The Brooklyn Historical Society is hosting a poetry reading in the stunning
Othmer Library on Friday, April 1 at 7:00 p.m.
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Girl:
An evening of poetry with E.J. Antonio, Rachel Eliza Griffiths, Robin Coste Lewis, Kamilah Aisha Moon and Aracelis Girmay
In celebration of National Poetry Month, BHS partners with A.I.R. Gallery and Cave Canem to present an evening of poetry in the Othmer Library, one of the most elegant rooms in all of Brooklyn and a wonderfully intimate space for a poetry reading. The collaboration marks the beginning of an ongoing series of poetry readings in the library. This evening of poetry was curated by JoAnne McFarland, on the occasion of her exhibition Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Black Girl at the A.I.R. Gallery, March 30-April 23, 111 Front Street in Dumbo.
Brooklyn Historical Society connects the past to the present and makes the vibrant history of Brooklyn tangible, relevant, and meaningful for today's diverse communities, and for generations to come. Founded in 1863, BHS functions as a library, museum and urban education center dedicated to the people of Brooklyn, providing opportunities for civic dialogue and thoughtful engagement. Cave Canem is a home for the many voices of African American poetry and is committed to cultivating the artistic and professional growth of African American poets. A.I.R. (Artists in Residence) Gallery was founded in 1972 as the first artist run gallery for women in the United States. A.I.R. provides a professional and permanent exhibition space for women artists to present work of quality and diversity.
About the Poets
E.J. Antonio
E.J. Antonio is a 2009 fellow in Poetry from the New York Foundation for the Arts and a recipient of fellowships from the Hurston/Wright Foundation and the Cave Canem Foundation. Her work has been published in various journals and magazines, most recently, Black Renaissance/Renaissance Noire, The Mom Egg, Torch and the Encyclopedia Project. Her first chapbook, Every Child Knows, was published in the Fall of 2007 by the Premier Poets Chapbook Series, and she is one of the featured poets on the CD, Beauty Keeps Laying It’s Sharp Knife Against Me: Brant Lyon and Friends. She recently released her debut album Rituals in the marrow: Recipe for a jam session.
Rachel Eliza Griffiths
Rachel Eliza Griffiths is a poet, painter, and photographer. Her visual and literary work has been widely published. A Cave Canem Fellow and recipient of numerous fellowships, she is the author of Miracle Arrhythmia (Willow Books), and The Requited Distance (The Sheep Meadow Press). Currently, Griffiths teaches at Sarah Lawrence College and lives in Brooklyn.
Aracelis Girmay
Aracelis Girmay is the author of the collage-based picture book, Changing, Changing, and the poetry collection, Teeth, for which she was awarded the GLCA New Writers Award. Her new book of poems, Kingdom Animalia, has won the Isabella Gardner Poetry Award and will be published by BOA Editions in the fall, 2011. She has taught writing workshops to young people for ten years, and teaches poetry in the school for Interdisciplinary Arts at Hampshire College and in Drew University's MFA program.
Robin Coste Lewis
Robin Coste Lewis's writing has appeared in The Massachusetts Review, The Harvard Gay and Lesbian Review, Callaloo, GCN, The Pocket Myth Series, and anthologized in Black Silk and The Encyclopedia Project, F-K. She was a finalist for the National Rita Dove Prize in 2004, and the 2010 War Poetry Prize. A graduate of Harvard's Divinity School, where she received a Master's of Theological Studies degree in Sanskrit and comparative religious literature, Lewis was the Samuel Valentine Cole Professor of Creative Writing at Wheaton College and Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Hampshire College. She has been awarded residencies and fellowships by the Caldera Foundation, the Ragdale Foundation, the Headlands Center for the Arts, the Can Serrat International Art Centre in Barcelona, and the Summer Literary Seminars in Kenya.
Kamilah Aisha Moon
A recipient of fellowships to Cave Canem, the Prague Summer Writing Institute, the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA, and The Vermont Studio Center, Kamilah Aisha Moon's work has been featured or is forthcoming in several journals and anthologies, including The Harvard Review, jubilat, Sou'wester, The Oxford American, Lumina, Callaloo, and Bloom. A featured poet in conferences and venues around the country, Moon received her MFA in Creative Writing from
Sarah Lawrence College.
The Brooklyn Historical Society
128 Pierrepont Street at Clinton Street
Brooklyn, New York 11201
