Then there are years marked by someone like IfeMichelle Gardin, who in 2024 “exposed the questions that the answers hide” — as artists do, according to James Baldwin.
Gardin is authoring a new chapter of New Haven’s literary history in the form of Kulturally Lit, an organization that blossomed over the past year during what would have been James Baldwin’s 100th year of life.
In a warmly lit room on Chapel Street, entrepreneur and business strategist Kathleen Griffith posed a question to her audience: “What’s your outrageous ask?”
Gracy Brown, with Kay Anderson: Saturday's Lit fest was filled with "kindness and community."
Inspired by James Baldwin’s commitment to telling the truth, Jacqueline Brown raised her hand to ask a question of the two literature scholars in front of her.
“In your personal experience, how has his work taught you to find joy? How has his work incited you towards action?”
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Brian Slattery |
Oct 1, 2024 8:50 am
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Do you have a mind’s eye, the ability to not just remember, but visualize the past? Do you have an interior monologue? Rich childhood memories, full of sights, sounds, and smells? For science writer Sadie Dingfelder — speaking to an audience of about a dozen Monday night at the Edgewood Avenue bookstore Possible Futures — the answer to all these questions and a few more like it were a clear no.
And until just a few years ago, she thought the same was true for everyone else. Until a fateful trip to the grocery store led her to become the subject of a few lab studies, and to the work of New Haven-area science journalist Carl Zimmer, and on and on — heading toward the edges of neurologists’ understanding of how varied the human experience can be.
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Karen Ponzio |
Sep 20, 2024 11:16 am
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Series co-organizers Shelton, Mattison, Czepiel, and Jessen.
A room full of writers and fans of the written word gathered Thursday night at Best Video for the first installment of the Sleeping Giant Reading Series, an event aimed at creating a space where authors not only share their works, but gather in community with others to offer support, make connections, and have a little fun.
Co-organizers Alice Mattison, Sandi Shelton, Kathy Czepiel, and Heather Jessen — all New Haven-based writers — will be curating a two-hour event every third Thursday of the month. The first hour will feature professional readings by published authors. The second hour will be dedicated to shaking away that oft-felt sense of isolation many writers have by sharing a “Writer’s Happy Hour” where they can chat with each other about their work and writing in general.
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Brian Slattery |
Sep 4, 2024 9:12 am
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Sam Carlson and Aug Stone.
“When we were, like, 15, 16, me and my best friend Trig used to go record shopping. And it was weird. Our local record store had this counter with all the cassettes behind it. The goods! You had to ask to see them,” a gregarious voice announces. “Trig was always after Buttery Cake Ass’s Live in Hungaria album. Week after week we’d ask, only to week after week be disappointed. Truth be told, Trig much more so than I. I didn’t know anything about Buttery Cake Ass. But that’s the beauty of music, of any sort of artistic creation — that another’s excitement for it can infect you like this.”
Ben Shattuck tells those dozen stories in his new collection called The History of Sound. The stories span three centuries. They interconnect in pairs — sometimes in passing, through an old painting or field recording buried under floor boards, sometimes more directly in traveling back in time to reveal the full story of a mystery that has been reinterpreted and rewritten by later generations.
In the process, Shattuck is telling us one story, about our legend-laden region of New England. And about telling stories, period.
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Maya McFadden |
Aug 5, 2024 8:23 am
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Nathaniel Joyner and Damien, reading side by side at summer camp.
Nathaniel Joyner took a quick break from reading aloud to a group of middle schoolers to spin an imaginary basketball on his finger before passing it over to eight-year-old Damien — who dribbled the “ball” between his legs, and then picked up the book to resume reading with the group.
Villains abound in Steven Brill’s new call to arms to rescue truth from internet disinformation agents and “pink slime” peddlers. My favorite villain is a piece of legislation.
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Karen Ponzio |
Mar 29, 2024 9:18 am
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artidea.org
Jazz vocalist Samara Joy, an A&I headliner this year.
Shakespeare in circus, choral fusion, climate activism and optimism talks, making your own empanadas: this eclectic mix of events and more is part of this summer’s International Festival of Arts and Ideas, which is returning with a full schedule of programming that covers just about anything an arts and culture lover would have a taste for — and maybe something they have never tasted before.
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Karen Ponzio |
Mar 19, 2024 10:18 am
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Ball & Socket Arts front view.
When asked to name the cultural hubs of the Northeast, most people would not consider Cheshire, Connecticut a part of that list. A group of enthusiastic artists and supporters of the arts are hoping to change that over the next few years, as Ball & Socket Arts, a complex located on West Main Street right along the Farmington Canal Linear Path, continues its efforts to create a central location aimed at encouraging ongoing creativity and attracting New Haven County residents and beyond to its galleries, performance venue, art education center, and more.
A student gifts a book to the Little Free Library.
“Sometimes when you talk, the universe listens.”
That’s what Chris Walker, manager of the new LaundroMax on Whalley Avenue, said to me as we watched 25 kids sit still between rows of gleaming washing machines and a cacophony of dryers tumbling and buzzers going off — and prepare to hear a story read aloud at New Haven’s most innovative new branch library.
