Bronx Latin American Art Biennial @ Loisaida Center

ARTISTS:
Antonio Tovar, Darío Fresco,
Ed Álvarez, Edwin Torres, Evelin Velásquez, Frank Guiller, Hillie Galarza, Ignacio Soltero, Jonás Hidalgo, Luis Carle, Ray Llanos, Rafael Carabano, Yelaine Rodríguez.

SPECIAL PERFORMANCE BY:
Carlos Rivera

Bronx Latin American Art Biennial’s Curators:
Alexis Mendoza & Luis Stephenberg

OVERVIEW
I am one of those peoples that…

The 2016 edition of the Bronx Latin American Art Biennial under the title, “I am one of those people that…” will examine artworks referring to personal aspects of the creation process, what is in the mind of the artists sometimes is not what is reflecting on the work or the personal opinion; the personal philosophy. The curators and organizers of the 5th Bronx Latin American Art Biennial will focus the selection of the artworks more in the way artists think and what are the specifics behind the creating process. We encourage the artists to be very vocal about their work. Also, our intention is to have the opportunity to explore some of today’s local, national and international social issues such as: migration, women’s rights, political conflicts, different types of discrimination, and more important issues that reflect on the autonomy of the opinion. We are not seeking for every artwork to be a portrait or self-portraits, rather to be a self-representation of the artist’s way of thinking.

Sometimes art’s autonomy is proposed not as a genuine theoretical claim but as strategic one, where the suggestion is that only by claiming that art is indemnified by its very nature against moral culture can we prevent the forms of censorship that art is regularly subject to. But this strategic appeal to autonomy may purchase art’s freedom only at the cost of denying art’s power. I believe that a society that supports the arts supports the cultivation of minds that are able to pay attention, to think and notice what’s on artists’ minds become a habitual experience. Only then are there opportunities to reinforce the national culture. That will be the ultimate autonomy. Here we have drawn unlikely under current conditions, opinion, proposing instead a problematization of the same to the extent that we would no longer or with a referential field or with the discursive strategies capable of taking charge of the experience under the dissolutive operations that ideology, while constituting each of the moments of the object, has practiced on the disciplines and techniques that seek to address it.

“De Aqui y De Allá” by Adrián Viajero Román

De Aquí y De Allá

By Adrián Viajero Román

Oct 19th – Nov 18th
Opening Reception: Oct 28 at 7:30pm

The EXODUS series explores the Puerto Rican experience of migration, past and present. Focused on towns and municipalities that are encountering a rapid decrease in population, causing separation of families, homes to be abandoned, and businesses to be closed down. Today’s crisis of the poor economy, high taxes, drugs and violence, and a decrease in agriculture that was once a thriving industry for Puerto Rico’s economy has contributed to an estimated over 300,000 people leaving the island in the past 10 years, with 144,000 of them leaving in the last 4 years, and 64,000 leaving in 2014 alone.

viajero-pr-pic

Adrian blocks some traffic on Broadway to show people what Puerto Rico looks like. (Wood house siding cut out in the shape of Puerto Rico, the black outlines are the shapes of the municipalities with the highest population of Puerto Ricans that have left their homes).

 

This is a portion of Viajero's installation on display at Loisaida Inc. Center which will become a permanent installation on display at the NYC Facebook office headquarters. 

#LOISAIDACenter #exodus #crisisisland #DefendPR

War in the Neighborhood: Gentrification and Graphic Art

War in the Neighborhood: Gentrification and Graphic Art

with Seth Tobocman

Music by Eric Blitz, Andy Laties and Joe Merolla.


Tuesday, November 15th, 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.


Published in 1999, Seth Tobocman’s War in the Neighborhood remains one of the most relevant graphic novels exploring housing and community issues. Called a “masterpiece of gentrification” and “the comic book version of Rent,” War in the Neighborhood is a riveting first-hand account of radical neighborhood transformations in late 80’s and early 90’s New York.

With nuance and candor, Tobocman tells the tales of courageous communities built from rubble while exploring the moral complexities inherent in any movement, and the struggles against displacement that continue in varied forms today.

To coincide with the republishing of this classic novel by Ad Asta Comix, Tobocman will lead an illustrated discussion of his experiences, his art, and how the two intersect.

