from my email / Woodland Pattern (and: event with Lisa Fishman!)

 

OCTOBER EVENTS

Concert: Alternating Currents Live presents Jon Mueller + Tom Lecky: All Colors Present, a sound and visual meditation Sun. Oct. 5 | 7 PM CDT  *IN PERSON & ONLINE* $15 ($13 Members)

Jon Mueller’s singular performance idiom is an awe-inspiring display of elegant athleticism, preternatural focus, brute restraint, and ecstatic, monastic reverie. Paired with Tom Lecky's photographs, it becomes a deliberate focus on form, shape, and detail. It requires and demands a state of inner quietude from witnesses. Yet, from this seemingly metronomic exercise blossoms every possible tint and hue of infinite spectral sound.  Jon Mueller studied jazz drumming with Hal Russell at Columbia College in Chicago, and singing with La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela at the Kirana Center for Indian Classical Music in New York. A prolific performer, he tours extensively and has appeared at festivals and venues throughout the United States, Canada, England, Europe, and Japan. In addition to his solo work, Mueller has collaborated and performed with groups such as Mind Over Mirrors, Volcano Choir, Collections of Colonies of Bees, and Pele. He has also worked with artists including Olivia Block, Aaron Turner, Faith Coloccia, Dawn Springer, Chris Hefner, Jason Kahn, Hal Rammel, Asmus Tietchens, Z’EV, Rhys Chatham, Jarboe, James Plotkin, Duane Pitre, and Raymond Dijkstra. He has released music on renowned labels such as Table of the Elements, Type Recordings, Important Records, Taiga Records, SIGE Records, and American Dreams. www.rhythmplex.com  IG: @jonmueller Tom Lecky has worked in photography, music (as Hallock Hill), the book arts, prose and poetry writing, and literary criticism. His creative work concentrates on memory, place, and environment, the work of the imagination, perception, and the intersections of abstraction and representation. He often interweaves appropriated texts and images with his own, evoking a conversation with the history of book design and illustration. These creative pursuits are linked to Tom’s career as an internationally recognized expert in the field of rare and antiquarian books and manuscripts. He has worked in the auction world—notably in a 17-year run as a specialist and Head of Christie’s New York Books and Manuscripts Department—and as an advisor to collectors and institutions. He is the owner of Riverrun Books, and the founder of the rare book and manuscript appraisal and advisory firm Lecky Art Group. www.tomlecky.com IG: @tom.lecky

ATTEND IN PERSON

ATTEND ONLINE

ONLINE TICKET DONATION

Third Annual QWERTYFEST  Fri.-Sun. Oct. 3-5 *IN PERSON* Multiple Events

We’re thrilled to be sponsors for the third annual QWERTYFEST, a 3-day festival for writers, artists, typewriter aficionados, history buffs, mechanical keyboard connoisseurs, and anyone who wants to celebrate innovation. The weekend is a whirlwind of live music, presentations, workshops, literary cemetery tours, brunch and camaraderie. QWERTYFEST will take place Friday, Oct. 3, through Sunday, Oct. 5, at numerous locations throughout Milwaukee. Tickets and a full schedule will be available at qwertyfest.com!

QWERTYFEST Details

Reading from works in translation: Olena Jennings and Alex Niemi Thurs. Oct. 9 | 7 PM CDT  *IN PERSON & ONLINE* $Give What You Can

Join us for a reading from works in translation with Olena Jennings, translator of Girl with a Bullet (World Poetry, 2025) by Ukrainian poet Anna Malihon; and Alex Niemi, translator of The Endless Week (Dorothy, a publishing project, 2025) by French poet & novelist, Laura Vasquez.  Olena Jennings is the author of the poetry collection The Age of Secrets (Lost Horse Press), the chapbook Memory Project, and the novel Temporary Shelter (Cervena Barva Press). She is the translator or co-translator of collections by Ukrainian poets Kateryna Kalytko (co-translated with Oksana Lutsyshyna), Iryna Shuvalova, Vasyl Makhno, and Yuliya Musakovska. Her translation of Anna Malihon’s Girl with a Bullet is forthcoming in 2025 from World Poetry Books. She lives in Queens, New York, where she founded and co-curates the Poets of Queens reading series and press. Alex Niemi is a writer and award-winning translator. Her work has been supported by the National Endowment for the Arts and anthologized in Best Literary Translations 2025. She is the author of the poetry chapbook Elephant (dancing girl press), and her latest translation, The Endless Week by Laura Vazquez, is forthcoming from Dorothy, a publishing project, in September of this year.

