Texas Author Talk featuring Carmen Tafolla
DESCRIPTION:Wednesday\, November 15th\, 2023 via Zoom @ 7PM CST\nUp Next: Carmen Tafolla’s children’s book\, Warrior Girl. Moderated by Dr. Rita Urquijo-Ruiz.\n\n RSVP\n\n\n\n\n\nABOUT WARRIOR GIRL\nAn insightful novel in verse about the joys and struggles of a Chicana girl who is a warrior for her name\, her history\, and her right to choose what she celebrates in life. \nCelina and her family are bilingual and follow both Mexican and American traditions. Celina revels in her Mexican heritage\, but once she starts school\, it feels like the world wants her to erase that part of her identity. Fortunately\, she’s got an army of family and three fabulous new friends behind her to fight the ignorance. But it’s her Gramma who’s her biggest inspiration\, encouraging Celina to build a shield of joy around herself. Because when you’re celebrating\, when you find a reason to sing or dance or paint or play or laugh or write\, they haven’t taken everything away from you. Of course\, it’s not possible to stay in celebration mode when things get dire–like when her dad’s deported and a pandemic hits–but if there is anything Celina’s sure of\, it’s that she’ll always live up to her last name: Guerrera–woman warrior–and that she will use her voice and writing talents to make the world a more beautiful place where all cultures are celebrated. \nABOUT CARMEN TAFOLLA\nCarmen Tafolla is an internationally acclaimed Chicana writer from San Antonio\, Texas\, and a professor emerita of bicultural bilingual studies at the University of Texas at San Antonio. Tafolla served as the poet laureate of San Antonio from 2012 to 2014\, and was named the Poet Laureate of Texas for 2015–16. Tafolla has written more than 40 books and won multiple literary awards. She is one of the most highly anthologized Chicana authors in the United States\, with her work appearing in more than 300 anthologies. https://www.carmentafolla.net/\n\n\n\nABOUT DR. RITA URQUIJO-RUIZ\n\nDr. Rita E. Urquijo-Ruiz is a Mexicana/Chicana queer educator\, author\, and translator who teaches Spanish as well as Queer\, Chicana/o\, and Latinx Studies at Trinity University in San Antonio\, Texas. She is the translator of Xelena González and Adriana Garcia’s award-winning books: Where Wonders Grow (Donde las maravillas crecen) and Remembering (Te recuerdo). She was absolutely thrilled when Dr. Carmen Tafolla invited her to translate her novel in verse Warrior Girl (Guerrera). Rita’s story about being previously undocumented\, entitled “First Visit\,” was published in the award-winning anthology Somewhere We are Human: Authentic Voices on Migration\, Survival\, and New Beginnings\, coedited by Reyna Grande and Sonia Guiñansaca. \n\nThe Big Texas Author Talk is a *free* lecture series devoted to showcasing Texas authors from across our big state. Each month we feature one Texas author in conversation with another—from New York Times bestsellers living in Dallas\, Houston\, and Austin to our rich Texas Latinx border authors living in Laredo and McAllen\, not to mention from other deep pockets and corners of our culturally diverse state.  Our lecture series is as entertaining as it is informative—and like Texas itself\, we offer a vast array of storytellers who represent the spirit of our extremely distinct Lone Star State and continue to keep us on the literary map. In the past\, we’ve featured novelists such as Kathleen Kent\, Marisol Cortez\, Joe Lansdale\, and Antonio Ruiz-Camacho and Texas poet laureates such as Carmen Tafolla\, Laurie Ann Guerrero\, Jenny Brown\, and Emmy Pérez.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/the-big-texas-author-talk-2/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Event,Lecture
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/carmen-tafolla.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20231123
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20231125
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231030T200841Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20231030T200841Z
UID:9355-1700697600-1700870399@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Thanksgiving Holiday – Office Closed
DESCRIPTION:
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/thanksgiving-holiday/
LOCATION:TX
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20231128
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20231129
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231030T201220Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20231030T201320Z
UID:9357-1701129600-1701215999@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Giving Tuesday
DESCRIPTION:https://www.givingtuesday.org/
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/giving-tuesday/
LOCATION:TX
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231202T100000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231202T143000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20230816T210348Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20231128T233544Z
UID:9037-1701511200-1701527400@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Creating Scenes that Move the Story with Desiree Kannel
DESCRIPTION:Saturday\, Dec 2\, 10am-2:30pm CST (with 30-minute lunch)\, Hybrid (via Zoom and in-person at Gemini Ink)\nInstructor: Desiree Kannel\nNonmember: $105; Member: $90; Student/Vet/Mil $75 \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE. \n \n  \nGreat novels and short stories use scenes to gain momentum\, escalate conflict\, and reveal character. But how do writers decide which scenes push the action forward and which ones stagnate the story with unnecessary details? \nIn this 4-hour workshop\, writers will analyze scenes from their own work and learn how to decide what to cut and what to revise. We will discuss scene structure\, effective transitions\, and how to let character motivation drive the plot instead of the author’s agenda. Writers will leave with a better sense of what may be missing from their work in progress and tips on how to move forward. \nThis workshop will include exercises on dialogue and setting. Each student will be asked to bring a scene from their own work to be revised in class. \nThis course is open to fiction writers of all skill levels\, 18+. Writers who have written the first draft are encouraged to attend. \nYou will leave this workshop with: \n\nA new approach to scene writing with purpose and movement\nIdeas of what details can be cut and what to keep for revision\nKnowledge of how to transition in and out of a scene\nAn edited piece of previously written work\n\nRead Desiree’s Writer’s Desk Q&A!\n\nDesiree Kannel is a writer and teacher from Southern California. She holds an MFA in creative writing from Antioch University\, Los Angeles\, and a post-grad certificate in Rhetoric & Composition from California State University Dominguez Hills. Desiree’s fiction has appeared in the Running Wild Anthology of Short Stories (2019)\, Fourth & Sycamore\, and others. Her novel\, Lucky John (2020)\, was a finalist in the African American Fiction category in the 2021 Next Generation Indie Book Awards. Her second novel\, The Delany Bennets\, was published in October 2023. Desiree leads creative writing workshops online and locally and is a Gemini Ink teaching artist.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/creating-scenes-that-move-the-story/
LOCATION:TX
CATEGORIES:Online Workshop,Workshop
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231214T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231214T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20230907T204718Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20231207T181749Z
UID:9164-1702578600-1702585800@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Gemini Ink Holiday Open House
DESCRIPTION:Don’t miss Gemini Ink’s annual holiday gathering. Join us at 1111 Navarro as we eat\, drink\, celebrate our collective creative accomplishments\, and merrily toast the closing of 2023 with our literary community of writers and friends.\nWe’ll gather around and listen to a wonderful sampling of stories from our Voices of San Anto bilingual storytelling workshop\, with Eddie Vega and Marisela Barrera. We’re excited to share some amazing videos with you from our Literary Video Lab. Lastly\, we’ll be honoring ??Volunteer of the Year for 2023\, Violeta Garza!?? \nDrop by when you can\, leave when you need to \, but stay long enough for a little eggnog and comfort food. Wine\, non-alcoholic beverages\, and coffee will be served. We will provide the main fare\, but you are also invited to bring a store-bought or prepackaged food item to share. Keeping with our annual tradition\, we’ll have a table of books to trade and give away. Please bring a book to share. \nWe can’t be San Antonio’s writing arts center without you! \n\n \nWe appreciate Violeta for sharing her time\, infectious laughter and poetic heart with us and our extended literary community. Please join us as we celebrate Violeta’s contributions to our team with a special volunteer spotlight! \nVioleta Garza (she/they/ella) is a multilingual Latinx poet and weaver from the Historic West Side of San Antonio\, Texas. She has been published in Acentos Review\, Boundless\, and Voices de la Luna\, among others\, and is a member of the Macondo Writing Workshop. She has also performed her original poems and stories for Texas Public Radio\, The Alamo Chapter for Human Rights\, The Curtain Up Cancer Foundation\, Voices of San Anto\, and elsewhere. Her safe space is listening to cheesy Mexican love ballads from the 1980s. You can peruse their work at violetagarza.com.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/holiday-open-house/
LOCATION:Gemini Ink\, 1111 Navarro St\, San Antonio\, TX\, 78205\, United States
CATEGORIES:Event
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231216T100000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231216T130000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20230816T211102Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20231208T203220Z
UID:9042-1702720800-1702731600@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Exploring Your Cultural Inheritance through Poetry with Ebony Stewart
DESCRIPTION:Saturday\, December 16\, 10am-1pm CST\, via Zoom\nInstructor: Ebony Stewart\nNonmember: $100; Member: $85; Student/Vet/Mil $75 \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE. \n \n  \nWhen we think of cultural inheritance\, we often think of language\, music\, food\, holidays\, and maybe even sports. But what about the way a culture approaches central concepts like race\, religion\, patriotism\, literacy\, and integrity?  \nIn this workshop\, we will explore the idea of our own unique heritage as a museum of poetic artifacts\, reflect on spoken word pieces\, and generate writing. In the discussion portion\, we will explore the concrete and intangible elements of culture\, any logical or illogical fears these may evoke\, and the impact of that. We will study how “Hairitage\,” “Fear\,” and Nina Simone’s “Four Women” depict culture and use literary devices to create memorable pieces. We will use all of our explorations of culture and fear to create new poems that use some of the literary techniques covered.  \nParticipants can expect a safe workshop space where they can take risks\, be vulnerable\, and give and receive feedback for future revisions. \nThis course is open to writers of all skill levels\, 18+.  \nStudents will leave this workshop with: \n\nA deeper understanding of your own culture\nKnowledge of literary devices\nOne complete poem that captures your cultural inheritance\n\n\n \nEbony Stewart is a poet\, writer\, and performance artist. Her work speaks to the Black experience\, with emphasis on gender\, sexuality\, womanhood\, queer-positivity\, and race\, with the hopes to remove shame\, heal minds\, encourage dialogue\, and inspire folks in marginalized communities. Ebony is a respected coach & mentor\, one of the top touring poets in the country\, and the 2017 Woman of the World Poetry Slam Champion. She has performed in 48 states\, at over 200 colleges and universities across the country\, as well as featured internationally in Canada\, Australia\, and Ghana. She is the author of BloodFresh\, Home.Girl.Hood.\, and Love Letters to Balled Fists. Her work has been featured in Button Poetry\, AfroPunk\, For Harriet\,  Teen Vogue\, The Texas Observer\, plus countless others. \nLearn more about Ebony at her Writer’s Desk Q&A.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/exploring-your-cultural-inheritance-through-poetry/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Online Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/ebony-stewart.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231218T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231218T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20191105T141203Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250212T145410Z
UID:8042-1702924200-1702931400@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Open Writer's Labs
DESCRIPTION:These peer-driven workshops\, held the last Monday of each month\, are free and open to writers of all levels and focus on poetry\, flash fiction\, and short creative non-fiction.\n \n  \n\n\nOnline Via Zoom\nFor the online workshop\, sign up the day before the class to ensure you receive the Zoom link. \nThis workshop is facilitated by Kevin Ramos. Originally from the northeast\, Kevin studied theater arts at Rutgers University and The University of Washington. He’s lived all over the country before making his home in San Antonio\, Texas. Kevin has written several novels and short stories. Most recently\, publishing a short memoir called Enough about addiction\, mothers\, and missing graves. And a novel\, Hayley’s Sense of Fire (DLG Publishing Partners)\, a modern re-telling of the classic fairy tale\, The Little Matchgirl. \n\nIn-Person at Gemini Ink\n \nJoin our in-person Open Writer’s Lab with Robert Allen at Gemini Ink’s office\, 1111 Navarro St.\, San Antonio\, TX 78205. \nRobert Allen has worked as a librarian and an electrical contractor for most of his life. Many moons ago\, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in English Literature from the University of Texas at Austin\, where he studied poetry under David Wevill. Allen has been active in local writer’s groups and open mics\, including the Sun Poets Society. He’s been published in The Ocotillo Review\, the Texas Poetry Calendar\, Voices de la Luna\, di-verse-city\, the San Antonio Express-News\, and Poetry on the Move. In 2006\, he started attending Gemini Ink’s free Monday night writing classes and has attended regularly ever since. With more than a decade of attending writers’ groups\, classes\, and open mics\, he now co-facilitates Gemini Ink’s Open Writer’s Lab. \nParking at Gemini Ink\nGemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/open-writers-lab-2-2020-08-31-2020-09-28-2021-06-28-2022-05-30-2022-06-27-2022-07-25-2023-03-27-2023-12-25/2023-12-18/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Open-Writers-Labs-1250-x-600-px-1.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231220T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20231220T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20191105T075945Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20260109T181511Z
UID:7879-1703097000-1703104200@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Veterans Writing Collective with Sarah Colby
DESCRIPTION:The Veteran’s Writing Collective (VWC) encourages the art of writing in a workshop environment where participants are offered honest\, positive\, and constructive peer-to-peer and mentor feedback. The workshop is open to all active-duty military\, veterans\, retirees\, and their immediate family members. Writers of all levels working in all genres are welcome. \nThe VWC meets monthly online via Zoom.\nIf you would like an invitation to this class\, send an email to veteranscollective@geminiink.org\n\nSarah Colby was born in northern New Mexico and raised in the Rocky Mountains. She is married to a retired Army Chaplain and is mother to a son in the Navy. Sarah has an MFA in Creative Writing from Sierra Nevada College and an exuberant interest in making the ordinary luminous. Her war-time experiences have motivated her to be a voice for the mostly untold stories of families and loved ones during these years of protracted conflict. She is currently working on a manuscript of poems about her experiences as a military family member.\n \n 
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/veterans-writing-collective-2020-07-15-2021-11-17-2023-08-16-2023-12-20/2023-12-20/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Event,Online Workshop,Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/homepage-footer-1250-x-600-1.jpg
ORGANIZER;CN="Sarah Colby":MAILTO:veteranscollective@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240113T130000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240113T170000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20230330T162005Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20230818T154829Z
UID:8431-1705150800-1705165200@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Voices of San Anto with Eddie Vega
DESCRIPTION:
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/voices-of-san-anto-4/
LOCATION:San Antonio Public Library\, 600 Soledad\, San Antonio\, Texas\, 78205
CATEGORIES:Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/eddie-voices-of-san-anton-eng.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240117T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240117T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231120T175014Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240116T183150Z
UID:9333-1705516200-1705523400@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:So\, You Want to Write Romance with Laura Castoro
