JAW PRESS PLAY: REST JOY PLAY: A Queer Literaoke (Drag Edition!!) presented by Liminal Bodies
Join us for Rest | Joy | Play: A Queer Literaoke Pop Up (Drag Edition!!!), a pre-reading community event centering and celebrating queer and trans artists as they sing karaoke favorites and read from their own literary works. Enjoy singing, mingling, and supporting local queer organizations! Presented in partnership with Liminal Bodies.
Oftentimes, our world doesn’t allow us to slow down, be present, and enjoy the community around us. This event centers queer and trans artists, but all friends are welcome! We will also have community partner tables featuring local queer/trans organizations and creators.
This event is FREE and OPEN TO THE PUBLIC.
Featuring:
Hal Apenyo is a Trans, Malaysian-Chinese Drag King. As a Martial Artist, Team USA figure skater, and costume designer: He's a little king with a big spicy kick! He was also named 2023 Austin International Drag Festival Headliner.
Lilly Do (she/her) is a queer Chinese American facilitator, instructor, and multidisciplinary artist. When she isn’t facilitating writing workshops, Lilly spends her time engaging in the BIPOC, AAPI, and queer and trans communities in Portland as the cofounder of Liminal Bodies, a PNW-based queer and trans writing project focusing on movement as a process for deepening our writing practices. Lilly is also the Program Manager at Write Around Portland, a free writing program that consists of participants writing, sharing, and giving strength-based feedback. Her piece, “Survival Artists and Their Generational Lessons” can be found in the first issue of Significant Beings.
Anna Karenema was discovered under one of Portland’s bridges. They enjoy becoming an omen, laying eggs, singing, or all three! Their other mediums are poetry, piano, and aerial arts. If they’re not making you laugh, they hope they can make your heart charged up. (Venmo: @Quiet123 and @anna.kar.enema on insta!)
No "Noli" Reyes is a queer pilipino and mexican writer, movement artist and cultural producer based in Portland. Co founder of Liminal Bodies.
JAW New Play Festival FREE! July 28-30
A week-long assembling of artists and audiences to create new plays! Artistic teams, including playwrights, directors and actors, come together to rehearse — and a lot of times rewrite! — a play. The final piece of the process happens during the weekend, when we share “music stands readings” with audiences so the playwrights can hear their work, often for the very first time!
Liminal Bodies is a Pacific Northwest-based queer and trans, Asian and Pacific Islander writing project focusing on movement as a process for deepening our writing practices. Liminal Bodies offers space for QTAPI and fellow QT/BIPOC to build community, read, write, and play together through various events, workshops, and retreats throughout the year.
Follow them on IG @liminal_bodies
Current & Upcoming
JAW Street Dance Showcase
Join us as we kick things off for JAW weekend with this wildly popular yearly showcase, presented by DJ NorthernDraw and featuring street, club, and urban dance styles, performed by artists from a variety of local Portland area dance crews and institutions.
JAW Play Reading: The Sugar Hole
By Virginia Baeta and Amy Driesler
A rent increase for a legendary lesbian bar threatens its existence, and Darcy has a plan to save it. Is the 90's-themed Lesbian Pageant she dreams up as a fundraiser the answer? Or do the lesbians around her have different ideas about what needs to be saved? The Sugar Hole skips through time and space—real and imagined—exploring what it means to be a lesbian in a lesbian community, the importance of spaces for queer people, and what makes someone feel they belong. Part zany comedy, part pageant, and fully heart-filled, The Sugar Hole speaks directly to what makes a community, a community.
JAW Community Artist Lab: Using Images to Catalyze New Work with Dr. Taylor Barfield
Playwrights from August Wilson to Stephen Sondheim have found inspiration for their dramatic works on the canvas of a visual artist. In this workshop, we'll use images and music as a way to launch the playwriting process, craft language, and listen for character.
JAW PRESS PLAY: Bridging Voices choir
Bridging Voices is a youth chorus for LGBTQ+ and allied youth, ages 13-21. We strive to be a safe, accessible place for youth to experience empowerment and unity through music. Bridging Voices is Portland’s first LGBTQ+ and Allied Youth Chorus and is one of the largest choruses of its kind in the nation.
JAW Play Reading: Teen Playwrights Showcase
Celebrate the newest generation of theater artists in this high-energy showcase of 8-10 minute plays written by local teens. These young writers are selected from PCS’s year-round education programs and the PCS Teen Council. The playwrights are commissioned to create bold new works that reflect their voices and experiences.
JAW PRESS PLAY: The Latino Network's Ballet Folklórico dancers
A performance by the Latino Network’s Ballet Folklórico students, a program that honors and promotes Mexican culture, heritage, and identity through traditional dance classes and performances for youth and the community.
Portland Center Stage is committed to identifying & interrupting instances of racism & all forms of oppression, through the principles of inclusion, diversity, equity, & accessibility (IDEA).
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