ATTEND IN PERSON

ATTEND ONLINE

$GIVE WHAT YOU CAN

Special Event: A Kenneth Koch Centennial Celebration Sat. & Sun. Oct. 11 & 12 *MULTIPLE EVENTS* $Give What You Can

“I liked having the whole world in my poems”: A Kenneth Koch Centennial Celebration Join us for a weekend-long celebration of the life and work of Kenneth Koch (b. 1925), presented in partnership with The Kenneth Koch Literary Estate. Events have been, and are, taking place around the country throughout the year! A poet, playwright, and fiction writer, Koch also taught writing at The New School and was Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University, in addition to teaching poetry to children in the New York City Public Schools, which was recounted in Wishes, Lies, and Dreams: Teaching Children to Write Poetry and “Rose, where did you get that red?”: Teaching Great Poetry to Children. His lessons in writing and reading poetry made a lasting impact on generations of young writers. Koch is the author of more than a dozen collections of poems, as well as stories, plays, librettos, and screenplays. He was a frequent collaborator with filmmakers, visual artists, and other contemporaries such as Larry Rivers, Joe Brainard, and Rudy Burckhardt, and someone for whom life seemed synonymous with writing and creative practice, and who, according to Ron Padgett, “was highly energized by the mystery and pleasure of being alive.”  In addition to the events listed below, there will be takeaway writing prompts based on Koch’s lessons and a commemorative broadside, as well as refreshments and great company!

Sat. Oct. 11 | 7 PM CDT ($Give What You Can) *HYBRID* In person at Woodland Pattern and livestreaming via Crowdcast To kick off the festivities we’ve invited poets and artists to give short readings of favorite Kenneth Koch poems, and, if they’re so moved, to offer thoughts and reminiscences. Among those taking part are Stacy Blint, Jordan Dunn, Lisa Fishman, Lewis Freedman, Karl Gartung, Mike Hauser, Anne Kingsbury, John Koethe, Richard Meier, and Evan Craig Reardon.

ATTEND IN PERSON

ATTEND ONLINE

Sun. Oct. 12 | 2–4 PM CDT | Sliding Scale fee of $20–$150 (Please give what you can; all donations will go directly to the instructor)  *IN PERSON* at Woodland Pattern Making a Story Out of Stories, a collaborative workshop with Lisa Fishman Some of Kenneth Koch’s very short fiction provides a model (or models) for combining unexpected elements in the making of a story. Dream, observation, overhearing, remembering, forgetting . . . how to play with such components to make a story that surprises even you, the author? In part, by collaborating with others, in this workshop led by poet and fiction writer Lisa Fishman.  Lisa Fishman is the author of eight books of poetry, a short-story collection, and several chapbooks. Her newest poetry book, One Big Time, was just released on Wave Books. World Naked Bike Ride was published in Canada by Gaspereau Press in 2022 and was a finalist for the Canadian ReLit Award in short fiction. Other Wave poetry titles are Mad World, Mad Kings, Mad Composition (2020), and 24 Pages and other poems (2015). Her earlier books, on Ahsahta Press, include The Happiness Experiment and F L O W E R C A R T. She lives on a farm in Orfordville, Wisconsin, and teaches at Columbia College Chicago. She is a dual US/Canadian citizen with earlier roots in both the Detroit area and Montreal.

REGISTER TO ATTEND

Sun. Oct. 12 | 7 PM CDT ($Give What You Can) *IN PERSON* at Woodland Pattern We’ll close out the festivities with a screening of Rudy Burckhardt films made in collaboration with Kenneth Koch, as well as a staged reading of Kenneth Koch’s short play, Bertha. The films being screened include:  The Automotive Story (1954, 15 minutes, B&W) Directed by Rudy Burckhardt Narrated by Jane Freilicher Text by Kenneth Koch Music by Debussy, Poulenc, and Scriabin; played by Frank O’Hara The Apple (1967, 2 minutes, color) Poem by Kenneth Koch Music by Tony Ackerman and Brad Burg; sung by Kim Brody On Aesthetics (1999, 9 minutes, color) Poem by Kenneth Koch In Bed (1986, 16 mm, 22 minutes, color) Poem by Kenneth Koch Music by Chopin; played by Gena Raps