DESCRIPTION:Wed\, January 17\, 24\, 31 & February 7\, 6:30-8:30pm CST\, Hybrid (in-person at Gemini Ink and online via Zoom)\nInstructor: Laura Castro\nNonmember: $155; Member: $130; Student/Educator/Military: $75 \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE\nClass Full\nCompelling lovers\, an emotionally driven plot\, and steamy sex scenes–these are the ingredients of every great romance story. If you’ve always wanted to write a romance but didn’t know how\, now is your chance! Bring your story idea to life with award-winning romance author Laura Castoro (aka Laura Parker).  \nIn this 4-session\, generative workshop\, we will guide writers through the creation of an emotionally resonant plot with a unique slant and irresistible characters for a fascinating and unforgettable romance. Yes\, there will be sex scenes! Writers will build on a story concept by constructing a synopsis and a first chapter while also learning about potential problems that can derail the creative process. By the end of the workshop\, each writer will have the good bones of a riveting romance. \nThis course is open to fiction writers 18+ who want to write or finish a romance manuscript. \nBy the end of the class\, students will have:  \n\nA story synopsis with characters and plot\nThe story structure and a good starting place\nIdeas on how to keep the creative process going\n\nRead Laura’s Writer’s Desk Interview!\n\nLaura Castoro\, a USA Today\, Amazon top 100\, and Apple Books bestseller\, has published 47 novels with major publishing houses such as Dell Books\, Berkley\, Avon\, Warner\, MIRA\, Harlequin\, Kensington\, Pocketbooks\, St\, Harper Collins\, Martins Press\, and William Morrow. She has also contributed to several fiction anthologies and has published non-fiction YA and short fiction in Good Housekeeping. Under the name Laura Parker\, she writes historical and contemporary romance\, westerns\, and sagas. As Laura Castoro\, she writes contemporary African American and contemporary women’s fiction. Writing as D. D. Ayres\, she publishes a romantic suspense series called the K-9 Rescue Series. Her current release as Laura Castoro is Love On The Line (2021) through William Morrow. Laura has won multiple national writing awards. In 2005\, she was inducted into the Arkansas Writers’ Hall of Fame. She is a past president of Novelists\, Inc. (2013)\, an international professional fiction writers’ organization. She is a past president and board member of the Writers Colony at Dairy Hollow\, a writer residency program in the AR Ozarks. She speaks at numerous conferences and workshops in the U.S. and abroad. Laura currently lives in San Antonio\, TX. Visit Laura at www.ddayres.com. \n\nParking at Gemini Ink\nGemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/so-you-want-to-write-romance/
LOCATION:TX
CATEGORIES:Online Workshop,Workshop
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240117T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240117T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231204T201913Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240108T225739Z
UID:9459-1705518000-1705523400@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:The Big Texas Author Talk featuring Rudy Ruiz
DESCRIPTION:RSVP\n\n\nWednesday\, January 17th\, 2024 via Zoom @ 7PM CST\nUp Next: Rudy Ruiz and his novel\, VALLEY OF SHADOWS. Moderated by Guadalupe Garcia McCall.\n\nABOUT VALLEY OF SHADOWS\nWinner of the Texas Institute of Letters’ Jesse H. Jones Award for Best Work of Fiction \nNew York Times Book Review Paperback Row Selection \n\n\n\n\nSolitario Cisneros thought his life was over long ago. He lost his wife\, his family\, even his country in the late 1870s when the Rio Grande shifted course\, stranding the Mexican town of Olvido on the Texas side of the border. He’d made his brooding peace with retiring his gun and badge\, hiding out on his ranch\, and communing with horses and ghosts. But when a gruesome string of murders and kidnappings ravages the town\, pushing its volatile mix of Anglo\, Mexican\, and Apache settlers to the brink of self-destruction\, he feels reluctantly compelled to confront both life\, and the much more likely possibility of death\, yet again. \nThrough luminous prose and soul-searching reflections\, Rudy Ruiz transports readers to a distant time and a remote place where the immortal forces of good and evil dance amidst the shadows of magic and mountains. \nABOUT RUDY RUIZ\nRudy Ruiz is an American author\, advocate and social entrepreneur. The son and grandson of Mexican immigrants\, Rudy Ruiz was born in Brownsville\, Texas and raised along the US-Mexico border\, living in Matamoros\, Mexico for extensive periods of time. He did not speak English until he entered school at the age of five. Once in school\, he dreamt of becoming a writer\, an entrepreneur\, and a contributor to the wellbeing of immigrants and minorities\, as well as to positive relations between diverse cultures and nations. He earned his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees at Harvard. Ruiz now resides in San Antonio with his wife\, Heather\, and their two children\, Paloma and Lorenzo.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nABOUT THE MODERATOR\n\n\n\n \nBorn in Piedras Negras\, Coahuila\, Mexico and raised in Eagle Pass\, Texas\, Guadalupe García McCall is the award-winning author of several young adult novels\, some short stories for adults\, and many children’s poems. Guadalupe has received the Prestigious Pura Belpre Award\, a Westchester Young Adult Fiction Award\, the Tomás Rivera Mexican-American Children’s Book Award\, and was a finalist for the William C. Morris Award and the Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy\, among many other accolades. Visit Guadalupe at her website: https://ggmccall.com/.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/the-big-texas-author-talk-featuring-rudy-ruiz/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Event
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Rudy-Ruiz-TBTAT-1.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240203T100000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240203T120000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231120T183251Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240117T231217Z
UID:9407-1706954400-1706961600@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:The Art of Zine Making with Caesar Morales
DESCRIPTION:Saturdays\, February 3 & 10\, 2024\, 10am-12pm CST\, in-person at Gemini Ink\nInstructor: Caesar Morales\nNonmember: $100;  Member: $85; Student $75.\n \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE. \n \n  \nWant to get your work out there but don’t want to wait for traditional publication? A zine is a quick\, easy way to distribute your writing in a format that’s one of a kind and easily digestible. These small independent publications are usually handmade and combine a collection of photos\, text\, illustrations\, poems\, etc.\, around a common theme. Because there is no definitive structure or layout for a zine\, this allows for highly creative book-making that can turn the publication itself into a work of art.  \nIn this two-session workshop\, we will use short writing prompts to generate new work around specific themes\, add visual elements through photos and drawings\, receive feedback\, and complete a mini-zine. We will also learn how best to distribute hard copy or digital zines. \nBasic supplies\, including construction paper\, writing utensils\, scissors\, glue\, and collage materials will be provided. Students are encouraged to bring in their own clip art\, magazines\, or photos that fit on 5.5” x  8.5” paper.  \nThis course is open to writers of all genres and skill level\, 18+.  \nStudents will leave with the following:  \n\n\n\nNew creative writing pieces\nOne handmade mini-zine\nInstructions on how to make more zines independently\nIdeas on how to distribute zines\n\n\n\nLearn more about Caesar at his Writer’s Desk Q&A.\nCaesar Morales has an MA in Playwriting and Screenwriting from City University of London in the UK. Prior to that\, he obtained a BSc from the University of Greenwich\, also in the UK. His photo essays have been published in Private Photo Review\, and he will have an original short story published in the upcoming anthology\, The 42 Anthology\, featuring 42 stories from 42 different writers\, each writing in 42 different genres/categories. Caesar’s story “The Outlaw Gerald Dorris” will be published in the Western category. He’s also taught podcast production\, photography\, filmmaking\, zine publishing and screenwriting at Wac Arts College in London\, UK and at the Institute for the Urban Arts in New York City. He’s also had two feature-length screenplays workshopped at the London Screenwriter’s Festival. \n\n\nParking at Gemini Ink\nGemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/the-art-of-zine-making-with-caesar-morales/
LOCATION:Gemini Ink\, 1111 Navarro St\, San Antonio\, TX\, 78205\, United States
CATEGORIES:Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Caesar-Morales-1.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240212T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240212T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231120T194444Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240130T203221Z
UID:9416-1707762600-1707769800@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Unexplored Greats: A Study of Lesser Known African American Authors with Arrie Porter
