Whether you are looking to conduct a workshop or attend one, our mission is to help you combine a unique cultural immersion experience with a serious pursuit of your passion.
Please scroll down to the month and year that interests you. To sign up, go to royceclayslape@gmail.com
August 6 - 15, 2007 - The Song Within
A native Chicagoan, flutist/singer/songwriter Suki Rae has been playing music since the age of five. A classically trained flutist, she has an MA in Music/Film and has been performing internationally for the last 20 years. Awards include: only American finalist in the Hoeillart Jazz Festival in Belgium; Honorary Award in Great American Song Festival; Runner up Song of the Year Award, Viewer's Choice Award at Kweevak.com; ASCAP Awards since 1994; American Song Festival; Nashville Song Festival and nominations for the Just Plain Folks Awards and the NAR Best Song Awards.
Performances include: Universal Jazz Coalition's Women in Jazz Festival; MUNY's Texaco Bell Atlantic Jazz Festival; Michigan Womens' Music Festival; Jerusalem Womens' Music Festival; St. Peter's Church; Makor; etc.
She has been a musician in residence at Cornell University; at the Arad Arts Project in Arad, Israel; at the Wurlitzer Foundation in Taos, New Mexico; at the Hilai Arts Colony in Israel; and at the Fundacion Valparaiso in Mojacar,Spain, and Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado.
She has written songs in many different genres and recently had one of her children's songs published in "The Music Box and Other Delights." She has also acted,directed, and written for Theatre and Film and appeared on Radio and TV.
Her five recordings, all self-produced on Reverence for Life Records are all of original songs except Cantique de Noel(Christmas songs). Her recordings include: Water and Fire; Pipedreams; Cantique de Noel; I Think of You and My Bamboo Hat.
August 20 - 29, 2007 - Travel Writing
In this class each student will begin the workshop having been assigned one article/story prior to arrival, and should expect that by the end of the workshop they will have at least two articles or stories ready to submit for publication, firsthand information and a true sense of how to find a market, and an insider's take with an extensive amount of knowledge on how to make their trips tax deductible and travel for less or even free as a travel writer.
Sheila Cole holds a BA from SUNY Empire State College, NYC and and MFA from Goddard College, VT. In addition to traveling around the world with her writing (having visited or lived in some 80 countries), she is a member of the Overseas Press Club, University Women's Org, NY as well as Storytellers of New Mexico. Her work has appeared in the travel sections of numerous prominent periodicals, including the New York Times, Newsday, New York Daily News, Harpers Bazaar, New York Post, Milwaukee Journal, New York Magazine, Chocolatier, Milwaukie Magazine, Private Clubs, Ladies Home Journal and Glamour. As both a novelist and travel writer she has been the recipient of numerous prestigious awards and fellowships.
November 19 - 28, 2007 - Speaking the Body, Dancing the Mind
We humans, as a species, used to participate fluently in what eco-theologian Thomas Berry refers to as “the great conversation” – the dialogue that is taking place at all times among the elements of the natural world. We listened, and understood the languages of plant, tree, rock, river, bird, animal, soil. The connection kept us in a healthy relationship within the delicate balance of nature. At some point in the course of history we stopped listening, began overvaluing the human, talking only amongst ourselves, mistakenly believing earth’s other systems existed to be subservient to our wants and needs, without rights of their own.
Just as we have disassociated from our connection with our environment, we have become estranged from our own bodies. Religious and philosophical traditions have denigrated the body and led us away from listening to and awakening innate powers and capabilities of body awareness and wisdom. This ignorance has led to ecological, social, psychological and spiritual devastation. The human body is an instrument of perception, an antenna picking up the energies and intelligence of the universe. We must reclaim the body as one of our most valuable resource for attunement to earth and spirit.
This workshop will begin to reacquaint participants with wisdom indigenous peoples have carried for ages which is our birthright as humans; allow us to listen to the body through movement exploration; to grapple with and shape images through drawing; and find the words to give voice to our inner story through dialogue. Join us as we make space for deep conversation, dreamwork, ritual and stories as we dance our reawakening to the knowledge and wisdom that we carry within the sinews of our muscles and bones.