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Karen Ponzio |
Feb 21, 2024 8:48 am
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Ross Gay: "The hope is to be unmade in the process.”
Ross Gay practiced what he preaches last night at Possible Futures, as the poet, essayist, and teacher offered a grateful crowd a selection of his work encompassing joy and tenderness that brought them from rapt silence to riotous laughter and everywhere in between.
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Michael Russem |
Feb 15, 2024 9:12 am
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Howard Gralla (pictured above; one of his books, below): A rare gift to mix beauty with utility.
Book designer Michael Russem gave the following eulogy at the recent funeral of Howard Gralla, a leader in the field who lived in Westville.
Yesterday morning I was in a used bookstore in Boston and spotted a book designed by Howard that I love: Netherlandish Drawings of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries and Flemish Drawings of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries in the Pierpont Morgan Library. It’s 9 × 12 inches, over 650 pages, and it weighs more than seven pounds.
This massive book had scores of Post-it notes poking out the top. The book was clearly well-used. Those Post-its were proof that Howard had done his job.
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Lisa Reisman |
Feb 12, 2024 9:13 am
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David Daniels at author talk at Stetson Library.
The Sunday, Aug. 21, 1994, edition of the Connecticut Post pictures a young Black man in police blues holding a hangman’s noose. The man was David Daniels, a police officer. The noose was left on his patrol car.
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Karen Ponzio |
Feb 12, 2024 8:58 am
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Members of the Urban Life Experience Book Discussion group.
As the temperature outside edged close to 60 degrees on Saturday, a warm and invigorating meeting of minds and hearts came together inside the Wilson branch of the New Haven Free Public Library for 2024’s first monthly installment of the Urban Life Experience Book Discussion Series.
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Karen Ponzio |
Jan 29, 2024 9:05 am
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IfeMichelle Gardin offers gratitude.
The Bricks in Hamden was the place to be on Saturday night, as literature fans gathered to fete author and civil rights movement icon James Baldwin — and the beginning of a year’s worth of programming based on his works — helmed by IfeMichelle Gardin and her Kuturally Lit organization.
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Karen Ponzio |
Jan 19, 2024 10:52 am
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Baldwin books available at Possible Futures.
Hosts Lauren Anderson and IfeMichelle Gardin spreading that "book joy" on kick-off night.
The vibe at Possible Futures was lit Thursday night — more specifically Kulturally Lit, as the literary-focused arts organization’s 100 Years of Baldwin Book Club had its inaugural meeting exploring the works of author, playwright, thinker, and civil rights icon James Baldwin.
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Karen Ponzio |
Nov 13, 2023 9:02 am
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Making zines at The New Haven Zine Club.
Tiny Ghosts Haunting Small Things, The Band Plays in Front of a Big Audience, and Cars Go Too Fast (and our road design encourages it) are not titles you might find on the bestseller list or at your local news stand. But you can find them in the zine library making its way through the city as part of the New Haven Zine Scene, a group of creatives that meet up once a month to make, read, and talk about zines and share everything and anything zine related. This past Saturday, the group met for the first time at Possible Futures on Edgewood Avenue, where it will continue to trade off monthly meeting dates with Witch Bitch Black Box on Whitney.
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Brian Slattery |
Oct 26, 2023 2:59 pm
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Patrick Scalisi and Valerie Ruby-Omen.
New Haven and Connecticut overall have a vibrant history, from the indigenous cultures that flourished here, to the religious zealots that founded the New Haven Colony, to the creation of the modern city as we know it in the 20th century. Weaving in and out of that is a folklore that includes sea serpents in the Long Island Sound, monsters in the woods in Winsted, Hamden, and elsewhere, and dragons in Fair Haven. All these and more are chronicled in Connecticut Cryptids: A Field Guide to the Weird and Wonderful Creatures of the Nutmeg State, written by Patrick Scalisi and illustrated by Valerie Ruby-Omen. The duo celebrated the book’s release with a party at Strange Ways this weekend, in which partygoers were invited to dress as their favorite fanciful creatures.
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Sheila Carmon |
Oct 5, 2023 10:00 pm
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At the Sept. 29 New Haven Museum meetup, with author Michelle Hord.
The following photos were submitted by Links member Sheila Carmon about a Sept. 29 book signing and meet and greet with Daytime Emmy Award winner, author, and media executive Michelle Hord. The event was organized by the New Haven chapter of The Links, Incorporated.
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Allan Appel |
Sep 26, 2023 12:17 pm
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Author Winsome Bingham, at Possible Futures-hosted reading.
Over the course of just three days, the following all unfolded on the modest corner of Hotchkiss Street and Edgewood Avenue: A regular monthly meeting of a major local nonprofit; a happy hour for exhausted educators; three authors’ readings, and a two-hour-long neighbors’ knitting circle smack dab among the displays, plants, comfy couches, and shelf after shelf of shiny, new, colorful volumes.