Seth Tobocman co- founded the magazine World War 3 Illustrated and is the author of many graphic books including his latest, Len, A Lawyer in History, about civil rights attorney Leonard Weinglass. His illustrations have appeared in The New York Times, the Village Voice, The Museum of Modern Art, The New Museum of Contemporary Art, posters, banners, murals, patches and tattoos by people’s movements all over the world.

This event is co-sponsored with GVSHP.


Below there is video documentation of the event for those who missed it.


Loisaida’s Mini Fest

Loisaida Inc. Center will be celebrating a Family day we like to call the Mini-Fest “Storytelling Edition” as part of El Festival de la Palabra NYC.


Eventbrite - Loisaida's Mini Fest


Join us:

Saturday, October 29th from 12:00 pm – 4:00 pm

Loisaida Inc. Center – 710 East 9th Street and Avenue C

The MiniFest will have: Creative workshops for kids, fun games and activities, storytelling and a Light Show called “Colorful Animals” with many more surprises.

Mini Fest Program & Schedule

12:00 pm – 1:00 pm

Cuentacuentos – “Storytelling”

With: Tina Casanova and José Rabelo (part of: Festival de la Palabra)


1:00 pm – 3:30 pm

Itinerant stations with diferent activities for kids. Including drawing, painting, creating you own puppet for the older ones. Creative and fun station for toddlers too. Open air activities and games.

  1. Story Workshop: Participants could create their own little story and their own book. Materials: Paper, pencils, crayons. With: Zuleyka Alejandro.
  2. Drawing and Painting Character Workshop: Kids will be able to draw or paint their characters this way helping them to develop the characters. Materiales: Paper, Paint, crayons, pencils. With: Juan Bautista
  3. Theatrical Games: Fun games for the kids to develop and act their characters. With: Zuleyka Alejandro
  4. Open air activities: Bubble making games and a variety of fun games and activities.
  5. Permanent Stations: Clay Sation, Printmaking Station, Games for toddlers.

3:30 pm – 4:00 pm

“Light Show”

Colorful Animals is a Light Show for kids! The story is an effort to learn about accepting each other with our differences. With: Zuleyka Alejandro, Juan Bautista, Daniela Fabrizi y Kevin Pérez.


Sponsored by: UnitedHealthcare ©
 

San Juan Noir

San Juan Noir Anthology Launches Amidst Puerto Rican Debt Crisis


Eventbrite - San Juan Noir - Book Presentation & Discussion


San Juan Noir is an unprecedented volume of contemporary Puerto Rican fiction edited by renowned author Mayra Santos-Febres, creator of Puerto Rico’s Festival de la Palabra which its New York edition will be celebrated at Loisaida Inc. Center this same weekend.

She’ll be attending this special New York City launch, alongside anthology contributors Charlie Vázquez, Wilfredo Burgos Matos and Manuel Meléndez—as part of Festival de la Palabra. This will take place at the Loisaida Center on Friday, October 28th at 7:00p.m.

Publisher Akashic Books will be on-hand to sell both Spanish-language and English-language copies of this breakthrough volume of Puerto Rican crime fiction, which features writers from the island and the diaspora. The Loisaida Inc. Center is located at 710 E 9th Street, NY, NY 10009.

“Puerto Rico is often portrayed as sandy beaches, casinos, luxury hotels, relaxation, and never-ending pleasure,” Santos-Febres says. “But the financial downturn of 2008 hit us hard and as in many crises, art, music, and literature have also flourished. We have responded to our crisis with many stories to tell. In these times, many of those stories are noir.”

The fifteen stories compiled in San Juan Noir have been published in both Spanish and English editions and were written by Ernesto Quiñones, Yolanda Arroyo Pizarro, José Rabelo, Luis Negrón, Ana María Fuster Lavín, Janette Becerra, Manolo Núñez Negrón, Tere Dávila, Edmaris Carazo and Alejandro Álvarez Nieves. Come celebrate this historic moment…

Info: info@loisaida.org

Book cover:


sjn


Folclor de Puerto Rico: memoria e identidad

Folclor de Puerto Rico: memoria e identidad

Idioma: Español
Fecha: Sábado, 22 de octubre de 2016
Horario: 2:00 pm a 5:00 pm
Recurso: Profesor Néstor Murray-Irizarry

Profesor universitario de Historia retirado. En 1976 fundó el Centro de Investigaciones Folclóricas de Puerto Rico, Inc. con sede en la Casa Paoli en Ponce, Puerto Rico. Investigador y estudioso de nuestra cultura durante más de 50 años. Tiene publicado más de 15 libros sobre diversos temas de nuestra cultura nacional. Fundó la Revista Miradero en papel (hoy virtual www.miradero.org). Ha editado más de 50 libros, revistas, DVD, CD. Es pionero en en el estudio del muralismo en Puerto Rico lo que le ha merecido varios premios. A sus 70 años continua trabajando en beneficio de nuestro acervo cultural.

