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WHOA. You made it happen, friends! We've made our Kickstarter goal AND we have five days left! That's five days for you to donate some extra beans so we can pay our fabulous photographers, provide free bus tickets at our event, secure our new childcare coordinator, and maybe even pay ourselves as organizers -- AND five more days for you to get your paws on our incredible perks! Take a look at the one-of-a-kind print by Nat Marshik, drawings from Kara Sievewright, and Alex Leslie's sweet deal on an editing session, and spread the word if you can!  Thank you SO, so much for making our February event a reality, and for keeping this little queer literary dream alive!  xox Esther & Leah 

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REVERB Winter 2015!

New year, new REVERB! It's time for our Winter 2015 event, on Wednesday, February 25th at Gallery Gachet (88 E. Cordova St.) on unceded Musqueam, Sḵwxwú7mesh, and Tsleil-Waututh land.

WE NEED YOUR HELP to make this event happen! If you haven't already seen or shared our Kickstarter, check it out!

***FEATURING***

JEN SUNGSHINE Jen Sungshine speaks for a living but lives for breathing life into unspoken situations in unusual places. As a queer artist-activist she facilitates with creativity and social justice media to evolutionize and revolutionize youth education in the classrooms and beyond through Out in Schools. Her artistic practice involves unlearning while learning and learning while unlearning; and instead of calling you out, she wants to call you in - to make artful social change with her through the language of love and nerdy codes. She is very wordy.

KARA SIEVEWRIGHT Kara Sievewright is a writer, artist and designer who creates comics, websites, prints, and posters. She has published comics and illustrations in many magazines and anthologies including Plenitude, Descant, filling Station, carte blanche, Briarpatch, and Certain Days: Political Prisoners Calendar. She lives on Haida Gwaii and is working on a graphic novel. You can see more of her work on www.makerofnets.ca

PRAGYA SHARMA

pragya sharma has been writing since she was a wee babe, constructing stories and worlds and characters to keep her company. Her work is grounded in her experiences as a fat, South Asian, queer, cis, femme settler on Turtle Island. She's never published anything other than a few zines in her 20s and she rarely performs, so she is very excited to be a part of REVERB

ZAIN MEGHJI

LADAN SAHRAEI

ALEX LESLIE Alex Leslie has published a collection of short stories, People Who Disappear, which was shortlisted for a 2013 Lambda Award, a chapbook of microfictions 20 Objects for the New World, and a collection of prose poems The things I heard about you, published last fall by Nightwood. Alex's poetry is included in Best Canadian Poetry In English 2014 published by Tightrope Books. Alex edited the Queer issue of Poetry Is Dead magazine and is currently working on a collection of stories entitled We All Need To Eat. Alex was born and has lived their life on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh peoples.

For more info, check out our Accessibility page, About REVERB, or take a look at our Calendar.

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Help keep this series thriving!

We're excited and nervous to be asking for community support for the first time to keep making this series happen! We've got about three weeks to raise $1500 so that we can put on our February event in its full glory and need your help.

Please check out our Kickstarter campaign and donate whatever spare bucks you might have in support of queer, anti-oppressive, POC-dominant literary spaces! Also get sweet perks like a handmade chapbook filled with REVERB writers, gorgeous art by Nat Marshik, and zines and books by Amber Dawn, Anoushka Ratnarajah, and Adrienne Gruber. If you can't donate, don't worry -- we'd also love your help in spreading the word and sharing queer joy with the world!

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Artist for 2015!

We're so excited to announce that we'll be working with artist April Alayon for 2015! Thank you to all the amazing artists who showed interest in working on this project with us, and please join us in welcoming April to our team for the coming year!

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We are looking for an artist-in-residence for 2015!

REVERB: A Queer Reading Series is looking for an artist-in-residence for 2015! We're hoping to find someone who will bring a whole lotta love to our seasonal event posters - one per reading, four times a year. We chat about your ideas about a month before the event, get you all the info you'll need to make magic three weeks before, and need the final product in jpeg and PDF form two weeks before the big day. This is a paid opportunity because the struggle is real and your talents as an artist deserve appreciation that will feed you! We're looking for someone big on deadlines, email communication, and anti-oppression. Is that you?

Email us at [email protected] with a couple sentences about why you'd like to come make art with us and a link to your portfolio or 3-5 samples of your work. If you have experience making posters, please send samples of those and if you don’t, don’t worry! Like all our events, we're prioritizing QTIPOCs, femmes, trans folks, and folks living with multiple dis/abilities. The deadline to email us about this is Friday, December 5th at midnight.