In the pristine and variegated landscape of Costa Rica we will not only visit places that have as yet been largely unspoiled by man but will also connect with the indigenous people who continue to live in connection to their land and spirit. As we journey into the depths of the jungle we will symbolically journey into the depths of our own beings to bring forth the knowledge that has lain dormant.
Tayria Ward and Donna Sternberg will be our workshop facilitators.
Tayria Ward has a Ph.D. in depth psychology, is a dreamworker, dialogue trainer, and works with oracular methods of communication.
Formerly a minister, and then a professor for several years, her new book, Recovering the Indigenous Mind, is being readied for publication.
She moved to North Carolina from Los Angeles in 2004 to start a retreat center in the mountains, in a location of wilderness and beauty conducive to the deep work of recovering indigenous sensibilities.
In addition to retreats at her own center, Tayria is available for classes and lectures upon request. She is an accomplished and engaging public speaker, having taught in the ministry and the classroom for more than 30 years.
She also offers private counseling to individuals in need of personal support. www.tayriaward.com
Donna Sternberg graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with degrees in Dance and Psychology. After graduation she co-founded the Mixed Motion Dance Company, where she choreographed, performed and taught throughout California, Oregon and Washington states. Desiring to work with artists of other disciplines, Ms. Sternberg moved on to become Artistic Director of Dance Collaborative, where she choreographed and performed solo and collaborative concerts. In 1985 she founded Donna Sternberg & Dancers, a modern dance company, to express her vision of the communicative power of movement. The company is based in Santa Monica, California. She has danced in the companies of Donald Byrd, Mary Jane Eisenberg, Dance/LA and TNR: Moebius.
Ms. Sternberg has professionally premiered over 62 works since 1975 throughout the United States, Canada and Mexico; several have been collaborations with artists of other disciplines including composers, visual artists, poets and actors. Ms. Sternberg’s choreography has been critically acclaimed for its "exceptional ability to communicate through pure movement" (LA Times). She has choreographed three full evening works, "On Stripping Bark From Myself" in 1996, based on a poem by Alice Walker, "Rituals"(1992) to an original score by Bobby Matos and George Kahn and "Nuestras Partes NoblesTienen Los Dientes" (2000) dealing with women’s sexuality and power. Donna Sternberg has been commissioned to create works for the California Science Center, California Choreographers Dance Festival, Dance Moving Forward Festival, the Catlin Gabel School in Oregon, Valley College and the Alleluia Dance Theatre among others. She was nominated for the Dewar’s Young Choreographer’s Award, and has received support for her work and company from the California Arts Council, California Council for the Humanities, Los Angeles, Santa Monica and Culver City Cultural Affairs Departments, Los Angeles County Arts Commission, National/State/County Partnership, National Performance Network, Pacific Bell and the Amgen Foundation.
Ms. Sternberg was selected to head the dance program at the first Visual and Performing Arts Summer Institute conducted by the Santa Ana Unified School District in June 2002. In 2001, she was Artist in Residence at UC Irvine as part of the California Dance & Movement Workshop for Dance Educators. Ms. Sternberg has taught in private studios, primary and secondary schools and colleges. These include UC San Diego, Pierce College, Cal State Los Angeles, and in colleges on the West Coast (CA, OR, WA). She has taught as part of Performing Tree, an arts-in-education organization, as a movement specialist on the National Endowment for the Arts Artists-in-Schools Program and is currently part of the Santa Monica Arts Education Project. Ms. Sternberg was appointed to the Santa Monica Arts Commission in December 2001. www.dsdancers.com
December 3 - 12, 2007 - Writing From the Gut
"What is writing from the gut? It's writing from the heart -- but with a twist. When you write from the gut, you write edgy, you write comfortable, you write from what's real and what hurts and what might just bring joy.