ATTEND IN PERSON

Concert: Formations Series for New & Improvised Music featuring Liz Sexe and Michael Firman Thurs. Oct. 16 | 7 PM CDT *IN PERSON & ONLINE* $10

Formations is a monthly music series curated by Jay Mollerskov, and dedicated to fostering the growth of new and improvised music in Milwaukee. Set 1) Liz Sexe—dance with motion-triggered synthesizers Set 2) Michael Firman—electronics

ATTEND IN PERSON

ATTEND ONLINE

ONLINE TICKET DONATION

Talk: Pregrettably Yours: On Being Influenced with Anselm Berrigan Sat. Oct. 18 | 7 PM CDT  *IN PERSON & ONLINE* $Give What You Can

This Bagley Wright Lecture is on being influenced (thinking of influence as a site of openness, and pleasure—not anxiety), with a focus on growing up in a family of poets and starting to write. The talk opens up into a wider range of influences from there, including a semester spent working one-on-one with Allen Ginsberg, and Berrigan’s life-long conversations on poetry with his mother, Alice Notley. Anselm Berrigan’s latest book of poetry, Don’t Forget to Love Me, was published in September 2024 by Wave Books. Other books include Pregrets, (Black Square Editions, 2021), Something for Everybody, (Wave Books, 2018), Come In Alone (Wave Books, May 2016), Primitive State (Edge, 2015), Notes from Irrelevance (Wave Books, 2011), Free Cell (City Lights Books, 2009), Some Notes on My Programming (Edge, 2006), Zero Star Hotel (Edge, 2002), and Integrity and Dramatic Life (Edge, 1999). He is also the editor of What is Poetry? (Just Kidding, I Know You Know): Interviews from the Poetry Project Newsletter (1983–2009) and co-author of two collaborative books: Loading, with visual artist Jonathan Allen (Brooklyn Arts Press, 2013), and Skasers, with poet John Coletti (Flowers & Cream, 2012). He was the poetry editor for the Brooklyn Rail from 2008 through 2023. With Alice Notley and Edmund Berrigan he co-edited The Collected Poems of Ted Berrigan (U. California, 2005) and the Selected Poems of Ted Berrigan (U. California, 2011). More recently, he co-edited Get The Money! Collected Prose of Ted Berrigan (City Lights, 2022) with Notley, Edmund Berrigan, and Nick Sturm. From 2003–2007 he was Artistic Director of The Poetry Project at St. Mark’s Church, where he also hosted the Wednesday Night Reading Series for four years. He teaches writing classes at Pratt Institute and Brooklyn College, and was a longtime Co-Chair in Writing at the Milton Avery Graduate School of the Arts interdisciplinary MFA program.  The Bagley Wright Lecture Series on Poetry, which supports contemporary poets as they explore in-depth their own thinking on poetry and poetics, and give a series of lectures resulting from these investigations. Lectures are delivered publicly in partnership with institutions and organizations nationwide.

ATTEND IN PERSON

ATTEND ONLINE

$GIVE WHAT YOU CAN

Reading: An Evening with the Wednesday Writers Wed. Oct. 22 | 7 PM CDT  *IN PERSON & ONLINE* $Give What You Can

An Evening with the Wednesday Writers. The Wednesday Writers will give a public performance of works developed during their weekly meetings. This group grew out of a series of memoir and poetry workshops led by writers-in-residence Maureen Owen and Jack Collom in 2009; it has continued because the members are devoted to the process of sharing their stories and reflections, and honing their writing skills. Featuring readings from Vince Bushell, Karen Haley, Carol Lee Saffioti-Hughes, Barbara Leigh, Pepe Oulahan, Lolly Rzezotarski, Judit Schugurensky, Janet Saenz, Virginia Small, and Jean Sobon.  Come enjoy the work of local writers! Stay for refreshments and good company following the reading!

ATTEND IN PERSON

ATTEND ONLINE

$GIVE WHAT YOU CAN

Reading: United We Read Fri. Oct. 24 | 7 PM CDT  *IN PERSON* Open to the public United We Read is the UW–Milwaukee Graduate Creative Writing Program’s student-faculty reading series that takes place in venues throughout the community. This reading will feature David Heinen, Saundra Norton, and Kimberly Rouse, along with Professor Liam Callanan!

COMMUNITY EVENTS