Registration now open for 4-week online class: Moving Through Change and Loss with a Creative Notebook Practice

I’m teaching a 4-week online class where I share techniques, materials, and inspiration for developing your own creative notebook practice, using mixed media visual art and expressive writing.

The focus of the class will be on processing emotions related to change and loss.

In this 4-session, online engagement class, you will be guided and inspired to develop your own creative notebook practice dedicated to processing emotions related to change and loss. With the individual and collective changes and losses sustained throughout the past year, we will explore how the making of expressive art forms can support the integration of difficult life experiences and facilitate communication both with and beyond words. We will see how self-compassion can extend to compassion for others and how images can support the meaning we seek in stories and words. 

In each session, a new mixed media art technique will be demonstrated as inspiration for your own spontaneous work using the materials you have gathered. Between sessions, you will be provided with written and visual inspiration drawn from other artists and creative prompts to start your own written and mixed media expressions. Finally, an important component of our time together will be sharing our work and our experience of the creative process in a safe and supportive way. A basic materials list will be provided prior to the class.

Meets on ZOOM four Tuesdays, 5:00-6:30pm.

February 2-23, 2021.

Start 2020 with a burst of creative energy! New writing workshop at The Marsh San Francisco

I’m excited to announce a new offering with Charlie Varon, my collaborator in the development of my one-woman show, and a long-time solo performer, writer, teacher, and director at The Marsh in San Francisco.

It’s called “Ignore the Obvious Path”.

I love this instruction because it reminds me of the life-changing words I heard from a teacher exactly ten years ago: “Play the wrong note.” These four words served as an awakening, a beckoning to open a new door to improvisation, after a lifetime of identifying solely as a classically trained musician. Having said "yes" to walking through that door, I can now report that beyond the fear of “doing it wrong” was the path to discovering my own creative voice. But in that moment, all I wanted to ask the teacher was, “Which wrong note do you want me to play?”.

Sometimes, when we are on a familiar path, we need to be jolted out of that comfort — awakened suddenly by a truth we never dared consider before.

What if we could use our writing practice to discover new ways of seeing ourselves and our stories? This workshop will explore specific writing prompts that will invite you to go in unexpected directions toward new possibilities. It is designed for writers at all levels who want to stretch and surprise themselves. In addition to enlivening the body in the writing process, we will experiment with narrative strategies, including:

* expanding and compressing time
* linking stories to digressions
* shifting point of view
* working with both terse and lush prose styles.

I’m thrilled to be joining Charlie in witnessing the magic of humans pursuing authentic creative expression.

I hope you’ll choose to start your new year with a fresh perspective and inspiration for your creative practice!

Learn more about the workshop here.