Allison Landa will be our instructor. Born in Manhattan, raised in San Diego, Allison now lives on McGee's Farm -- a converted preschool in Berkeley, Calif. Her fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction have been featured in CleanSheets, Word Riot, Pindeldyboz, CherryBleeds, and The Furnace Review, among other venues. Allison received her MFA in fiction writing from St. Mary's College of California, and as a December 2006 resident at the Julia and David White Artists' Colony, she finished a draft of a memoir, TURNING MY FACE TOWARD THE SEA.
2008 WORKSHOPS
January 2 - 11, 2008 - Screenwriting
Together we will break down the process by which original ideas are developed into complete, fully realized screenplays, toward the goal of developing your original idea into exactly that. Viewing and analyzing carefully selected movies, with a focus on elements of plot, character, dialogue, and action, we will examine the process of building the structure for your screen story, and how to express it on a correctly formatted page. We will also look at the process of how a screenwriter goes about the daily process of writing -- and rewriting -- a script.
Perhaps most importantly, you will have the opportunity to present your own work. Bring your complete or partial script to be read aloud and critiqued by other members of the group, as well as the instructor.
Paul Zimmerman will be our instructor. He holds an MFA from the Yale School of Drama and works as a private script consultant, in addition to teaching writing workshops at both Hofstra University and the Gotham Writers Workshop in New York. He wrote the screenplay for the feature film A Modern Affair, has served as screenwriter-in-residence for Tribe Pictures, and has written screenplays for several film companies. His stage play Pigs and Bugs recently received an acclaimed production by the Echo Theater in Los Angeles and his one-person play RENO was performed at many performance spaces in New York City and nationally. Paul's work has been developed at the Eugene O'Neill National Playwrights Conference and he is a grant winner from the New York Public Theater. He is a contributer to the Gotham Writers Workshop screenwriting handbook, Writing Movies, edited by Bloomsbury Press.
February 18 - 27, 2008 - New Inspirations in Watercolor with Lorraine Bromley: Instructor's biographical information and class description coming soon.
March 17 - 26, 2008 - Seeing Through Art (Class description to be posted soon.)
Born in Arizona, Fred Bendheim has lived and worked in Brooklyn, NY since 1983. As a teen-ager, he apprenticed with the surrealist painter, Phillip Curtis. Later, Mr. Bendheim studied art with Joseph Piasentin at Pomona College and with Roland Reese at The Claremont Graduate School. He has had numerous one-person shows and his works are in collections world-wide. His commissions include two fountain sculptures for Frank Lloyd Wright buildings and paintings for some of the finest hotels in the world. As well as painting, he has made: drawings, prints, collages, sculpture, illustrations for William Blake’s The Tygre, and has written numerous articles about art for the British journal The Lancet. Although his travels have taken him throughout the world, simply working in his studio everyday has been the greatest adventure. He lives with the set designer, Sarah Edkins, and their daughter, Gemma. http://www.fredbendheim.com/
October 6-15, 2008 - Drawing/Painting for Beginners
Deborah McLaren is a graduate of the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. She studied at the Woodstock School of Art in Woodstock, New York, The Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts, in Old Lyme, Connnecticut and with James Sulkowski and Ian Roberts. Her paintings are in private collections throughout the United States.
Deborah has traveled extensively and painted in Europe, Puerto Rico, Canada, Mexico, Costa Rica and the United States. Her paintings are in private collections throughout the US. Deborah has been a member of the Connecticut Society of Plein Air Painters, is currently a member of the Lyme Academy Alumni Association and the Art Institute Alumni Association, Pittsburgh Society of Illustrators, in addition to Mystic Art Association and Lyme Art Association where she also was on the faculty, teaching beginning drawing. She has also taught at the Lyman Allyn Art Museum in New London, Connecticut and is currently on the faculty of Sweetwater Center for the Arts in Sewickley, Pennsylvania teaching beginning drawing, and also private lessons. More about Deborah and her work can be found on her web site: http://www.deborahmclaren.com/.
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