Oops, he did it again

My good friend Anthony became my good friend Anthony because we separately wandered into Taft Street in Houston around the same time several years ago and as serendipity would have it, the two of us, along with Mark Bertrand and then Karen Miedrich-Luo, ended up establishing a writer's workshop that lead to many wonderful happenings, both personally and collectively. The group, housed in what was then Strange Land Bookstore, was largely instigated by Anthony's desire to foster a nurturing community for writers. We had a good run and were joined by many great folks along the way before the four of us, in less than a year's time, were blown like dandelions to various points northward. Anthony's roots lighted down in Columbia, Missouri and it wasn't long before he was back to his old tricks, pulling creative people of all stripes together to form "Hearing Voices," a weekly arts salon which ran last night. Tuesday nights at Orr Street alternate between readings from local poets, playwrights, memoirists, novelists, etc. and films on art, artists or creativity in general.

This is Anthony's description of last night's offering:
"It was an extraordinary night of Cheese-Its; Green Tea Iced Tea beyond its expiration date and phenomenal lyrical expressions of love, physics, finding one’s soul mate and, well, rock, scissors, paper at last night’s Hearing Voices. Thanks to all of you for showing up, despite the rain. Special draws were held for free books including David Lynch’s Capturing The Big Fish and Mark Doty’s Source. We also held a special Shirley Jackson lottery and we are afraid to report Fred is no longer with us, but at least we’ll have a feisty crop this year. Readers Allison Smythe and yours truly lightened the benighted CoMo ever so briefly…"

He's the new kid in town but already he's bringing Columbia's visual artist and writing communities together in some wonderful alchemy at Orr Street, the newest art space in town (which also has a strong resemblance to Taft Street). Shown here is Anthony reading his essay, "Radio at Night" in the common area between halls of artists' studios and what the space looked like last week during Columbia's newly reestablished gallery crawl.

Notice the detail of the oversized door. Each studio has a unique door, sculptures created by the fabulously talented Chris Teeter.