Para más información: nmirizarry@gmail.com

Entrada gratis


Eventbrite - Folclor de Puerto Rico - Memoria e Identidad


The Word Festival at Loisaida Inc.

Loisaida Inc. and Acacia Network together with Salón Literario Libroamérica, Instituto Cervantes, Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña presents:

Festival de la Palabra (The Word Festival)

When?

Thursday, October 27th through Saturday, October 29th from 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm (Thursday and Friday) and 12:00 pm – 10:00 pm (Saturday)

Where?

Loisaida Inc. – 710 East 9th Street New York, NY 10009


OVERVIEW:

Festival de la Palabra (The Word Festival) is the top literary event in Puerto Rico, and the only literary festival in the world based on one single community -the Puerto Rican community- which is held in two very distinct cities: San Juan and New York, and for the first time celebrated at Loisaida Inc. in the heart of the Lower East Side of Manhattan.

Over 15,000 visitors attend this international encounter of writers and readers, featuring 100 prestigious authors from Puerto Rico and 20 other countries in America, Europe and Africa, all sharing their common passion for literature.


Thursday, October 27th – 6:00 PM


Venue: LOISAIDA INC. CENTER – 710 EAST CALLE 9 LOWER EAST SIDE – 6:00 PM

“LOS DE AQUÍ Y LOS DE ALLÁ” 
PANELISTAS:
• Manolo Núñez Negrón
• Tere Dávila
• Bonafide Rojas
• Urayoán Noel

Venue: INSTITUTO CERVANTES – 211 EAST 49TH STREET – 7:30 PM 

“EUROPA-AMÉRICA LATINA: VIAJES A UTOPÍA”
PANELISTAS:
• Jesús Ferrero
• Marina Perezagua
• José Manuel Fajardo
• Raúl Aguiar
• Mayra Santos-Febres


Friday, October 28th – 7:30 PM


Venue: LOISAIDA INC. CENTER – 710 EAST CALLE 9 LOWER EAST SIDE – 7:30 PM
”SAN JUAN NOIR”  (RSVP here)
INAUGURACIÓN Y PRESENTACIÓN DE LIBRO CON:
• Johnny Temple
• Mayra Santos-Febres
• Charlie Vázquez
• Wilfredo Burgos Matos
• Manuel Méndez
• Tere Dávila


Saturday, October 29th – 12:00 – 10:00 PM


Venue: LOISAIDA INC. CENTER – 710 EAST CALLE 9 LOWER EAST SIDE
12:00 PM – 4:00 PM

“LOISAIDA’S MINI FEST” (RSVP here)

12:00 – 1:00 PM – CUENTACUENTOS (Storytelling)
CON:
• Tina Casanova
• José Rabelo

1:00 PM – 3:00 PM – ESTACIONES ITINERANTES DE ACTIVIDADES CREATIVAS
CON:
• Zule Alejandro
• Daniela Fabrizi
• Juan Bautista

3:00 PM – 4:00 PM – ESPECTACULO DE LUCES
CON:
• i Luminate


Venue: LOISAIDA INC. CENTER – 710 EAST CALLE 9 LOWER EAST SIDE
4:00 PM – 9:00 PM

4:00 PM – “MEMORIA, LITERATURA Y COMUNIDAD”
PANELISTAS:
• Tina Casanova
• Charlie Vázquez
• José Rabelo
• Mariposa Fernández

4:30 PM – PROYECCIÓN DE DOCUMENTALES: “LUIS/LIZZA” Y “CLEMENTE SOTO VÉLEZ”
CON:
• Joelle González-Laguer
• Luis Felipe Díaz
• Alfredo Villanueva Collado

5:30 PM – “CARIBE: ARCHIPIÉLAGO DE SUEÑOS”
PANELISTAS:
• Raúl Aguiar
• Carlos Fonseca
• Manolo Núñez Negrón
• Mayra Santos-Febres

7:00 PM – PRESENTACIÓN DE LIBRO “YO SOY IRIS CHACÓN”
CON:
• Iris Chacón

8:00 PM – CIERRE POÉTICO


Sponsored by: Southwest Airlines © and the New York Public Library

Tale of 4 Schools

image001

Visit The Greenwich Village Society for Historical Preservation.