DESCRIPTION:Mondays\, February 12 & 19\, 2024\, 6:30-8:30pm CST\, Hybrid (in-person at Gemini Ink and online via Zoom)\nInstructor: Arrie Porter\nNonmember: $135; Member: $115; Student/Educator/Military $75 \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE. \n \n  \n  \n \n  \nTupac Shakur\, Toni Morrison\, Nicki Giovanni\, Richard Wright\, and Maya Angelou. These gifted authors are all household names who have put African American literature on the map. However\, so many Black writers outside of pop culture have contributed to the lexicon of settings\, spaces\, imagery\, and poetics found in Black literature. Such authors include Henry Dumas\, Rita Dove\, Lucille Clifton\, Christopher Gilbert\, Yusef Komunyakaa\, and others. Delving into their work is vital to gaining an expansive view of literature and our shared history as Americans.  \nIn this two-session workshop\, participants will study the works of non-mainstream African American authors who have made valuable literary contributions. Participants will explore the narrative and lyrical license\, devices\, and history of these authors\, while learning to craft our own dynamic works in poetry and fiction. Join us and get acquainted with these Black authors! \nThis course is open to writers of all genres and skill level\, 18+.  \nStudents will leave this class with: \n\nA greater appreciation for lesser-known African American authors\nAn understanding of these writers’ craft techniques\nA listing of anthologies where undiscovered writers may be found\nSeveral beginnings to new creative work \n\nRead Arrie’s Writer’s Desk Q&A!\n\nArrie Porter is a poet and fiction writer with publications in The Windward Review\, Voices de la Luna\, RiverSedge\, The Thing Itself\, and other noteworthy periodicals. She has reviewed books of fiction for Angelo State University and serves as a Gemini Ink Teaching Artist. She is the former host of the Coffee Loft Open Mic in Atlanta Georgia\, and performs at various open mics. She is the creator of “Voices\,” a DreamWeek San Antonio event\, and creator and publisher of Nubian Notes\, a magazine now maintained as a special collection at the John Peace Library\, Institute of Texas Cultures. Her interviews and articles have appeared in the San Antonio Report and the San Antonio Express-News. Arrie has developed commentaries for Texas Public Radio\, including “The George Floyd Protests in the Pandemic” and “Juneteenth–It’s Complicated.” She oversees the Poetry Ministry at Agape Christian Church and holds a MA/MFA degree in Literature\, Creative Writing\, and Social Justice. Arrie is a Professor of English at Our Lady of the Lake University. \n  \n\nParking at Gemini Ink\nGemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/unexplored-greats-with-arrie-porter/
LOCATION:TX
CATEGORIES:Online Workshop,Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/unnamed.jpg
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240221T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240221T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231204T202628Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240122T234400Z
UID:9466-1708542000-1708547400@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:The Big Texas Author Talk featuring Mag Gabbert
DESCRIPTION:A Free Monthly Online Lecture Series from WritingWorkshops.com & Gemini Ink\nWednesday\, February 21st\, 2024 via Zoom @ 7PM CST\n\nRSVP\nUp Next: Poet & Essayist Mag Gabbert and her poetry collection\, SEX DEPRESSION ANIMALS. This discussion will be moderated by poet Séamus Fey.\nABOUT SEX DEPRESSION ANIMALS\n\n“This bewitching debut delivers everything the title promises and more.” –Electric Literature \nIn SEX DEPRESSION ANIMALS\, which was selected by Kathy Fagan as the winner of the 2021 Charles B. Wheeler Prize in Poetry\, Mag Gabbert redefines the bestiary in fiery\, insistent\, and resistant terms. These poems recast the traumas of her adolescence while charting new paths toward linguistic and bodily autonomy as an adult. Using dreamlike\, shimmering imagery\, she pieces together a fractured portrait of femininity—one that electrifies the confessional mode with its formal play and rich curiosity. Gabbert examines the origin of shame\, the role of inheritance\, and what counts as a myth\, asking\, “What’s the opposite of a man? / A woman? A wound? The devil’s image?”\n\n  \nABOUT MAG GABBERT\nMag Gabbert is the author of SEX DEPRESSION ANIMALS (Mad Creek Books\, 2023)\, which was selected by Kathy Fagan as the winner of the 2021 Charles B. Wheeler Prize in Poetry; the chapbook The Breakup\, which was selected by Kaveh Akbar as the winner of the 2022 Baltic Writing Residencies Chapbook Award; and the chapbook Minml Poems (Cooper Dillon Books\, 2020). Her awards include a Discovery Award from 92NY’s Unterberg Poetry Center\, a Pushcart Prize\, and fellowships from the Kenyon Review Writers Workshop\, Idyllwild Arts\, and Poetry at Round Top. Mag’s work can also be found in The American Poetry Review\, The Paris Review Daily\, Copper Nickel\, Guernica\, Poetry Daily\, and elsewhere. Mag has an MFA from UC Riverside and a PhD from Texas Tech. She lives in Dallas\, Texas and teaches at Southern Methodist University. \nABOUT S.FEY\nS. Fey (they/he) is a Trans writer living in LA. Currently\, they are the poetry editor at Hooligan Magazine\, and co creative director at Rock Pocket Productions. Their debut poetry collection\, decompose\, is out with Not a Cult Media. His work has appeared in American Poetry Review\, Poet Lore\, The Sonora Review\, and others. They love to beat their friends at Mario Party. Find them online @sfeycreates.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/the-big-texas-author-talk-featuring-mag-gabbert/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Event
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Mag-Gabbert.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Alexandra van de Kamp":MAILTO:avandekamp@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240222T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240222T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231204T202357Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240214T165905Z
UID:9463-1708626600-1708633800@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Rev Up Your Writing in the New Year:  Gemini Ink’s Spring Open House  
DESCRIPTION:We’re excited to introduce our dynamic roster of teaching artists who can help you take your writing to the next level. \nCome connect with talented writers from San Antonio and beyond as they share new work and discuss the classes they’ll be teaching. We will hear from award-winning fiction writer and founder of Gemini Ink Nan Cuba\, poet and Zoeglossia Fellow Jonathan Fletcher\, and other instructors. We’ll also get a sneak peek at Typewriter Rodeo and their on-the-spot-generated poetry!   \nThe presentation will be followed by time to mix and mingle with fellow literature lovers and to enjoy light refreshments. Our evening will culminate with a community open mic. Bring your latest work and arrive early to grab a spot. The list is capped at 6 readers.  \nIt all happens at Gemini Ink’s downtown writing arts center at 1111 Navarro Street. Don’t leave without our spring calendar of classes and events! \n\nSean Petrie & Rebecca Bendheim are part of the nationally-renowned Typewriter Rodeo\, where they’ve written thousands of poems for strangers on the spot\, and do weekly radio poems for NPR. Both have MFAs in Writing for Children from Vermont College of Fine Arts\, are writing teachers (Sean at UT\, Rebecca at Trinity Episcopal School)\, and authors. Sean’s books include Typewriter Rodeo\, the award-winning Pet Poems (also not just pets)\, and the Jett Ryder series for kids. Rebecca is represented by Patricia Nelson and has multiple books in the works. Join Sean and Rebecca for Poetry Flurry with Typewriter Rodeo! on March 30th\, and get ready for National Poetry Month in April. \nNan Cuba is the author of Body and Bread\, winner of the PEN Southwest Award in Fiction and the Texas Institute of Letters Steven Turner Award; it was listed as one of “Ten Titles to Pick Up Now” in O\, Oprah’s Magazine and was a “Summer Books” choice from Huffington Post. As an investigator of the causes of extraordinary violence\, she is a featured journalist in the Netflix documentary\, The Confession Killer\, and another by Hulu\, Wild Crimes: Murder in Yosemite. She is founder and executive director emeritus of Gemini Ink\, a nonprofit writing arts center. Nan is teaching a 6-week class in fiction beginning on March 18: Fiction Never Lies: Turning Personal Experience into Emotional Truth. \nOriginally from San Antonio\, Texas\, Jonathan Fletcher holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing (Poetry) from Columbia University School of the Arts.  He has been published in The Adroit Journal\, Arts Alive San Antonio\, FlowerSong Press\, riverSedge\, and The Thing Itself. He has served as a Columbia Artist/Teacher for iHOPE\, a specialized school for students with traumatic brain injury\, as well as a poetry editor for Exchange\, Columbia’s literary magazine for incarcerated writers and artists. Currently\, he serves as a Zoeglossia Fellow. Jonathan is teaching a Poetry for Beginners in April; a 4-session workshop for newbie poets who are ready to learn more about the genre.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/spring-open-house/
LOCATION:Gemini Ink\, 1111 Navarro St\, San Antonio\, TX\, 78205\, United States
CATEGORIES:Event
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/Spring-Open-House-.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240302T100000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240302T120000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231120T200628Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240221T170504Z
UID:9421-1709373600-1709380800@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Loss\, Memory\, and Mortality: A Mixed Genre Workshop with 2023 Texas Poet Laureate ire’ne lara silva
DESCRIPTION:Saturdays\, March 2\, 9\, 16\, & 23\, 2024\, 10am-12pm CST\, in-person at Gemini Ink\nInstructor: ire’ne lara silva\nNonmember: $150; Member: $125; Student/Educator/Military $75 \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE. \n  \nCLASS FULL. To have your name added to the waitlist\, email joshua@geminiink.org. \nOur lives are marked by losses small and great. Dreams that don’t materialize; relationships that fail; bodies that age and get sick; friends\, spouses\, parents\, children\, and other loved ones that die. In these turbulent times\, the world seems filled with tragedy and death. Few have the tools to handle these losses as individuals\, much less as artists\, yet many of us are expected to ‘move on’ from our grief without having the space to process what happened. \nIn this four-week workshop\, we will read and discuss grief-focused poetry\, fiction\, and nonfiction written by ire’ne lara silva. We will explore strategies for writing about loss\, memory\, and mortality and apply them when responding to on-theme writing prompts. This workshop will create an open and empathetic space to discuss loss in our lives\, so we can move forward with acceptance. \nThis course is open to writers of all genres\, backgrounds\, and skill level\, 18+.  \nBy the end of the class students will:  \n\nstudy grief-focused poetry\, fiction\, and nonfiction written by ire’ne lara silva\nexplore strategies for writing about loss\, memory\, and mortality\nrespond to 3-4 writing prompts per class regarding our workshop themes\n\n\nire’ne lara silva\, the 2023 Texas State Poet Laureate\, is the author of four poetry collections\, furia\, Blood Sugar Canto\, CUICACALLI/House of Song\, and FirstPoems\, two chapbooks\, Enduring Azucares and Hibiscus Tacos\, and a short story collection\, flesh to bone\, which won the Premio Aztlán.ire’ne is the recipient of a 2021 Tasajillo Writers Grant\, a 2017 NALAC Fund for the Arts Grant\, the final Alfredo Cisneros del Moral Award\, and was the Fiction Finalist for AROHO’s 2013 Gift of Freedom Award. Most recently\, ire’ne was awarded the 2021 Texas Institute of Letters Shrake Award for Best Short Nonfiction. ire’ne is currently a Writer at Large for Texas Highways Magazine and is working on a second collection of short stories titled\, the light of your body. A new poetry collection\, the eaters of flowers\, is forthcoming from Saddle Road Press in January 2024. \n  \n\nParking at Gemini Ink\nGemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/loss-memory-and-mortality/
LOCATION:TX
CATEGORIES:Workshop
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20240308
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20240309
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20240214T173804Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240214T173804Z
UID:9781-1709856000-1709942399@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Deadline to submit to the Ekphrastic Poetry Contest Sponsored by National Poetry Month San Antonio
DESCRIPTION:Ekphrastic Poetry Contest Sponsored by 2024 National Poetry Month San Antonio
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/deadline-to-submit-to-the-ekphrastic-poetry-contest-sponsored-by-national-poetry-month-san-antonio/
LOCATION:TX
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240318T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240318T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231120T203004Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240228T194808Z
UID:9428-1710786600-1710793800@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Fiction Never Lies: Turning Personal Experience into Emotional Truth with Nan Cuba
DESCRIPTION:Mondays\, March 18\, 25 & April 1\, 8\, 15\, 22\, 2024\, 6:30-8:30pm CST\, Hybrid (available in-person and online via Zoom)\nInstructor: Nan Cuba\nNonmember: $155; Member: $135; Student/Educator/Military $75 \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE. \n  \nCLASS FULL. To have your name added to the waitlist\, email joshua@geminiink.org. \nPeople we’ve known\, moments we’ve witnessed\, conversations we’ve overheard\, places we’ve been\, something we’ve read: these influence aspects of our fiction. Sometimes an experience is so profound\, we decide to use that memory as inspiration for a story. But how do writers free themselves from the restrictions of facts in order to create a story with emotional truth? This six-week class will introduce techniques for identifying real events\, people\, or places that can be adapted into fiction. Examples will be shared\, participants will be guided through a sample exercise\, and each person’s story will receive feedback from the instructor and fellow classmates. Workshop discussions will honor individual styles\, voices\, intended audiences\, and perceived intents. \nThis course is open to writers of all genres and skill level\, 18+.  \nBy the end of the class students will:  \n\nHave strategies for successfully adapting personal experience into fiction.\nLearn and practice skills for giving sensitive critical feedback on manuscripts.\nHave a completed story draft with ideas for revision.\n\nThe Writer’s Desk with Nan Cuba \n \n\nNan Cuba is the author of Body and Bread\, winner of the PEN Southwest Award in Fiction and the Texas Institute of Letters Steven Turner Award; it was listed as one of “Ten Titles to Pick Up Now” in O\, Oprah’s Magazine and was a “Summer Books” choice from Huffington Post. Other work has appeared in Antioch Review\, Harvard Review\, Columbia\, Quarterly West\, and Chicago Tribune’s Printer’s Row. As an investigator of the causes of extraordinary violence\, she is a featured journalist in the Netflix documentary\, The Confession Killer\, and another by Hulu\, Wild Crimes: Murder in Yosemite. Cuba is included in Texas Monthly’s “Ten to Watch (and Read)” and has received a Dobie Paisano Fellowship and an artist residency at Fundación Valparaiso in Spain. She is co-founder and executive director emeritus of Gemini Ink\, a nonprofit writing arts center\, and was Writer in Residence at Our Lady of the Lake University. \n\nParking at Gemini Ink\nGemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/fiction-never-lies-with-nan-cuba/
LOCATION:Gemini Ink\, 1111 Navarro St\, San Antonio\, TX\, 78205\, United States
CATEGORIES:Workshop
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240320T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240320T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231204T203428Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240314T150231Z
UID:9468-1710961200-1710966600@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:The Big Texas Author Talk featuring Jason Stone
DESCRIPTION:Visit the Big Texas Author Talk page. RSVP for the link.\nWednesday\, March 20th\, 2024 via Zoom @ 7PM CST\nUp Next: Jason Stone and his novel\, THE BEAUTY OF THE DAYS GONE BY. Moderated by Matt Walter.\nABOUT THE BEAUTY OF THE DAYS GONE BY\n\n\n\n\nBased on historical events that occurred in Comancheria\, the region of West Texas and New Mexico controlled by the Comanche in the 18th and 19th centuries\, THE BEAUTY OF THE DAYS GONE BY is a historical survival story\, interweaving the reminisces of aging plainsman Charles Goodnight in the late 1920s against the backdrop of Reconstruction Texas and the events set in motion when a Kiowa raiding party kills the wife and abducts the sons of his friend R.L. Terry. \nABOUT JASON STONE\n\nJason Stone grew up in West Texas and graduated from the University of Texas at Austin. He lives in Austin. He is currently working on a non-fiction book about the real story behind Friday Night Lights. \nABOUT MATT WALTER\n\n\n\nMatt Walter recently retired after 20 years as Curator of Collections at the Museum of the Big Bend\, located on the Sul Ross State University campus in Alpine\, Texas. He earned an MA in History from Sul Ross and taught there for 17 years. Before that\, Matt spent 20 years in the U.S. Coast Guard. Much of his time in the Service was spent in Galveston\, Texas\, but he did get to visit 19 countries\, courtesy of Uncle Sam\, during his career.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/the-big-texas-author-talk-featuring-jason-stone/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Event
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/24-TBTAT-Jason-Stone.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Alexandra van de Kamp":MAILTO:avandekamp@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240330T100000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240330T120000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231129T201057Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240316T205452Z
UID:9444-1711792800-1711800000@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Poetry Flurry with Typewriter Rodeo!
DESCRIPTION:Saturday\, March 30\, 2024 10am-12pm CST\, in person at Gemini Ink\nNonmember: $115; Member: $100; Student/Educator/Mil $75 \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE\n  \nCLASS FULL. To have your name added to the waitlist\, email joshua@geminiink.org. \nGet your creative juices flowing for National Poetry Month 2024 with Typewriter Rodeo!\nWhether you’re a poet or not\, this workshop has something for everyone\, including a room full of typewriters to play with. Clacking away on those keys with no way to correct your mistakes is freeing and just darn fun! \nIn this one-day\, fast-paced workshop\, you’ll write between 12 to 21 short poems in less than 2 hours. Yes\, really! And\, along the way\, discover a bit more about the creative voice that’s been waiting inside you\, patiently\, to peek out. Participants will respond to a wide range of highly creative prompts and generate new poetry. The techniques we’ll learn apply to crafting poetry\, stories\, and even non-fiction (you need a voice for that\, too). \nThis course is open to writers of all genres and skill levels\, 16+. \nStudents will leave this class with the following: \n\n12-21 new poems\n3 techniques to spark your writing at any point (hey there\, writer’s block)\ntypewriter experience (oh yeah)\n\n \n\nSean Petrie & Rebecca Bendheim are part of the nationally renowned Typewriter Rodeo\, where they’ve written thousands of poems for strangers on the spot\, and do weekly radio poems for NPR. Both have MFAs in Writing for Children from Vermont College of Fine Arts\, are writing teachers (Sean at UT\, Rebecca at Trinity Episcopal School)\, and authors. Sean’s books include Typewriter Rodeo\, the award-winning Pet Poems (also not just pets)\, and the Jett Ryder series for kids. Rebecca is represented by Patricia Nelson and has multiple books in the works. \n\nParking at Gemini Ink\nGemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/poetry-flurry-with-typewriter-rodeo/
LOCATION:Gemini Ink\, 1111 Navarro St\, San Antonio\, TX\, 78205\, United States
CATEGORIES:Event,Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/typewriter-rodeo.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240404T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240404T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231129T202159Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240403T160152Z
UID:9450-1712255400-1712262600@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Poetry for Beginners with Jonathan Fletcher
DESCRIPTION:Thursdays\, April 4\, 11\, 18 & 25\, 2024\, 6:30-8:30pm CST\, In person at Gemini Ink\nInstructor: Jonathan Fletcher\nNonmember: $135; Member: $115; Student/Educator/Mil $75 \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE\n  \nCLASS FULL. To have your name added to the waitlist\, email joshua@geminiink.org. \nHave you ever wanted to try your hand at poetry but didn’t know where to start? Or are you a newbie poet who’s ready to learn more about the genre? If so\, this National Poetry Month workshop is for you!  \nIn this four-week class\, we will review the history of poetry\, study contemporary poets and their craft\, and review different poetic forms\, including prose\, lists\, lyrical and narrative\, and more. Using these texts and forms for inspiration\, we will write and give poetic form to our own experiences and dreams. Participants will receive light feedback and resources to keep them writing.  \nThis course is open to beginning poets or anyone who wants to try poetry for the first time\, 18+. \nStudents will leave this class with: \n\nKnowledge of contemporary poetry and craft tools\nDrafts of work generated from class readings\, discussions\, and prompts\nResources and materials to further their own study and poetic work\n\n\nOriginally from San Antonio\, Texas\, Jonathan Fletcher holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing (Poetry) from Columbia University School of the Arts.  He has been published in The Adroit Journal\, Arts Alive San Antonio\, FlowerSong Press\, riverSedge\, and The Thing Itself. He has served as a Columbia Artist/Teacher for iHOPE\, a specialized school for students with traumatic brain injury\, as well as a poetry editor for Exchange\, Columbia’s literary magazine forincarcerated writers and artists. Currently\, he serves as a Zoeglossia Fellow. \n\nParking at Gemini Ink\nGemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/poetry-for-beginners-with-jonathan-fletcher/
LOCATION:TX
CATEGORIES:Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/poetry-for-beginners.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240411T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240411T220000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20240325T191027Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240325T191221Z
UID:9917-1712862000-1712872800@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Free Autograph Reading with bestselling author Aimee Nezhukumatathil
DESCRIPTION:We invite you to join Gemini Ink and bestselling author Aimee Nezhukumatathil at a free public reading and book signing on Thursday\, April 11th\, at 7pm\, at the San Antonio Botanical Garden\, with nature writer and journalist\, Monika Maeckle\, facilitating an author conversation. This event is part of our Autograph Series. Please RSVP at https://bit.ly/AimeeN \nA candid\, vivid witness to our contemporary world\, Aimee Nezhukumatathil has garnered some of the most prestigious literary awards\, including a poetry fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts and a Guggenheim Fellow in poetry. Author of the best-selling World of Wonders\, she also has written five poetry collections\, including Oceanic (2018)\, Lucky Fish\, (2011)\, and At the Drive-In Volcano\, (2007). In 2021\, she became the first-ever poetry editor for Sierra magazine. She is a professor of English and Creative Writing in the University of Mississippi’s MFA program and her forthcoming book of food essays is called Bite By Bite (Ecco\, May 2024).
