Arts In

St. Petersburg Poet Laureate Helen Pruitt Wallace reads her narrative poem "Pink Streets" and shares her memories of this offbeat neighborhood.

St. Petersburg Poet Laureate Helen Pruitt Wallace talks with Barbara St. Clair about growing up in St. Pete’s “Pink Streets” neighborhood and shares poems inspired by her rollicking childhood, the joys and grief of family, and her mother’s struggle with Alzheimer’s.

With laughter and enthusiasm, she talks about her passion for the sounds of poems, the spark of playing with formal structure and how she’s not afraid to confront politics through poetry.

You can explore Helen Pruitt Wallace’s writing at http://helenwallacepoetry.com/ and follow her on Twitter at @HelenPWallace.

Helen hosts the Dalí Poetry Series - free and open to the public - typically the second Thursday of the month from September through May at The Dalí Museum. Details here.

Tenea Johnson is a writer of speculative fiction, a poet and musician. In this conversation with Barbara St. Clair she talks about her imaginative stories and novels, and how her childhood in Kentucky shaped her views of life.

Tenea shares enticing details from her stories, and how she’s built a sustainable full-time career as a writer. She’s currently bringing printed words to life in multimedia creations. The Knitting Factory, Dixon Place, The Public Theater and others have opened their doors to this new form.

Her work has appeared in Mothership: Tales of Afrofuturism, African Voices, Arise, Humanities in the South, Infinite Matrix, Contemporary American Women Poets, Shades of Blue and Gray, Whispers in the Night: Dark Dreams III and Necrologue, among others. She is the author of a poetry/short prose collection, Starting Friction as well as the novels, Smoketown, R/evolution and Evolution.

Find out more about Tenea Johnson’s work at http://www.teneadjohnson.com

Links to printed and recorded work:

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1204168.Tenea_D_Johnson

http://www.teneadjohnson.com/compositions/

Suzanne Pomerantzeff - or Ms. P, as she’s known to generations of dancers in St. Pete - shares her love of dance with movers of every ability.

For 50 years, dancers of all ages have learned and flourished with Ms. P, sparked by her passion for all of the arts. Many who’ve studied with her at the Academy of Ballet or the Pinellas County Center for the Arts at Gibbs High School have gone on to acclaimed professional careers.

An award-winning teacher and choreographer, Suzanne shares how her own performance career was cut short by injury, which let her find a path to teaching. She tells us how the Academy of Ballet Arts grew from one rented room to their current home, covered in murals - and explains how vital St. Pete’s own “Fame” high school is, as Pinellas County’s arts magnet.

Ms. P talks about how much the classic discipline of ballet and the idea of a ‘perfect body’ has changed and grown. She shares the Academy’s newest success, an adaptive ballet program open to dancers of differing abilities. A seasoned educator, she explains how as a teacher, she never stops learning.

You can hear the joy and passion in her voice, on this inspiring conversation with Barbara St. Clair.

Find out more about the Academy of Ballet at https://www.academyofballetarts.org/.

The Pinellas County Center for the Arts at Gibbs High School serves public school students throughout Pinellas County - https://www.pcsb.org/pcca-gibbs.

- Arts In is produced by Sheila Cowley. Executive Producer, Barbara St. Clair.

As Florida CraftArt gets ready to host artists from around the country at their annual CraftArt Festival, Executive Director Katie Deits guides Barbara St. Clair through the varied landscape of Fine Craft.

Katie shares her favorite experiences at Florida CraftArt - from exhibits inspired by the use of light and poets writing about work inspired by animals, to visiting Tibetan Monks creating, and erasing, a mandala.

Katie talks about her own artistic journey from aerial photographer to curator, and explains the history of downtown St. Pete's vibrant Fine Craft center - a place where everyone is welcome to wander in and look at art.

Find out more about Florida CraftArt at floridacraftart.org.

Saumitra Chandratreya is an adventurous visual artist whose work is political, but beautiful - and often created from unexpected materials.

In this conversation with Barbara St. Clair, he talks about identity, immigration and the inspiration he takes from objects other people overlook or throw away.

As he explains, “If I don’t make challenging work, then I’m letting down anyone who is of brown skin and queer, who might be interested in making their voice heard, but don’t have the tools - because I have the tools.”

Saumitra Chandratreya’s work was chosen this month for the 2019 Visions of Health Equity project sponsored by the Foundation for a Healthy St. Petersburg. His work will be featured at the Chad Mize Gallery in November.

Link to the Foundation For Healthy St. Pete announcement:

https://myemail.constantcontact.com/News--Events-and-Resources.html?soid=1120560768999&aid=BfoxUOerk8I

Link to Mize gallery website:

http://chadmize.com/exhibits.html

Find out more about Saumitra Chandratreya’s work at https://www.saumitrac.com

Instagram:

saumiisawyou

Facebook:

Saumitra Chandratreya

Arts In: Don Gialanella

Don Gialanella can make a cow out of children’s toys, that’s the size of a cow. He made the giant twirly moustache in front of The Dalí Museum.

Don creates huge and beautiful sculptures that have personality and humor. From a life-sized metal man tenderly opening his chest to reveal his glowing heart, to a diver arcing exuberantly into a dumpster full of plastic bottles, to remind us to recycle.

In this conversation with Barbara St. Clair, Don Gialanella shares wild and wonderful stories of working with sculptor Louise Bourgeois, new projects involving sound and how he keeps up with more commissions than ever despite Parkinson’s disease. Don explains how he wound up on the cutting-edge of digital design for television and shares his enthusiastic passion for public art.

Explore Don Gialanella’s work at donsculpture.com

Arts In is produced by Sheila Cowley. Executive Producer, Barbara St. Clair.

Award-winning filmmaker and screenwriter Victoria Johnson creates both narrative and documentary films. In this conversation with Barbara St. Clair, she tells us surprising and humorous tales of learning the craft of analog filmmaking in the adventurous artistic atmosphere of the University of South Florida in the late 1970s.

She explains how her skills evolved through video and digital, and her focus on creating films that change her audience’s views about a subject.

Victoria shares the challenges of suddenly needing to run her family business, and how she brought video to her marketing firm - and surprisingly got hired by the 2012 Republican National Convention, something she still chuckles about. She won the Telly Award for Welcome to Tampa.

Victoria shares her passion for screenwriting, an art she came to after establishing a career as a filmmaker. She reflects on the thriving world of streaming video, and how to find an audience in a world where everyone can make a film on their cell phone.

Victoria’s currently exploring political performance art. You can read about her recent project here - https://www.cltampa.com/arts-entertainment/visual-art/article/21080912/tampa-bay-artist-puts-toy-babies-in-cages-to-protest-trumps-migrant-detention-centers.

And here - https://www.wtsp.com/mobile/article/news/local/ice-ice-baby-local-artist-takes-aim-at-immigration-crisis/67-6bdae07b-a0e9-48dc-a4ed-e8220edaf090.

You can find out more about Victoria Jorgenson’s work at http://amovieproductions.com/.

Bahia Ramos recently spoke at the Art of Marketing and Branding Summit hosted by Creative Pinellas.

She serves as Director of Arts at New York City’s Wallace Foundation, and leads the team responsible for the foundation’s work funding research by arts organizations around the country, as they explore a larger question that affects the entire arts community.

Bahia explains the five-year relationship she has with grantees, as they help create a body of knowledge that can be shared to help arts organizations nationwide.

She shares her thoughts on the crucial business of philanthropy, on growing new audiences and how to change your art as the world around you changes.

Find out more about the Wallace Foundation at https://www.wallacefoundation.org/pages/default.aspx.

Explore their five-year project, Building Audiences for Sustainability -

https://www.wallacefoundation.org/knowledge-center/building-audiences-for-the-arts/pages/default.aspx

 

Their research is available for anyone to read. Here’s a selection from many pages of documents you can download.

 

Audience Building and Financial Health for Nonprofit Performing Arts

https://www.wallacefoundation.org/knowledge-center/pages/audience-building-and-financial-health-nonprofit-performing-arts.aspx

 

Ballet Austin: Building Audiences for Unfamiliar Works

https://www.wallacefoundation.org/knowledge-center/pages/ballet-austin-building-audiences-for-unfamiliar-works--discussion-guide.aspx

 

Change in Audiences in American Theaters

https://www.wallacefoundation.org/knowledge-center/pages/change-in-audiences-american-theaters.aspx

 

Arts for All: Connecting New Audiences

https://www.wallacefoundation.org/knowledge-center/pages/arts-for-all-connecting-new-audiences.aspx

 

Studies in Building Arts Audiences and Building Deeper Relationships

https://www.wallacefoundation.org/knowledge-center/pages/wallace-studies-in-building-arts-audiences-building-deeper-relationships.aspx

Mark Feinman is the drummer for the eclectic jazz trio, La Lucha - and an inventive composer.

Mark tells La Lucha’s origin story of how he and pianist John O’Leary and bassist Alejandro Arenas began their long-term collaboration. And he shares his own journey in jazz, with stops at St Pete’s Pinellas County Center for the Arts at Gibbs High School and the University of South Florida’s cutting-edge School of Music.

He talks with Barbara St. Clair about constantly listening and creating music, and even shares a sneak peek at a future song, recorded on his phone during a dog walk.

Find out more about La Lucha’s music and performance schedule at https://www.laluchamusic.com/.

You can read about Mark Feinman’s work during his tenure as a Creative Pinellas Emerging Artist Fellow at https://creativepinellas.org/mark-feinman/.