Hoffman Center Blog

On Saturday, October 15, from 1 pm to 3 pm, Vince Wixon will facilitate a Poetry Workshop called “Getting Started and Keeping it Going”.

Vince is the author of two books of poetry, The Square Grove (2006) and Seed (1993), as well as a recent chapbook, Blue Moon, 29 poems developed from lines from the Chinese masters (Wordcraft of Oregon, 2010). He has poems in three anthologies, including From Here We Speak: An Anthology of Oregon Poetry. With Paul Merchant, Wixon co-edited William Stafford’s Crossing Unmarked Snow: Further Views on the Writer’s Vocation (Michigan, 1998) and The Answers Are Inside the Mountains (Michigan, 2003) and helped edit Stafford’s The Way It Is: New and Selected Poems (Graywolf, 1998). Wixon is also co-producer of two videos on William Stafford, What the River Says and The Life of the Poem, and one on Lawson Inada, What It Means to be Free. He and his wife Patricia are long-time poetry editors for “Jefferson Monthly,” the Jefferson Public Radio program guide. The couple has spent more than three decades bringing poets and poetry-related events to the Rogue Valley area and the past decade promoting the works of Oregon’s most famous poet, the late William Stafford. They live in Ashland, Oregon.

Oregon Poetic Voices will also have a recording studio set up on the premises, from 4:30 to 6:30 pm on October 14, and from 3:30 to 5:30 pm on October 15. All poets, published or not, are welcome to record. This will be a first-come, first-serve event and poets will have about fifteen-minutes allotted to them. Poets should consider these time constraints when deciding which works they want to record.

All participants must be prepared to sign a waiver to allow the recordings and texts to be displayed on the website (www.oregonpoeticvoices.org). Please also bring paper copies of the poems and a biographical statement. All participants will be mailed a CD of their readings at a later date.

Recognizing the need for poetry in our lives, the Oregon Poetic Voices Project (OPV) began in 2010, in order to create a comprehensive digital archive of poetry readings that will complement existing print collections of poetry across the state. This sound archive is available online to Oregonians of all ages and geographic locations at libraries, in schools, at home, or visiting the State Library Poetry Room. OPV is funded by the Library Services and Technology Act FFY2011.

For more information, please direct any questions to Poetry Project Fellow, Melissa Dalton at 503-768-8190 or mdalton@lclark.edu. All poets are also welcome to schedule an individual appointment to record in the OPV office, located on the Lewis & Clark campus in Portland, Oregon.

Be sure to stop by the Hoffman Center on Saturday, July 23rd, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

We’re excited to show off some of the changes to our performance and gallery spaces, as well as the newly expanded Clay Studio.  Plus, you’re invited to explore all sorts of demonstrations of what the Hoffman Center has to offer, including clay, drawing, writing, reading, music, letterpress, mixed media, and book and paper arts.  Click on the Hoffapalooza Schedule for a printable schedule of events.  There’s no admission.

Local businesses and individuals have also generously donated over $1,500 worth of products and services for our fabulous raffle and silent auction prizes. Enter to win a $25 gas card from Bayside Shell & Grocery, just for showing up. Click on this list of Hoffapalooza prizes to see all of the wonderful raffle prizes and special silent auction items.  Raffle tickets are just $1 each,  12 for $10, or 25 for $20.    All proceeds go to the Hoffman Center Operating Fund.

And that’s not all!  Over 20 local artists will be showing and selling their art, including pieces made in the Hoffman Center Clay and Life Drawing Studios, and other art classes.  There also will be a display of art by kids in the Outside the Box Arts program.

Did we forget anything?  Well, there will be a lemonade stand on the front porch, plus tasty hand baked goods donated by Kim Miller.

We’ll see you there!

Please join us for another book launch party on Friday, April 22nd from 6:00 p.m. to 8 p.m.  Travis Champ will read from his new book — As a Ghost Through a City of Millions.

“I was in Mexico City for six weeks this past autumn,” says Champ.  “Holed up with a typewriter in a cheap hotel.  Trying to adapt and become comfortable in the city. If anything, that is what the book is about.”

The book was printed entirely by letterpress at The Manzanita Community Printshop which is located at the Hoffman Center.  Sarah Archer designed and printed the cover and Champ bound the hardcover books by hand.

There are ongoing printmaking classes and information about that will be available at the reading as well.