Tale of Four Schools

FREE. Reservation required. All ages welcomed, bilingual friendly (Spanish, English). Thurs. Sept. 22 – 6:30pm to 9:00pm. Wheelchair accessible.

Architect CBJ Snyder was a prolific designer of New York public school buildings, completing more than 350 schools in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. A graduate of Cooper Union, Snyder had big ideas about design, too – he believed that public school buildings should be civic monuments to a better, brighter future. Snyder’s innovative buildings included progressive solutions for light, air, fireproofing, and classroom size. How can we better care for our community resources facilitate adaptive reuse, and what can we still learn from Snyder’s century-old philosophies? Professor Jean Arrington, who has researched Snyder’s work and legacy in New York, will share her insights and Simeon Bankoff, Executive Director of the Historic Districts Council, will moderate a discussion with stakeholders of four Snyder projects – a demolished Bronx landmark, two former Harlem schools aiming to serve as community anchors, and an East Village building with an uncertain future.

Co-sponsored by Loisada, Inc., the Historic Districts Council, East Village Community Coalition and Lower East Side Preservation Initiative.

Register Here!

BRAINLINGO

Loisaida Inc. presents:

BRAINLINGO – A poetry workshop for the body and mind.

With: Edwin Torres

Thursdays, September 15th, 22nd, 29th & October 13th from 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm

710 East 9th Street New York, NY 10009

(Joining Edwin on Sept. 22 will be guest artist Will Power, Doris Duke Foundation Resident Artist at New York Theater Workshop)


Eventbrite - BRAINLINGO - Open Sensory Awareness


OVERVIEW:

A Poetry Workshop For The Body And Mind — is a creative laboratory combining elements of theater, collage, and movement structured around language. Participants will explore the performative edges that embody transition as rich tools for transformative work. By cultivating an awareness between the disciplines of body language and archetypes of imagination, the tri-lingual voice, the speaking-seeing-hearing voice, will be nurtured. The four weeks are oriented around opening the sensory awareness necessary for artistic expression.

The workshop is structured sequentially for maximum effect, however each class can be taken individually to fit your schedule. Please enroll online.


September 15th – CLASS 1: GROUND

Poets are creatures grounded in awareness. To establish that ground, we need to see what happens to awareness as it transitions. We activate that trigger by presenting two immersive exercises built to represent the evolution of the creative process as a microcosm of the writer’s experience. The writing that emerges is then shared and a discussion follows, utilizing the newly-charged creative space. This becomes groundwork for transition to become a resource in the creative process.


September 22nd – CLASS 2: BALANCE (with guest artist Will Power)

In this class, we’re lucky to be joined by award-winning playwright and performer Will Power. To nurture creativity is to spark the imagination, to see the world from many viewpoints, to cultivate where balance lies, literally, from one foot to the other. Using alignment to explore movement in theater and performance, we’ll integrate exercises from The Alexander Technique that explore the spine’s relationship to language, and how support is integral to creativity. We’ll then explore improvisation in dialogue on stage and in action by creating brief performances in group settings. Between Will Power and Edwin Torres, an immersive narrative among a range of genres will create an intoxicating blend of creative inspiration for the class to journey by.


September 29th – CLASS 3: SIGHT

Our volume, our mass, the weight of our perception is defined by the movement we attach to it. This week, we’ll take what we explored with Will Power the previous week and interpret music as movement, words as sound, interconnecting the accumulation of classes as possibilities for interpretation. The students will be taking their places with each other to create movement plays, based on word exercises reducing writing into vowels and consonants. Our movements are mapped into choreo-poems, as concrete poetry and collage are explored and assigned, creating new pathways into the visual senses.


October 13th – CLASS 4: VOICE (Please note that the first Thursday in October, Oct. 6th, will be skipped)

To communicate what’s being listening to requires an understanding of border with intention, defined as “voice.” This final class explores the Japanese dance Butoh – which explores energy slowly traveling through the dancer’s body. Butoh will be used to translate the voices within, to interpret listening to unknown voices into action. Mantra and repetition will be used to generate new writing out of trance states, further opening the possibilities of sensory awareness. Collaged pieces will be adapted into new texts, creating a performance of collected works to be presented at The Loisaida Center at a later date in November.


ABOUT THE ARTIST:

Edwin Torres came to poetry as a graphic designer in New York City, becoming a self-proclaimed “lingualisualist,” fluent in the languages of sight and sound. The iconic diversity of the East Village during the 90’s, along with the combined forces of Dixon Place, The Nuyorican Poets Café, and The St. Marks Poetry Project, shaped his multi-disciplinary approach to language. He was a member of the poetry collective “Nuyorican Poets Café Live” that helped revitalize Spoken Word, performing and giving workshops worldwide. He is the author of eight books of poetry, including Ameriscopia (University of Arizona Press 2014), Yes Thing No Thing (Roof Books 2010), In The Function Of External Circumstances (Nightboat Books 2009) and The PoPedology of An Ambient Language (Atelos Books 2008). He’s received fellowships from the DIA Foundation, The New York Foundation for the Arts, The Foundation For Contemporary Performing Arts, The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and The Poetry Fund among others.

In 2016, he judged the Andre Montoya Poetry Prize at the University of Note Dame, performed his solo show “Mi Voca Su Voca” at The Kimmel Center in Philadelphia, is part of a 2-year artist’s residency entitled Open Studios at The Drawing Center in New York City, and received a residency fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania, Creative Writing Program for the upcoming semester. His visual poetics have been exhibited at Exit Art, EFA Gallery in NYC, and a graphic retrospective “Poesís: The Visual Language of Edwin Torres” at The Center for Book and Paper Arts, Chicago, Il. His CD “Holy Kid” (Kill Rock Stars Records) was part of the Whitney Museum’s exhibit “The American Century Part II.” Anthologies include, American Poets in the 21st Century: Vol. 2 (Wesleyan University), Angels Of The Americlypse: An Anthology of New Latin@ Writing (Counterpath Press), Post-Modern American Poetry Vol. 2 (Norton), Best American Poetry (Penguin), Kindergarde: Avant Garde Poems and Plays for Children (Black Radish Books), and Aloud: Voices from The Nuyorican Poets Cafe (Holt).

Will Power is an award-winning playwright and performer. Plays include “Stagger Lee” (Dallas Theater Center), “Fetch Clay, Make Man”(New York Theater Workshop, Marin Theatre Company, Roundhouse Theatre, True Colors Theater), “Steel Hammer” with SITI Company (Humana Festival, Brooklyn Academy of Music), “The Seven” (Lucille Lortel Award Best Musical, New York Theater Workshop, La Jolla Playhouse, Ten Thousand Things Theater Company), Five Fingers of Funk! (Children’s Theatre Company), Honey Bo and The Goldmine (La Jolla Playhouse) and two internationally acclaimed solo shows “The Gathering,” and “Flow.”

In addition to being the Doris Duke Foundation Resident Artist at New York Theater Workshop, Power is also on the faculty at The Meadows School of the Arts/SMU, and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Playwright in Residence with the Dallas Theatre Center

#LaSoPA 2016 (Session II)

The Loisaida Center is proud to announce

2016 Summer Loisaida Artists in Residence:

The School of Poetic Arts


#LaSopaNYC: Summer 2016 (Session II)

Session II: 3 Saturdays, TBA from 11:00am to 1:00pm.

Our Session II 2016 edition consists of two writing workshops that will explore and give voice to personal and societal issues from the perspectives of women and men.

Register here.

_________________

Mens group: Exploding Poems, Masculinity, and Privilege

Facilated by: Rich Villar

Workshop description:

We will examine various paradigms of masculinity and how it plays out

in our poetic practices. Among the subjects discussed: fatherhood and

family relations; toxicity, patriarchy, and machismo; and the politics

of the body in poetic discourse. In solidarity with other male

writers, our intention is to create a positive space to examine and

challenge our privilege, to speak frankly about our imagined roles in

society, and to cultivate empathy as a writing practice.

_________________

Womens Group: The “She” in the Poem

Faciliated by: Jani Rose

Workshop description:

We birth these works for as many reasons and in as many ways, as there are facets

to our person. Each poem as unique as the variables that inspire it. Among our

sisters and friends, we discuss this “I am”, that influences our journey. The “She”

 that thinks and speaks. How well do we know her? How do we receive her? Do we

respect this voice? Join us at La Sopa to explore the feminine voice, to read and write

with sisters who know that your voice is a necessary companion to her own.

write with sisters who know that your voice is a necessary companion to her own.

Ages: 17 and over.
Please send 3 samples of your work & Submit your application here!

Any questions or concerns to LaSopaNYC@gmail.com or info@loisaida.org


Eventbrite - La Sopa Bookcase


Overview:

La Sopa is facilitated by established members of the arts community who are seasoned teaching artists. The founders, as poets began the series with poetry workshops, and have plans to expand the series to include many more artistic disciplines. With their finger on the pulse of the arts movement throughout the tri-state area, they have access to professors and teaching artists who are knowledgeable in many different arenas. Their pedagogy is that of a Community S.T.E.A.M. program with a special focus on Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics, as it pertains to adult innovators seeking mastery of arts or entrepreneurship.

Full rollout includes coursework in:

S cience: The use of social sciences in identity and influence, reader/ audience perception, interaction, understanding of community needs, and the development of approaches by which these needs might be fulfilled. * (which will include traditional and social media marketing)

T echnology: The use of cutting edge phone/computer apps and tools for writers and artists along with best practices in use of Social Media engagement.

E ngineering: Sound and Stage Engineering for Theatrical classes and/or Music Production as well as App creation.

A rts: Prose and Poetry Writing, Performance, Acting, Screenplay, Vocal, Live Paint, Comic Book/Graphic Novel art, Web Design.

M athematics: Financial Education Classes with a focus on ground level issues such as credit, saving for retirement, and real estate for first home/condo/co-op.

The School of Poetic Arts (La SoPA NYC) is an educational workshop series from Capicu Culture that provides a communal space dedicated to the development of artistic skill and exploring the core principles of theatrical and literary expression. Join us as the first official class of our Artist residency at The Loisaida Center, Inc! As artists and scholars from historically marginalized communities, we feel that it is important to create opportunities for our stories to be seen, read, and heard. La Sopa provides a platform for those voices to be supported and uplifted, increasing the proliferation of creative works across the artistic spectrum. Our time together, generating and editing works, launching new ideas and projects, is an inspirational way to end each week and begin anew. We look forward to the return of our previous participants, as well as the addition of new voices that will enrich the experience.

The Capicu School of Poetic Arts (La SoPA)

Writers of all levels of experience are welcome to join us for this new Summer 2016 season of La Sopa, at the Loisaida Center, on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, NYC.

This multi-level educational workshop series provides a communal space dedicated to the development of artistic skill, while exploring the core principles of theatrical and literary expression. We look forward to collaborating with the Loisaida Center, an organization aspiring to build a connection between community learners, artists, and scholars through affordable education opportunities in cultural fields. As artists and scholars from historically marginalized communities, we feel that it is important to create opportunities for our stories to be seen, read, and heard. La Sopa provides a platform for those voices to be supported and uplifted, increasing the proliferation of creative works across the artistic spectrum.

Our time together, generating and editing works, launching new ideas and projects, is an inspirational way to end each week and begin anew. We look forward to the return of our previous participants, as well as the addition of new voices that will enrich the experience.

Outcomes:

La Sopa is rooted in a vision of the artist as cultural worker, in the longstanding tradition of the creative community of the Lower East Side. La Sopa’s founders, administrators, and faculty all believe strongly in the power of creativity to affect change in society. This program is the result of their shared commitment to provide a dynamic environment for diverse communities of artists to convene, work on craft, develop their voices within community, and publicly promote that work through the use of social media and other technologies. A strong familial dynamic underpins the program’s dedication to quality of content, as well as the reversal of destructive forces within our creative community. As the program expands its support base and builds its community, La Sopa will engage faculty and students similarly rooted in cultural work and community betterment.


Profile:

La Sopa (School of Poetic Arts): is a community-based arts program with its intellectual roots in the poetics of the Nuyorican, Black Arts, and Beat movements. From its home base at Loisaida Inc., a historic enclave for artists and people of color on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, La Sopa serves as an incubator for poets, performers, and other creatives to explore and expand their artistic selves, develop their voices, distribute the works in live performance and exhibition, and promote their works in various media. La Sopa (School of Poetic Arts) is a program of Capicu Poetry & Cultural Showcase, led by Juan “Papo Swiggity” Santiago (Director of Operations), Jani Rose (Director of Education) and George Torres (Director of Engagement), with pedagogical contributions by author Rich Villar.