And now for the same information in a different form!

Position: 2015 Artist-in-residence with REVERB: A Queer Reading Series

This position entails:

Designing and delivering four high-quality posters for REVERB events throughout 2015, to be held in January/February, April/May, July/August, and October/November

Brainstorming and sharing thematic ideas, sketches, and drafts as appropriate with the creation of each poster, but especially at the beginning of 2015 as we establish a general theme for the whole year

Some back-and-forth through email (hopefully very little!), including one round of edits per poster

Converting all poster art to high-quality JPEG and PDF format

Requirements:

Good availability by email, especially five-three weeks prior to each event, which is when all of the poster design and communication happens

Strong communication skills and ability to incorporate feedback

Ability to meet deadlines

Commitment to anti-oppression values, love of queer writing/art and general awesomeness!

Time commitment:

Up to you! Our guess is between 5-10 hours spent on each poster/event communication but everyone works differently. You do you.

Compensation:

$400 honorarium for the year, broken down into 4 $100 payments to be paid out upon the completion of each event

Apply by sending us an email at [email protected] with “Artist application” in the subject line, a couple of sentences about why you'd like to work with us and a link to your portfolio or 3-5 samples of your work.

DEADLINE: Friday, December 5th at Midnight

We’ll be making decisions by December 15th and will contact everyone then. Thank you!

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REVERB Fall 2014 Event!

Yes, finally! It's time for our Fall 2014 REVERB reading, on Wednesday, November 5th at Gallery Gachet (88 E. Cordova St.) on unceded Musqueam, Sḵwxwú7mesh, and Tsleil-Waututh land. ***FEATURING*** VANESSA SHANTI FERNANDO Vanessa Shanti Fernando identifies as a queer, mixed-race femme dandy. She is studying to become a social worker, but will always be a writer first. She believes in the power of romance and rootedness. BEN KEANE-O'HARA Ben has grown up and surrounded himself with writers. He's finally coming to a place of holding that space for himself. He moves towards stories of unknown mixed and poc ancestry, trans and queer identities, and the way light catches on the curve of a belly. He is at once afraid of and in love with the ocean. AMBER DAWN Amber Dawn is a local writer. Her memoir How Poetry Saved My Life: A Hustler’s Memoir won the 2013 Vancouver Book Award. She is the author of the Lambda Award-winning novel Sub Rosa, and editor of the anthologies Fist of the Spider Women: Fear and Queer Desire and With A Rough Tongue. TIARÉ JUNG Tiaré (tee-ah-ray) Jung is a survivor, queerdo, love slut, mixed brown kid with ties to their Polynesian roots. They make art for pay, play, and survival. Songster. Poet. Memoirist. Poster designer. They facilitated leadership storytelling at CampOUT and took part in queer writing spaces, “Writing Ourselves Alive,” and “Telling it Bent.” They are new to sharing their care-chosen-words.  They have an appetite for undertold stories, and want to tell you some of theirs… ANTONETTE REA Antonette Rea is a local poet who has shared her work in various literary magazines, chap books and performance poetry. She recently was the subject of a short film “A Woman with a Past” currently on the international film fest circuit and is currently working on a play based on a collection of her poetry about her life’s challenges as a transgender woman.

JILLIAN CHRISTMAS Jillian Christmas serves as Artistic Director of Versəs Festival of Words. She has won Grand Poetry-Slam Championship titles at both the Vancouver BedRocc poetry-slam (2011), as well as the Vancouver Poetry Slam (2012, 2014), and has represented Vancouver at the Women of the World Poetry Slam for the past two years. An enthusiastic organizer within the Canadian poetry community, Jillian has participated in, developed and executed programs in partnership with Toronto Poetry Project, Wordplay, Brendan McLeod’s Travelling Slam and the CULTCH Mentorship, and facilitated spoken word workshops for youth and adults across the country. ****** Doors at 7 PM; show at 7:30 PM sharp. We're asking for a dollar at the door, but no one will be turned away for lack of funds. There will be some seriously great stuff to buy at our merch table, so bring your bucks if you can! We're going to have some great stuff to give away as well, so don't forget to enter our draw in the hat on your way in the door! Event poster by our amazing artist-in-residence, Tiaré Jung, who's been making art for us all year and is now sharing a different kind of art at this event! Check out more of Tiaré's work here: http://teeahray.tumblr.com/

******

ASL interpretation provided. Scent-reduced space. Wheelchair accessible.

