Marianne Bernstein on-stage at last night’s Salon.  She presented her work Tatted, a forthcoming book from GritCity, Inc. featuring tattoos and the stories and motivations behind them.

The next Salon will be March 11th, but don’t forget that there’ll be TWO storyslams between now and then!  Tuesday, February 24th at L’Etage and Tuesday, March 3rd at World Cafe Live.  You can buy tickets for that one right here!

6:50pm Okay, just a little bit before the Salon gets underway tonight.  All the artists are here.  Daravann Yi, Marianne Bernstein, Katie Sweeney and Cecelia Smith.  The Laurie Beechman Cabaret space looks fantastic, and the beer from Philadelphia Brewing Company is chilling in the bucket.  Volunteers Sebastian and Shane are here helping us keep things on track!

7:21pm Just met Jose Cedillos–a bricolage artist–who we’ve now confirmed, and can announce, will be featured in the March 11th Salon!  Also part of the Salon will be a fantastic documentary film by Olivia Antsis, Barry Vacker, and Brett Sroka called Space Times Square, a presentation by Angela Krofton on some recent work for the City of Philadelphia Mural Arts program, and a fascinating collaborative poetic memoir presented jointly be Dr. Niama Williams and Reverend Joseph Massey.  I’m already excited!

7:33 We’ll be starting relatively soon, just a little behind schedule.  Great to see our boar members Karen Shakoske and Priscilla Rosenwald in the house!

7:47 And we’re underway!

8:00 Daravann Yi talks about life under the Khmer Rouge.  It’s incredible to imagine life without constant connectivity.  He didn’t see his family or hear about them for months and years.  He considers himself lucky to have only lost half of his family.  Khmer Rouge on Wikipedia.  He collected Beta Fish–it’s such a charming and devastating detail–and worried about how his fish would fare when he had to leave.

8:06 Fulfilling the dreams of his children is a marvel to him–allowing them to eat Pat’s and Geno’s cheesesteaks!  

8:09 Yi has an extraordinary catalog of photos from his days in Cambodia.  They had a pretty cool Citroen sedan!  French engineering…

8:15 What a great story.  Daravann Yi is giving so much back to Cambodia!  Check him out at www.saltseeker.com

8:17 Marianne Bernstein is up next with work from Tatted.  The subject on the cover of the book is here tonight!  (She told a story at a StorySlam last year: “Secrets”)  She worked for the Maysles brothers.  Did not know that….Brian from Grit City, Inc. is here.  Tatted will be only their second book!  

8:21 Bernstein ran around South Street asking people to take photos of their tattoos.  ”What I like about South Street is everyone says ‘Yes’”  

8:25 Interesting comparison to making documentary films.  I didn’t know that Philadelphia was home to the first legal tattoo parlors in the United States.

8:29 Extraordinary range of motivations and stories behind the tattoos people get.  One of her subjects is a prostitute with PIMP tattoo on her neck.  Turns out it’s an acronym:  Positive Improvement Motivated Person (or something, she can’t remember)

8:34 In some ways the photographs are just an excuse to talk to lots of people you might never encounter.   This program is so in the spirit of what we’re all about at First Person Arts.  Fabulous.  People in the crowd are recognizing some of the photo subjects–we’re at Broad and South after all!

8:39  Frank, who was featured on the flyer is here in the audience tonight!  

Bernstein thinks more people get words tattooed in Philadelphia than elsewhere.  

Marianne doesn’t have her own tattoo!

8:42 Interesting questions about tattoos here.  The tattoo as “spectacle.”  I wonder if the ubiquity of the tattoo has diminished its value as spectacle.

8:45 Marianne sees doing portraiture as a way to make connections to other people.   Yup.  Does anyone regret their tattoos?  Evidently not among Marianne’s subjects…. Ooh, and we get to see Frank’s back!   Film at 11, or thereabouts…

9:05 It’s after intermission, and Cecelia’s up, showing off the Complaint Choir music video!

The Philly Complaint Choir was so much fun!  Get the whole story at complaints.firstpersonarts.org

9:13  Great to hear from Cecelia Smith about her experience shooting the Philadelphia Complaint Choir.  She treated it as a journalistic piece.  The final piece will be done before may and will be called The Art of Fine Whining.

9:20 Hearing it from the filmmaker’s perspective, it’s even more amazing that we pulled the complaint choir together between September and the 2008 First Person Festival last year.  Crazy.  In case we haven’t thanked our singers enough, THANK YOU!

9:25 Oh wonderful!  Cecelia’s drawn a comparison to the tattoos with the way people in the Philly Complaint Choir adorned themselves.  We’ll definitely have updates on how Cecelia’s project evolves.  Should be sometime in the Spring or Summer.  

9:29 This is a masterful presentation by Katie Sweeney.  Really a great way to make a blog come alive for an audience.  http://broken-umbrellas.blogspot.com/  

There’s no mistaking that Katie Sweeney is a splendid copy writer.  The crowd loves this.  In Q&A, Katie maintains perfect journalistic integrity.  She never touches the umbrellas she shoots!   A great note to end the evening on!

