upcoming grant deadline: 05/15/2024
Featured Artist: Ondartza, Shari Tobias, Debra Powell-Wright, Genne Murphy & Beverly Dale
Produced by Erin Gautsche
Hosted by Michaela Majoun
Episode 91 of LIVE featured grant winners from the Leeway Foundation, a group that focuses on female and transgender artists in Philadelphia who work to promote social change and resist oppression. During the event, the winners described the projects funded by the Leeway grants. These works ranged from books to artistic portraits to plays. The final winner, Reverend Dr. Beverly Dale, performed one-woman shows on women's liberation from sexual opression. Genne Murphy, playwright and grant winner, was unfortunately unable to join us; however, prior to the event, she worked with two actresses – Anjoli Santiago and Leyla Eraslan – on a reading of Scenes Three and Four of her play-in-progress, "Giantess." Poetry by Shari Tobias and Debra Powell-Wright was also shared during this episode, as well as the introduction to Ondartza Polita's "Legend of Nahia."
"LIVE at the Writers House" is a long-standing collaboration of the people of the Kelly Writers House and of WXPN (88.5 FM). Six times annually between September and April, the Writers House airs a one-hour broadcast of poetry, music, and other spoken-word art, along with one musical guest -- from our Arts Cafe onto the airwaves at WXPN. "LIVE" is broadcast on WXPN. "LIVE" is made possible through the generous support of BigRoc.
For more information about the show, or if you are interested in reading or being a part of the audience, contact series producer Alli Katz (katza@writing.upenn.edu) c/o "LIVE at the Writers House," 3805 Locust Walk, Philadelphia PA 19104-6150.
"LIVE" stands in a tradition of "new writing" on radio; Cid Corman, a poet and great supporter of experimental poetry in the 1950s, created his own broadcast, "This is Poetry," over WMEX-FM (Boston).