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/free-autograph-reading-with-bestselling-author-aimee-nezhukumatathil/
LOCATION:San Antonio Botanical Garden\, 555 Funston Place\, San Antonio\, TX\, United States
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Autograph-website-header-1920-x-1080.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Alexandra van de Kamp":MAILTO:avandekamp@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240412T113000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240412T133000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143604
CREATED:20231204T203944Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240222T183958Z
UID:9470-1712921400-1712928600@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:An Afternoon with Aimee Nezhukumatathil
DESCRIPTION:Autograph Series ticketed luncheon at the McNay Art Museum\nPURCHASE TICKETS AND SPONSORSHIPS AT EVENTBRITE.\nAimee Nezhukumatathil is the author of the New York Times best-selling illustrated collection of nature essays\, WORLD OF WONDERS: IN PRAISE OF FIREFLIES\, WHALE SHARKS\, & OTHER ASTONISHMENTS. She also wrote four previous poetry collections including OCEANIC. Her most recent chapbook is LACE & PYRITE\, a collaboration of epistolary garden poems with the poet Ross Gay. Honors include a poetry fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts\, the Pushcart Prize\, a Mississippi Arts Council grant\, and being named a Guggenheim Fellow in poetry. She is poetry editor for SIERRA magazine\, the story-telling arm of The Sierra Club. She is professor of English and Creative Writing in the University of Mississippi’s MFA program and her forthcoming book of food essays is called BITE BY BITE (Ecco\, May 2024).  \n\nAutograph Series with Terrance Hayes\, with local high school students\, 2019. \nAutograph Series presents writers of national and international stature—many of them recipients of major prizes such as the Pulitzer or National Book Award—in free public performances followed by an audience Q&A and book signing. Ours is one of the few such series in the nation offered to the public at no cost. A ticketed luncheon with the visiting writer partially supports the Autograph Series. Local businesses also sponsor tables for high school students\, cultivating a community of support and encouragement for the writing arts. \nPrevious Autograph writers include Margaret Atwood\, U.S. Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera\, Ha Jin\, Edward P. Jones\, Tim O’Brien\, Grace Paley\, Philip Levine\, Luis Alberto Urrea\, Terrance Hayes\, Ben Fountain\, among others.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/afternoon-with-aimee-nezhukumatathil/
LOCATION:McNay Art Museum\, 6000 N. New Braunfels Ave.\, San Antonio\, TX\, United States
CATEGORIES:Event
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/aimee.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240413T100000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240413T130000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143605
CREATED:20231207T171933Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240422T193344Z
UID:9522-1713002400-1713013200@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:The Edge of the Sea is a Strange and Beautiful Place: Hybrid Poetry & Prose Experiments with Aimee Nezhukumatathil
DESCRIPTION:Saturday\, April 13\, 2024 10:00am-1:00pm CST\, in-person at Gemini Ink\nInstructor: Aimee Nezhukumatathil\nNonmember: $145; Member: $125; Student/Educator/Mil $75 \n*EARN CPE’S\nSCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE. \n \n  \nBuilding upon writer and marine biologist Rachel Carson’s famous maritime observation\, we will investigate and interrogate the “strange and beautiful place” of genre-blurring work—work that melds elements of creative non-fiction and poetry.  \nIn this one-session\, cross-genre workshop\, participants will focus on generating new work that builds upon Audre Lorde’s idea that “the sharing of joy…forms a bridge between the sharers which can be the basis for understanding much of what is not shared between them\, and lessens the threat of their difference.” We will spend our time generating work that sings and celebrates the various big and small delights of this earth. We will also learn several craft practices to help keep us generating new work long after returning home.  \nCome prepared to roll up your sleeves and dig in! We’ll have plenty of time for in-class craft analysis\, discussion\, and writing prompts galore that will send you home with several solid drafts of new work. Ideal for writers at any level of experience looking for a vibrant shake-up to their writing practices long after the workshop is over. \nThis course is open to writers of all genres and skill levels\, 18+. \nStudents will leave this class with: \n\nAn understanding of how to blur genres effectively in writing\nSeveral drafts of new pieces\nCraft tips for continuing to write independently\n\n\nAimee Nezhukumatathil is the author of the New York Times best-selling illustrated collection of nature essays\, WORLD OF WONDERS: IN PRAISE OF FIREFLIES\, WHALE SHARKS\, & OTHER ASTONISHMENTS. She also wrote four previous poetry collections including OCEANIC. Her most recent chapbook is LACE & PYRITE\, a collaboration of epistolary garden poems with the poet Ross Gay. Honors include a poetry fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts\, the Pushcart Prize\, a Mississippi Arts Council grant\, and being named a Guggenheim Fellow in poetry. She is poetry editor for SIERRA magazine\, the story-telling arm of The Sierra Club. She is professor of English and Creative Writing in the University of Mississippi’s MFA program and her forthcoming book of food essays is called BITE BY BITE (Ecco\, May 2024).  \n\nParking at Gemini Ink\nGemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/the-edge-of-the-sea/
LOCATION:TX
CATEGORIES:Workshop
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240417T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240417T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143605
CREATED:20191105T075945Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20260109T181535Z
UID:9482-1713378600-1713385800@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Veterans Writing Collective with Sarah Colby
DESCRIPTION:The Veteran’s Writing Collective (VWC) encourages the art of writing in a workshop environment where participants are offered honest\, positive\, and constructive peer-to-peer and mentor feedback. The workshop is open to all active-duty military\, veterans\, retirees\, and their immediate family members. Writers of all levels working in all genres are welcome. \nThe VWC meets monthly online via Zoom.\nIf you would like an invitation to this class\, send an email to veteranscollective@geminiink.org\n\nSarah Colby was born in northern New Mexico and raised in the Rocky Mountains. She is married to a retired Army Chaplain and is mother to a son in the Navy. Sarah has an MFA in Creative Writing from Sierra Nevada College and an exuberant interest in making the ordinary luminous. Her war-time experiences have motivated her to be a voice for the mostly untold stories of families and loved ones during these years of protracted conflict. She is currently working on a manuscript of poems about her experiences as a military family member.\n \n 
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/veterans-writing-collective-2020-07-15-2021-11-17-2023-08-16-2023-12-20/2024-04-17/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Event,Online Workshop,Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/homepage-footer-1250-x-600-1.jpg
ORGANIZER;CN="Sarah Colby":MAILTO:veteranscollective@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240420T100000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240420T143000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143605
CREATED:20231207T174510Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240417T174852Z
UID:9528-1713607200-1713623400@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:From Description to Discovery: Personal Essays on Art with Jehanne Dubrow