Full accessibility info here.

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Kickstart REVERB at the Queer Arts Festival!

Our first event under our sparkling new name is a glittery collaboration with our friends at Kickstart Disability Arts and the Queer Arts Festival! Join us at the Roundhouse (181 Roundhouse Mews), on un­ceded Musqueam, Tsleil­-Waututh and SkwxwÃo7mesh land. Show starts at 7:30 pm sharp! Doors will be open in the Gallery from 10:30 am to 10:00 pm. Entrance by donation, pay-what-you-can!

Featuring: KATRINA ELISSE CAUDLE Katrina Elisse Caudle is a biracial, polyglamorous Caribbean femme who has worked as a sex worker, community organizer, and artist. She writes dreamy, short, speculative fiction & creates immersive, interactive art installations where you can talk to the spirits. Her experience in sex work has ranged from escorting, to porn, to sacred devotion. Her hobby is hiding charms in public spaces and her motto is "Make it enchanting, make it exquisite".

romham pádraig gallacher i'm a white fat queer trans genderqueer g/imp sober anarchist survivor working-­class-turned­-feeble­-ass, accordion-­playing­-but-­barely­-dancing­bear, living endlessly grateful with a beautiful community of troublemakers on the rainy un­ceded Coast Salish Territories of the Musqueam, Tsleil­Waututh and SkwxwÃo7mesh peoples. i'm currently moving from self­deprecatingly conceptualizing my writing and accessibilities work as "navel gazing" and "spreadsheet hell", respectfully, to "confessional" and "experiential". like me, it's a variously successful work­in­progress.

ALEX LU Alex Lu is a community organizer of disability justice who works with Vancouver queer communities to foster intersectional practices around accessibility. When not working in the community, he conducts biological research, having recently contributed to a body of research on tendon disease with UBC. He currently resides in Vancouver.

SEEMA SHAH Seema Shah is a Queer South Asian writer living in Vancouver, B.C., Unceded Coast Salish Territories. Her interest in writing was rekindled after leaving the practice of medicine several years ago due to chronic illness and disability. This change in life circumstance also sparked her interest in the multiple ways that the arts intersect with health. Seema mainly writes autobiographical creative nonfiction, usually stemming from the places where she lives on the margins. Her writing has been published in various anthologies and journals over the past decade. In addition, she has worked on projects that involve the use of the arts in health care and has published articles related to these experiences in interdisciplinary texts and journals, including a chapter in the text ‘Creative Arts in Interdisciplinary Practice: Inquiries for Hope & Change’. Writing and visual art have been vital means of countering some of the isolation and limitations Seema has experienced secondary to ME/CFS (myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome) and depression; they have provided her a way to stay connected to the outside world and helped her find a new focus and sense of meaning within her changed, more narrowly-defined world. Her piece, “Jane Wayne”, was shortlisted for the Canadian Lesbian & Gay Archives' First Person Narrative Essay Contest in 2008 and was published last year in the Archives’ anthology, ‘Keeping Our Stories Alive’. Seema is currently in the process of reviving a couple of creative projects that use a combination of text and image. Her creative muses, Finnegan and Sadie, still live with her in spirit.

IRIT SHIMRAT Irit Shimrat is an escaped lunatic who has a bee in her bonnet with regard to psychiatry. She co-founded the Ontario Psychiatric Survivors’ Alliance in 1990. Her book Call Me Crazy: Stories from the Mad Movement was published in 1997 in Vancouver.

JOTIKA Jotika is a mixed media artist, singer, writer, listener, community organizer and aspiring social worker. She is a Queer, Poor, Brown, Femme whose roots are in Fiji and Northern India. She identifies as a settler on land that was stolen from the xʷməθkwəy̓əm, sḵwx̱wú7mesh, Stó:lō, Burrard and Tsleil-Waututh peoples. Her art and writing aims to understand the effects of colonization that her families have experienced and also to examine and learn to how stand with folks whose land she is a settler on; who have and continue to experience colonization. ASL Interpretation is confirmed. This event is scent-reduced, and fully wheelchair accessible. For more information on how to support a scent-reduced event, please visit http://www.peggymunson.com/mcs/fragrancefree.html. The Radical Accessibility Mapping Project performed an accessibility audit for the Roundhouse in August 2011, and the space has remained the same since. Access Overview, Just The Basics: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1QHUwp36z-6krVXM5P8vB81RRCibNF81QUpbwnRMqpOg/edit?usp=sharing Full Access Audit: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AkEveutSlMoVdHo2RDRFZDVlQ25yUjNLVzRYcFZfcWc&usp=sharing You can learn more about the Radical Access Mapping Project here: http://radicalaccessiblecommunities.wordpress.com/radical-access-mapping-project-vancouver/ ARE YOU A QAF FAN? Buy a 4-show QAF Pass for only $69 / $20 for youth. http://www.brownpapertickets.com/ref/22139/event/747714 Get advance seating, invitations to parties, special passholder offers & more! Event poster by our amazing artist-in-residence, Tiaré Jung. Check out Tiaré’s work here: http://teeahray.tumblr.com/

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Upcoming Event on August 6th!

Our upcoming event on is on Wednesday, AUGUST 6TH, 2014, a collaboration with Kickstart Disability Arts and Culture as part of the Queer Arts Festival - more info coming soon! Check back here for a full list of artists, accessibility info, and more!

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Announcing our new name!

Our last year and a half under the name LITANY has been full of magic. We're grateful to everyone who welcomed the series, supported, and challenged us. We'd also like to thank those who offered feedback and questions about how our original title, which referenced Audre Lorde's "A Litany For Survival," participated in the all-too-common practice of non-Black queers co-opting the words of prominent Black queers. We hope that in changing the name of our series we're carrying on the work towards an anti-oppressive queer reading series and working against the long history of anti-Black racism in Vancouver.

With that in mind, we bid a fond and grateful farewell to the name LITANY, and welcome in the new name for our series: REVERB. After a year of creating and transforming community through queer lit, this name echoes of how all your stories and words have stayed with us through this process. Reverb, or reverberation, is described as "the persistence of sound" after it has been produced -- and we like to think that an anti-oppressive space for queer writing to resonate will continue to make some noise even beyond our events! A reverb is made up of reflections; we hope that this series provides space for you to reflect and be reflected, in all your many layers.

We've been blown away by how generous folks have been throughout our process of change! Particular thanks must be extended to our unofficial advisory board who volunteered to meet with us for lunch, tea, and many, many emails: Anoushka Ratnarajah, Anthony Meza-Wilson, Amal Rana, Ben Keane O'Hara, Cecily Nicholson, Fayza Bundalli, Jillian Christmas, Kay Lamothe, and !Kona.

So, welcome to Reverb; hope you like it! We're looking forward to our first event under our new name in August, as part of a collaboration with Kickstart Disability Arts and the Queer Arts Festival. More information on that very soon!

Look for updated contact info and all other pieces about us on the Internet to change soon.

Esther & Leah

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It's May Day! In the spirit of labour, mayhem and magic, please send us your suggestions for our new name! We're open to hearing your ideas, thoughts and concerns on any part of this process for the week to come (until May 8th, when we're going to try to start making decisions) so please be in touch! Email us at [email protected], send us a message on Facebook or book a time to speak in person or on the phone. We want to hear from you!

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Wow, last night was amazing! Thanks to all who came out and shared their love. And special thanks to everyone who posed with a sign that our artist-in-residence extraordinaire made for a fundraising campaign for their mom.

Here's an invitation from Tiaré to like/ share/ donate to the Tooth Fairy Campaign!: Sometimes mom's need tooth fairies too. Raising 3 kids as a single mother has a lot of benefits, but dental isn't one of them. So that's why my two sisters and I are banding together on a quest for tooth fairies to help us fund dental care for our mom. If you believe in tooth fairies, please share/ like/ donate! https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-tooth-fairy-campaign#home

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Upcoming Event on April 10th!

This Spring 2014 LITANY reading is on Thursday, April 10th at Havana Theatre (1212 Commercial Drive) on unceded Musqueam, Sḵwxwú7mesh, and Tsleil-Waututh land. Doors at 7:30 PM. Show starts 8 PM sharp. Featuring: CARVEN LI Carven is an aspiring novelist who grew up in urbanized Hong Kong and is currently living on the ancestral homelands of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm/Musqueam, Tsawwassen, Tsleil-Waututh, Skwxwú7mesh and Stó:lō nations. He is grateful to be building community on this unceded, occupied and urbanized territory during this phase of unjust global modernity. !KONA !Kona is a professional actor, artist and writer, She has worked with a range of cultural non-profits, is a community events organizer, has a background in governmental social justice work, and currently earns her lucre as a municipal cultural facilitation. in addition to contemplating the next iteration of The Queeriodic Table, Kona is researching and writing her first novel and planning more art projects. ADRIENNE GRUBER Adrienne Gruber is a poet living in Vancouver. She’s the author of the full-length poetry collection This is the Nightmare (Thistledown Press) and two chapbooks, Mimic (Leaf Press) and Everything Water (Cactus Press), and has a third chapbook forthcoming with Jack Pine Press. She’s usually found hiking on the North Shore with her daughter Q. http://adriennegruber.wordpress.com/ K!MMORTAL K!MMORTAL is a multidimensional artist with her original art, songs, raps, and spoken word. Her style and words are influenced by hip hop, honesty, ancestry, spirituality, boldness, and raw heart. This May she will release her first acoustic-soul-hop album and will also star as a leading actress in "Sal Capone: The Lamentable Tragedy Of" a hip hop theatre through Vancouver's "Urban Ink Productions". Kim also loves coffee, mangoes, and laughing at her own jokes. Follow her at kimmortal.com or on facebook at: facebook.com/kimpossiblemusic

RAVEN SALANDER Raven Salander currently resides in Vancouver BC. She is a yoga instructor and writer, which does not mean she can write “standing on her head.” While she loves writing it is hard work and she is honoured to be considered worthy of the moniker. and our feature reader ALESSANDRA NACCARATO Alessandra Naccarato is a Vancouver-based writer and artist educator with a background in community organizing and zine publishing. Currently completing an MFA in Creative Writing at the University of British Columbia, she is a three-time Canadian national slam finalist who has toured nationally and internationally as a spoken word artist and facilitated hundreds of creative writing workshops across the country. Her forth-coming album of spoken word and music, Hunger & Lightning, will be released in summer 2014.

This will be our last event under the name "LITANY" - come out to the event to hear more about our process for choosing a new name or stay tuned online. And start brewing up any name ideas for us! For more information on why we're changing our name, scroll down. This show is All Ages. Box office and Will Call will open with doors at 7:30 PM. Box office is CASH ONLY. There is an ATM located directly across the street. Buy an advance ticket if you can, as space is limited! This time only, as part of this collaboration, tickets will be $5. No one will be turned away for lack of funds at the door; tickets bought ahead of time are set at $5 (email us if you need to work something out!). Our readers will have seriously awesome stuff for sale at our merch table so bring any extra bucks you have and support our readers! We'll also have some sweet giveaways as usual, so just come to win stuff if you want. This LITANY Queer Reading Series Event is part of the Verses Festival of Words. Tickets and Festival Passes are available here: http://versesfestival.ca/wp/event/litany-queer-reading-series/ Event poster by our amazing artist-in-residence, Tiaré Jung. Check out Tiaré's work here: http://teeahray.tumblr.com/

Accessibility info & all info on the venue on our Accessibility page.

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It's time to change our name!

It's time to change our name! Our upcoming event in April 2014, as part of the Verses Festival of Words, will be the last event under the name LITANY Queer Reading Series. We've received generous feedback in the last couple months about how by using the name "Litany," we've participated in the all-too-common trend, especially in this city, of non-Black queers co-opting the work and words of prominent Black queers (such as Audre Lorde, whose poem "A Litany for Survival" we wrongfully drew on for the name of the series). We apologize for the negative effects and harm caused by the name of our series and our actions, and would like to thank everyone who's engaged in conversation around this with us. We'll be announcing more information on this change at our next event in April, and online in the next few months. There will be opportunities to weigh in and give feedback, as we hope always to keep this conversation open. In the meantime, email your suggestions to us! Write to us at [email protected] with any ideas for names or feedback on this process. And stay tuned for an update to our contact info that will reflect the name change, too! Thanks, friends. Keep in touch.

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It's our second time around the sun! Come celebrate with us as we move into our second year of queer readings! Welcome to 2014 - and to the Winter 2014 LITANY reading, on Thursday, January 23rd at Gallery Gachet (88 E. Cordova St.) on unceded Musqueam, Sḵwxwú7mesh, and Tsleil-Waututh land. Featuring: NAI LOUZA Nai originally hails from Amman, Jordan and came to Vancouver five years ago to pursue her degree in Psychology. She was introduced to the medium of Spoken Word earlier this year and has been eagerly exploring ever since. Nai was mentored by Kimmortal this summer during ArtQuake 2013's Spoken Word Mentorship Program and later had a chance to perform with a wonderful group of local artists. She is currently a research assistant at UBC navigating the psychological complexities of Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock. ALIZA BOSA Aliza Bosa is a queer Filipino-Italian youth from Fort Langley, who is obsessed with rainbows. She spends way too much time in Vancouver doing cool and exciting things she is passionate about. She loves art, music and you're see her lurking in spaces that encourage anti-oppression and love. When you do see her, make sure to give her a hug, unless you don't want a hug, which is totally okay too. LILY SHINDE Bio coming soon! ADAM DOUBA Adam Douba is completing his MFA in Creative Writing at the University of British Columbia. His short fiction has been shortlisted for the Glimmer Train Very Short Fiction and New Writers Awards, and his stage play, Mahjub, was featured in the 24th Annual Brave New Play Rites Festival. Douba grew up in the United Arab Emirates, but is now living in Vancouver, BC, with his husband, Kevin James. He is currently hard at work on a novel as well as a feature-length screenplay. ANUSHKA IN-REPAIR Bio coming soon! and our feature performer SARAH LEAVITT Sarah’s first book, Tangles: A Story About Alzheimer’s, My Mother, and Me, a graphic memoir, was published in Canada, the US, UK, and Germany to international critical acclaim (LA Times, Vanity Fair, Globe and Mail, The Guardian). She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from UBC, but is largely self-taught as an artist and cartoonist. Thanks to the Canada Council, Sarah is about to start a six-month leave from her day job to work on her next book. Doors at 7 PM; show at 7:30 PM sharp. We're asking for a dollar at the door, but no one will be turned away for lack of funds. There will be some seriously great stuff to buy at our merch table, so bring your bucks if you can! Event poster by our amazing artist-in-residence, Tiaré Jung. Check out more of Tiaré's work here: http://teeahray.tumblr.com/ This event is partially funded by SFPIRG. NOTE: We've spent our first year of existence thinking and talking a lot about what it means for this event to use Audre Lorde's words as inspiration for our name, as we know that her work has been and is frequently co-opted by non-Black and especially white queer communities. We also want to recognize that anti-Black racism functions in a very particular way in this city, and that Black figures, work, and words are disproportionately used as radical symbols for events and spaces here all the time. We're in the process of working out what that means for this event for the future and are hoping to use these next few months as time to deepen these conversations and go further with this work. Thank you to all who have already talked with us about this! Know that we'll be making time for more conversations with more folks as best we can. Hopefully we'll have a little more to offer on the night of the event itself so look for more from us on this soon! ACCESSIBILITY INFO: ASL Interpretation Provided. For Gallery Gachet: front door: 5 feet width front door step: 6 inch height (but we have a ramp) ramp: 31 inch width washroom door: 33 inch width toilet: 10 inch clearance on left side 14" inch clearance in front to sink There is an all genders washroom. Gallery Gachet is an art gallery and as such may have some chemicals present that some maybe be sensitive to including paints, pottery glazes, or other art supplies. In order to create a space where folks with multiple chemical sensitivities can participate, please refrain from wearing perfumes, colognes or other scented products (including essential oils) and smoke far away from the entrance to the space. We do clear out the space with an air purifier prior to the event. For info on how to support folks with multiple chemical sensitivities, visit: http://www.peggymunson.com/mcs/fragrancefree.html For a full accessibility audit of Gallery Gachet, visit: http://radicalaccessiblecommunities.wordpress.com/2013/05/26/this-audit-of-gallery-gachet-was-performed-on/ We provide snacks for each event, including gluten-free and vegan options, and do not sell alcohol at the event. If you're attending and will need particularly comfortable seating, please let us know! We have a few comfy and large office chairs that we're stoked to save for folks who need that kind of seating, so if that's you, please message or email us with your name so that we can be sure you'll be comfortable throughout the event (and please also show up early to make sure you get in the door!). If you would be made more comfortable by the addition of a cushion, please bring one with you -- and if you don't have one you can bring, let us know and we'll do our best to rustle up something for you.

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Collaboration!

We're so excited to announce that we're teaming up with Tiaré Jung for a year of beautiful LITANY posters all through 2014! Tee-ah-ray (Tiaré Jung) is a visual storyteller, community organizer, queerdo. Studying illustration and design at Capilano was a marathon of hands-on and digital image making. Tiaré emerged with a wider repertoire of mediums, skills, and a process for moving ideas into a eye-catching messages. Ink-drawing, paper-cutting, silk-screening, and poster-making is their cup of tea. Check out their work here: http://tiarejung.daportfolio.com/

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You're invited to our upcoming reading on Friday, November 15th at Gallery Gachet (88 E. Cordova St.) on unceded Musqueam, Sḵwxwú7mesh, and Tsleil-Waututh land. Featuring:

ALIZE ZORLUTUNA

Alize Zorlutuna is a Vancouver-based artist and writer who works with a diverse range of mediums. Incorporating found objects, textiles, performance, video,  poetry and audio, her work draws upon her experience as an individual living between two cultures. Negotiating multiple perspectives simultaneously, this embodied liminality informs her creative practice; manifesting in explorations of interstices. The desire to activate interstices where differing perspectives, emotions, and physical entities meet, and the meanings created in those meetings rests at the heart of her work.

SUZANNE KILROY

bio to come, but for now know that Suzanne is awesome.

NADINE BOULAY

Nadine is a bookish lesbian feminist, who came to Vancouver from the prairies last year for graduate school. She is a shy butch who loves queer forms of storytelling, and refuses to choose between writing poems and writing academic essays.

ANOUSHKA RATNARAJAH

Anoushka is a queer bi-racial femme, and a writer, performer and organizer.  She is a founding member of vancouver based theatre troupe, Collective Hallucination, who are continuing work on “Capital, Alice!” an anti-capitalist, Alice in Wonderland musical. She is also one half of the duo film-performance and community building project, Toasted Marshmallows, which explores what it means to be a mixed race woman in north america today.

KAREN WARD

Karen Ward is a local oddity in the Downtown Eastside. She believes that things don’t have to be this way, and that trying to change things is really important and possible. How queer is that?

and our feature performer...

LARISSA LAI

Larissa Lai is the author of two novels, When Fox Is a Thousand and Salt Fish Girl; and two books of poetry, sybil unrest (with Rita Wong) and Automaton Biographies. A recipient of the Astraea Foundation Emerging Writers' Award, she has been shortlisted for the Books in Canada First Novel Award, the Tiptree Award and the Dorothy Livesay Prize. She is an Assistant Professor in English at the University of British Columbia.

Doors at 7 PM; show at 7:30 PM sharp. We're asking for a dollar at the door, but no one will be turned away for lack of funds. All proceeds go directly to Gallery Gachet. We'll have some great giveaways from PRISM International, AORTA, and Sad Mag! Event poster by Tiaré Jung. Check out more of Tiaré's work!

This event is partially funded by donations from Dr. Peter Dickinson, on behalf of the Performance Studies Research Group, Simon Fraser University; and the Jane Rule Endowment for the Study of Human Relationships.

Hope to see you there!

[reverbqueerreadingseries]

upcoming LITANY and summer news!

Thank you all for waiting so patiently as we've sorted out our upcoming schedule for LITANY Queer Reading Series! We're so excited to continue hosting radical, accessible, magical readings--and that means we need to take a little more time with the next LITANY. Due to Esther & Leah being in and out of town all summer, we won't be holding a July event. We really like the idea of LITANY being a quarterly reading series, though, so we've shifted our dates around slightly to make sure that we can still bring it four times a year. The next event will be--fingers crossed--held in early October, which will give us more time to take a bit of a rest this summer and get all our proverbial ducks into their bow-tied and nail-polished rows for optimal fabulousness. After that, we're planning on bringing you one more LITANY before this year is up: look for us again in December, and then into the next year! Thanks as always for supporting this project! If you have any complimentary or constructive feedback, don't hesitate to get it touch. If you think you might want to read at LITANY in the future, have suggestions or thoughts on our events accessibility or mandate, or want to offer us dreamy funding avenues, please email us! Talk to you at litanyreadingseries[at]gmail.com. To see more info about LITANY and our past events, keep an eye on us here on Tumblr, and follow us on Twitter @LitanyQueers! May the next few months bring you the queerest of summer stories and some sweet, sweet poetry. Leah and Esther