PoetryFest on March 19

Poet Laureate Paulann Petersen, and fellow award-winning poets Margaret Chula, Carlos Reyes and Penelope Scambly Schott 
will participate in a Poetry Fest at the Manzanita Writers’ Series at 7 pm on Saturday, March 19, at the Hoffman Center in Manzanita.

Oregon’s sixth Poet Laureate, Paulann Petersen has five full-length books of poetry: The Wild Awake, Blood-Silk, A Bride of Narrow Escape, Kindle, and The Voluptuary, published by Lost Horse Press in 2010. A former Stegner Fellow at Stanford University and the recipient of the 2006 Holbrook Award from Oregon Literary Arts, she serves on the board of Friends of William Stafford, organizing the January Stafford Birthday Events. (http://www.paulann.net)

Margaret Chula is a poet, performer and world traveler. In 1977 she traveled overland through Asia and Southeast Asia with her husband before settling in Japan, where she taught English and creative writing at universities in Kyoto. She has published six books of poetry. Her one-woman performance of Three Women Who Loved Love premiered in Krakow in 2003 and toured to Canada, Japan and the US. (http://www.margaretchula.com or www.margaretchula.blogspot.com)

Poet and translator Carlos Reyes lives and writes in Portland, Oregon when he is not traveling. He travels a lot, and whether he journeys to Panama, Spain, Alaska or Ireland, those experiences inspire and inform his poetry. In 2007 he was honored with a Heinrich Boll Fellowship, which gave him two weeks to write on Achill Island, Ireland. He has had fellowships to Yaddo and the Fundación Valparaíso (Mojåcar, Spain). He was poet-in-residence in 2009 at the Lost Horse Ranger Station in the Joshua Tree National Park.

Penelope Scambly Schott has published eight full-length books of poetry. Her verse biography A is for Anne: Mistress Hutchinson Disturbs the Commonwealth won the 2008 Oregon Book Award for Poetry, and her most recent collection Crow Mercies (2010) received the Sarah Lantz Memorial Award from Calyx Press.

 To help you prime your own poetry, join the poets during the day on Saturday in a series of mini-workshops called Prompting New Work. Spend an hour with each of these acclaimed poets. They’ll share their favorite writing prompts. You’ll come away inspired and with new material for your work. Pick and choose, or spend time with all four; the price is the same, $40 for the day. Just download a registration form.

The series is a program of the Hoffman Center and will be held at the Hoffman Center (across from Manzanita Library at 594 Laneda Avenue.) The building will be set up in a café style with coffee/tea and snacks available. Admission fee is $5.

Sage Cohen’s two-part workshop on Saturday, April 17, has been moved to the Center for the Contemplative Arts in Manzanita, which is located at the Underhill Plaza on the corner of Manzanita Avenue and Division.  The workshop will cover the creativity and the business of poetry.
 
Poetry: From Pen to Page to Published, will run from 1pm to 3:30pm.
 
Have you always wanted to write a poem, but don’t know how to begin? Are you already writing poetry and want to connect with your muse more often? Spend the first half of this lively workshop to get your poetic juices flowing with a mix of inspiration, craft tips, and exercises.
 
After a break, get down to the business of poetry. Participants will learn to develop the skills, tools and systems they need to publish their poetry:
How to identify the right publications, contests, prizes and residencies for your poetry.
How to establish a submissions tracking system that keeps you moving forward.
How an online presence can help you get in the public eye, and stay there.
Sage is the author of Writing the Life Poetic: An Invitation to Read and Write Poetry (Writers Digest Books, 2009), The Productive Writer: Tips & Tools for Writing More, Stressing Less and Creating Success(Writer’s Digest Books, forthcoming in 2010) and the poetry collection Like the Heart, the World.
Sage won first prize in the Ghost Road Press poetry contest, was nominated for a Pushcart Prize and was awarded a Soapstone residency. She is a columnist for Read Write Poem and publisher of the Writing the Life Poetic Zine.
Sage holds an MFA in creative writing from New York University and a BA in comparative literature from Brown University. She teaches, lectures and reads widely at writing conferences, libraries, universities, bookstores, as well as the popular online class “Poetry for the People”. Learn more about Sage and her books at www.sagesaidso.com <http://www.sagesaidso.com> . 

The workshop is a program of the Hoffman Center.  Admission fee is $25, $25 for students. Download a registration form at http://hoffmanblog.org/manzanita-writers-series/workshops or contact Kathie Hightower, 503-739-1505; kathie@jumpintolife.net.