DESCRIPTION:Saturday\, April 20\, 10am-2:30pm CST (with 30 min lunch)\, via Zoom\nInstructor: Jehanne Dubrow\nNonmember: $140; Member: $120; Student/Educator/Mil $75 \nClass Cancelled.\nEkphrasis teaches us that in standing back to study a work of fine art\, we can find a way to step back and examine ourselves as if we are the art. For many writers\, ekphrasis is a literary device that provides a visual springboard for unlocking stories you didn’t even know were inside of you. \nIn this one-day course\, participants will read examples of ekphrastic writing from across genres and go through the process of creating an ekphrastic essay. They’ll learn how to write about art using the five senses and concrete\, specific details and how to research the history of an art piece. Participants will then weave their description\, research\, and a personal experience together to generate an ekphrastic personal essay. \nStudents should come to class with an image of a piece of art that has personal meaning to them. This course is open to writers of all genres and skill level\, 18+.  \nStudents will leave this class with: \n\nA first draft of an essay that engages with a work of art\nAn understanding of how ekphrasis can be used to break through writer’s block\nConcrete strategies for blending research with personal stories\n\n\nJehanne Dubrow is the author of nine poetry collections and three books of creative nonfiction\, including most recently Exhibitions: Essays on Art & Atrocity (University of New Mexico Press\, 2023)\, and Taste: A Book of Small Bites (Columbia University Press\, 2022). Her next book of poems\, Civilians\, will be published by Louisiana State University Press in 2025. Her writing has appeared in New England Review\, POETRY\,  and The Southern Review\, among others. She is a Professor of Creative Writing at the University of North Texas.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/from-description-to-discovery/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Online Workshop,Workshop
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240424T190000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240424T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143605
CREATED:20231204T204127Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240422T213114Z
UID:9472-1713985200-1713990600@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:The Big Texas Author Talk featuring Cyrus Cassells
DESCRIPTION:A Free Monthly Online Lecture Series from WritingWorkshops.com & Gemini Ink \nWednesday\, April 24th\, 2024 via Zoom @ 7PM CST\nUp Next: Poet Cyrus Cassells and his collection\, Is There Room for Another Horse on Your Horse Ranch?\nABOUT IS THERE ROOM FOR ANOTHER HORSE ON YOUR HORSE RANCH?\n \n\nRSVP\nCyrus Cassells has perfected a poetics of merciful vitality and tenderness\, celebrating eros — in his daring and prolific representation of lust\, yes\, but more broadly in his understanding of the erotic as an affirmation and preservation of life — through time and space. Beginning his latest collection with the piece “You Be the Dancer\,” he bids us return to sacred sites of nostalgia\, insisting on it “whether we’re feeling frisky\, / Empty-handed\, / Or still beguiled by inchoate dreams–.” Is There Room for Another Horse on Your Horse Ranch? is the apotheosis of Cassells’s work to elevate the mundane and the bodily to the exalted\, his vigorous lyrics a routine ecstasy. Though our senses lay us bare to suffering\, they also create the possibilities for pleasure and connection\, the basis of — and rewards for — humanity. “My Only Bible\,” Cassells pledges\, “is this blood-red joy / Of breathing beside you\,” “The gospel of bougainvillea / At your boyhood gate” which perfumes “the soul’s endless\, luxuriant / Coming and becoming…” Gorgeous and wry in its portrayal of transformational romance and queer selfhood\, Cassells’s ninth book of poetry reads as an anthology of love letters to people and places across the world. Cassells revises an old premise: is it better to have loved than lost\, or is that love\, once bestowed\, is never lost? A champion of the flight real intimacy requires of us\, Cassells addresses a beloved\, “You’ve just died in my arms / But suddenly it seems we’re eternal\,” the joie de vivre and bravery of his perseverance made immortal through the poem’s titular declaration — “I Believe Icarus Was not Failing as He Fell.” If in these pages you see the crash\, the poet seems to say\, remember the flying\, too\, “the giddy Argonauts we were.” \nABOUT CYRUS CASSELLS \nCyrus Cassells was the 2021 Poet Laureate of Texas. Among his honors: a 2023 Civitella-Ranieri Foundation fellowship; a 2022 Academy of American Poets Laureate fellowship to administer his statewide Juneteenth poetry project; a 2019 Guggenheim fellowship; the National Poetry Series; a Lambda Literary Award; two NEA grants; a Pushcart Prize; and the William Carlos Williams Award. His 2018 volume\, The Gospel according to Wild Indigo\, was a finalist for the NAACP Image Award\, the Helen C. Smith Memorial Award\, and the Balcones Poetry Prize. Still Life with Children: Selected Poems of Francesc Parcerisas\, translated from the Catalan\, was awarded the Texas Institute of Letters’ Soeurette Diehl Fraser Award for Best Translated Book of 2018 and 2019. To The Cypress Again and Again: Tribute to Salvador Espriu\, combining translations\, poetry\, and memoir in homage to Catalan Spain’s most revered 20th century writer\, was published in 2023. Cassells was nominated for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in Criticism for his film and television reviews in The Washington Spectator. He teaches in the MFA program at Texas State University\, where he received a 2021 Presidential Award for Scholarly/Creative Activities and was named a 2023 University Distinguished Professor. \nABOUT THE MODERATOR \n\n\nD E Zuccone is the author of a volume of poetry\, Vanishes\, with 3ATaos Press. He is currently completing No Provenance//Art-o-mata\, a manuscript of semi-ekphrastic poems surrounding works of art that don’t precisely exist. He has been a poetry reader in Houston\, Taos\, Los Angeles\, and a frequent\, grateful guest of Archway Gallery. He has published poetry in Ekphrastic Review\, Borderlands\, Water Stone\, International Review of Poetry\, Southern Indiana Review\, Schuylkill Review\, Hurricane Review\, Big River\, Apalachee Review\, Deep Water Literary Review\, & Garden Box. His poetry and fiction have been in anthologies from Round Top\, Taos Artists\, Words & Art\, Equinox\, Mutabilis Press\, and Big Poetry Review. He is an MFA graduate of Vermont College of Fine Arts and currently has an interview podcast\, Amicus Briefs for Public Poetry. Visit dezuccone.com.\n\n\nVisit the Big Texas Author Talk page.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/the-big-texas-author-talk-featuring-cyrus-cassells/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Event
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Cassells-TBTAT-.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Alexandra van de Kamp":MAILTO:avandekamp@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240429T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Mexico_City:20240429T203000
DTSTAMP:20260403T143605
CREATED:20191105T141203Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20250212T145412Z
UID:9495-1714415400-1714422600@geminiink.org
SUMMARY:Open Writer's Labs
DESCRIPTION:These peer-driven workshops\, held the last Monday of each month\, are free and open to writers of all levels and focus on poetry\, flash fiction\, and short creative non-fiction.\n \n  \n\n\nOnline Via Zoom\nFor the online workshop\, sign up the day before the class to ensure you receive the Zoom link. \nThis workshop is facilitated by Kevin Ramos. Originally from the northeast\, Kevin studied theater arts at Rutgers University and The University of Washington. He’s lived all over the country before making his home in San Antonio\, Texas. Kevin has written several novels and short stories. Most recently\, publishing a short memoir called Enough about addiction\, mothers\, and missing graves. And a novel\, Hayley’s Sense of Fire (DLG Publishing Partners)\, a modern re-telling of the classic fairy tale\, The Little Matchgirl. \n\nIn-Person at Gemini Ink\n \nJoin our in-person Open Writer’s Lab with Robert Allen at Gemini Ink’s office\, 1111 Navarro St.\, San Antonio\, TX 78205. \nRobert Allen has worked as a librarian and an electrical contractor for most of his life. Many moons ago\, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in English Literature from the University of Texas at Austin\, where he studied poetry under David Wevill. Allen has been active in local writer’s groups and open mics\, including the Sun Poets Society. He’s been published in The Ocotillo Review\, the Texas Poetry Calendar\, Voices de la Luna\, di-verse-city\, the San Antonio Express-News\, and Poetry on the Move. In 2006\, he started attending Gemini Ink’s free Monday night writing classes and has attended regularly ever since. With more than a decade of attending writers’ groups\, classes\, and open mics\, he now co-facilitates Gemini Ink’s Open Writer’s Lab. \nParking at Gemini Ink\nGemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.
URL:https://geminiink.org/events/open-writers-lab-2-2020-08-31-2020-09-28-2021-06-28-2022-05-30-2022-06-27-2022-07-25-2023-03-27-2023-12-25/2024-04-29/
LOCATION:Online via Zoom
CATEGORIES:Workshop
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://geminiink.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Open-Writers-Labs-1250-x-600-px-1.png
ORGANIZER;CN="Mandy Lynn Lara":MAILTO:mllara@geminiink.org
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR