⚡️Upcoming Roundtable Discussion- Writer’s Corner at Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2025⚡️
Friday, 3.15- 4.45pm (CDT), June 27th, 2025,
At: New Orleans Healing Center Suite 250,
2372 St Claude Ave,
New Orleans, LA 70117,
United States.

I am delighted to be hosting this roundtable discussion with the great Kirk Read and Erica Trabold.
This informal workshop is a space for those with a writing practice to connect with one another.

Author and collagist Kirk Read (Portland, Oregon, USA) will kick off the space with an exercise centered on visual and word practices. He wrote, “We will explore how these language and visual practices inform each other, how they compete and argue and agree in our minds and hands. Using generative writing experiments, we will create titles, move past stuck places and animate our personal writing. We will use fast collage paste-up to breathe life into our writing practice and quickly tap into the weird parts of our creative landscape.”

In the past year, Erica Trabold (Lynchburg, Virginia, USA) has been using prompts to take her practice to unexpected places. “One collage prompt even resulted in an entire series I wouldn’t have other wise made,” she wrote. “As a writing professor, I assign and use prompts constantly—but I had never explored them in the visual art space.” Trabold will share what she’s learned.

Anthony D Kelly (Castlebar, Co. Mayo, Ireland) often uses the cross activation of collage practices and literary mediums to spur on new moments of inspiration and to deepen the experience of both for an audience. He believes in both words and images as seeds which can give rise to each other and that by “changing channels” between these modes of expression we can nurture unexpected and exciting new works. Kelly will invite participants to consider this concept and lead a short playful visualization exercise along these lines to free up the imaginative process.

For more about the Roundtable Discussions at Kolaj Fest 2025 CLICK HERE.

To learn more about about the wondrous Kolaj Fest and to download the festival events program
CLICK HERE.

For more from the Kolaj Institute and Magazine CLICK HERE.

Image: “A Dream of the Awakening Spring” (2020) - Digital Collage - Anthony D Kelly

⚡️Upcoming Symposium- Curiosity, Wonder, Joy, & Portals at Kolaj Fest New Orleans 2025⚡️
Saturday, 2-3pm (CDT), June 28th, 2025,
At: Cafe Istanbul, 2372 St Claude Ave,
Room 252, New Orleans, LA 70117,
United States.

I am really honored to be presenting research and work on my upcoming Lexicon of Wonder project at Kolaj Fest 2025 as part of a symposium on Curiosity, Joy, Wonder and Portals alongside the amazing Breasia Hayes, Savannah Greene & C.Joi Sanchez.

I have been formulating the Lexicon of Wonder project over the last number of years and it is soon to be completed and released in the form of exhibitions and a publication. The first iteration of the Lexicon of Wonder exhibition will take place at Áras Inis Gluaire later this Summer with details coming soon.

Check out a note below from the organizers about the Symposium and my part in it:

”With its roots and history in the Surreal, collage is a well-built path to exercise curiosity. What happens if I put these two things together? Collage’s ability to bridge time and geography makes it a vehicle to explore new realms. During the Symposium at Kolaj Fest New Orleans, we will hear from Anthony D Kelly, Breasia Hayes, Savannah Green, and C. Joi Sanchez, each who are engaged in projects that explore wonder and joy and how life experiences take one down creative paths.

Anthony D Kelly is an artist, writer, and integrative psychotherapist from Castlebar, County Mayo, Ireland. “At the beating heart of my art practice are both wonder and play. Collage is a way for me to connect with myself, my community and the world around me,” wrote the artist. “I often hold a concept, word or idea in mind until an image coalesces and presents itself internally. I then sit and begin to sift through materials both digital and analogue for something that resonates.” Kelly will present his project, “Lexicon of Wonder”. He wrote, “Wonder and Awe are complex emotions arising in response to experiences of profound beauty, connection, natural phenomena, or through bearing witness to the incredible capacities, courage or talents of other human beings. They can also arise at times of great personal crisis or fear such as witnessing the raw power of nature at a time of natural disaster.” Kelly will speak about project origins, his ongoing research into the emotional states of wonder and awe, the role poetry plays in the project, and his plans for an exhibition and publication.”

For more about the Symposium itself CLICK HERE.

To learn more about about the wondrous Kolaj Fest and to download the festival events program
CLICK HERE.

For more from the Kolaj Institute and Magazine CLICK HERE.

Image: “Communications Bananatron” (detail) by Anthony D Kelly
21″x9″; Digital Collage; 2024.