Community Healing Through Poetry

By Bernice Willis. Let’s talk, not text, your voice is what I want to hear
It closes in the distance, as if you-are-near.
Call Me
Your voice is pleasing, gives me the same joy as to when
I heard it the first time. A text can’t recapture that moment, now or then…. Read More

Creating Gourd-geous Art

By Robyn Crosa and Christina Marko. An NEA/Pinellas Recovers grant update. Visual artist Robyn Crosa has a solo exhibition, Gourdgeous Goddess Gals, on display at the Largo Public Library. Robyn first became enchanted by gourds when she was in a small town country store in Georgia. “When I looked at the basket of gourds, it looked like my mother and my sisters and I sitting together… Read More

Community Healing Through Artistic Transformation

By Fanni Green. University of South Florida Theatre professor, actor, director and writer Fanni Green talks with USF English professor, author, spoken word and visual artist Dr. Gary Lemons about his focus this month as our guest editor – Community Healing through Artistic Transformation. As Gary explains, “We must change people’s lives to believe we all have the right to be creative.” Listen here… Read More

Community Healing Through Visual Art

By Dwaine Watts. An art community is a place where people of all ethnicity, gender, ideology can express their artistic talents freely without repercussions. It is a place that provides a platform for freedom of expression in any art form. It inspires and nurtures the growth of one’s talents. I began drawing in my early years growing up because I wanted to. I never thought of it as my true calling in life. … Read More

Healing Through Performance

By Andrea Assaf. At Water’s Edge / Al filo del agua is a bilingual, interactive, theatre and dance performance, with storytelling and live music, created by three women from different generations and different geographic locations—one in the United States, the other in Mexico, and the third at the edge of the two. Stories, legends and acts of resistance intertwine as their lives intersect…. Read More

The Crystal Clear Pond

By Pamela Joy Trow. I was awarded an NEA grant from Creative Pinellas for a project encompassing my poem, Scanned Electron Microscope images and a message about the unseen world of water pollution. With the focus on engaging both children and adults in Pinellas County, the project vehicle is a coloring book to educate and provide solutions to achieving clean water…. Read More

Art Therapy in Tarpon Springs

By Robin Saenger. Peace4Tarpon is a community initiative that began in 2010 making Tarpon Springs the first trauma-informed community in the nation. One healing method we wholly embrace is Art Therapy and several of our community partners offer this healing opportunity in their practices…. Read More

Poetry by Troy Legette

By Troy Legette. Proud of you; Yes! Proud of you; I am
For you come from a culture so rich
Proud of you; Yes! Proud of you; I am
For your powers are phenomenal
Every poem that I write has a purpose. I think my very first poem evolved after reading a newspaper while enduring tough times and came across a poetry contest. I entered it…. Read More

Directing Amiri Baraka Today

By Jake-ann Jones. Erica Sutherlin, who is making herstory as the first Black woman director at American Stage, has brought together a panel to discuss Amiri Baraka, the man behind the upcoming play Dutchman. The evening’s presentation, “Through the Lens: Amiri Baraka, the man behind the words,” is the first in a three-evening series of talks in the free “Beneath the Surface” conversations on the play. The next discussion, “The Forbidden Fruit: exploring the themes in Dutchman” will be held Tuesday, June 14 at … Read More

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