Two hours. Four artists. One provocative evening showcasing fast-paced, interactive memoir and documentary art.  That’s right, FOUR artists for just 8 bucks.  You’re practically robbing The Arts Bank!

First Person Salon
Feb. 11th, 2009 7:30-9:30 (Doors at 7pm)
Location: Laurie Beechman Cabaret at The University of the Arts
(Philadelphia Arts Bank, 601 S. Broad St., Philadelphia)
Admission: $8

Buy advance tickets to guarantee a seat!

Check out previews of the artists at the links below:
Blogger Katie Sweeney
Memoirist Daravann Yi
Filmmaker Cecelia Smith (and the Philadelphia Complaint Choir)
Photographer Marianne Bernstein

It’s not a snow story, but in honor of those who had to get in a car and drive around in adverse conditions today, here’s a Bad Idea from last month’s StorySlam host and reigning Best Storyteller in Philadelphia, Ryan T Barlow:

Marianne Bernstein is a photographer, but she’s so much more.  Armed with a camera and undaunted curiosity about tattoos and their bearers, she circumscribed a 5 block radius of South Street and set out to find as many tattoo wearers as would talk to her.  The result is a forthcoming book of photographs and stories called Tatted from Grit City, Inc.  Bernstein will share some of her photos,  and she’ll photograph anyone interested in sharing a tattoo and a story before the Salon, during intermission and afterwards.

First Person Salon
Feb. 11th, 2009 7:30-9:30 (Doors at 7pm)
Location: Laurie Beechman Cabaret at The University of the Arts
(Philadelphia Arts Bank, 601 S. Broad St., Philadelphia)
Admission: $8
Buy advance tickets!

Featured alongside Marianne Bernstein will be memoirist Daravann Yi, blogger Katie Sweeney, and filmmaker Cecelia Smith.

Salt Seeker is Daravann Yi’s extraordinary memoir of his flight from Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge to a Thai refugee camp:

Daravann Yi will read from his gripping account at the First Person Salon, February 11th 7:30pm-9:30pm.  He’ll be joined by filmmaker Cecelia Smith, blogger Katie Sweeney, and photographer Marianne Bernstein. Get your tickets in advance or at the door, but do not miss the kick off to the season of salons!

You can read more about Daravann Yi at his website.

First Person Salon
Feb. 11th, 2009 7:30-9:30 (Doors at 7pm)
Location: Laurie Beechman Cabaret at The University of the Arts
(Philadelphia Arts Bank, 601 S. Broad St., Philadelphia)
Admission: $8
Buy advance tickets!

If you missed the Philadelphia Complaint Choir’s meteoric rise to fame in the run-up to it’s spell-binding performance at the 2008 First Person Festival, you must have been sleeping!  Fortunately, intrepid documentary filmmaker Cecelia Smith followed the choir from it’s earliest practices through its final performances.  You can get much of the story at the Philadelphia Complaint Choir blog or find out about the global Complaint Choir movement at complaintschoir.org.  Smith will screen A Fine Whine, a music video of the Philadelphia Complaint Choir, and talk a little bit about her work covering this extraordinary effort stemming from a fruitful artistic partnership between Shelley Spector and First Person Arts.  Please join us on February 11th from 7:30pm-9:30pm.  No whine, just beer from Philadelphia Brewing Company!

First Person Salon
Feb. 11th, 2009 7:30-9:30 (Doors at 7pm)
Location: Laurie Beechman Cabaret at The University of the Arts
(Philadelphia Arts Bank, 601 S. Broad St., Philadelphia)
Admission: $8
Buy advance tickets!

Here’s a fan video of the Philadelphia Complaint Choir in action in Suburban Station back in November:

Other artists at the First Person Salon on Feb. 11th:  Katie Sweeney, Daravann Yi, and Marianne Bernstein.

Thanks to a little break in the weather, our umbrellas can all rest easy, but they’re shame is always on display at Better Off Soaked.

“Better Off Soaked” is Katie Sweeney’s homage to–or perhaps visual roast of–the discarded umbrella.  Each blown out umbrella reveals a little story of trauma–a moment when the protection of the device failed miserably and left it’s owner exposed to the elements.  It’s no wonder that those moments of trauma are visited on the failed accoutrements with such fury and abandonment.  No second look to see if it might be salvaged or mended, it’s just stuffed in the trash, cast into the gutter or otherwise disposed of.  Sweeney’s made a fetish of these little dramas, adorning them with haikus that capture some element of the context of the discarding and, occasionally, a flash of delight in the detritus. She’ll share her stories at the February 11th First Person Salon at The Laurie Beechman Cabaret at the Philadelphia Arts Bank.

Purchase advance tickets or pay at the door.  Either way, join us on February 11th for Sweeney and three other compelling works of memoir and documentary art from Daravann Yi, Marianne Bernstein, and Cecelia Smith.

Dan has some thoughts on the matter.  His story, full of foreboding detail, danger and risk celebrates the idea that, sometimes, a bad idea is all you’ve got to work with: