Confession time. I haven’t started shopping for Christmas gifts. I’m guessing that some of you readers out there may be in the same boat. For those of you still shopping for the storytellers and story lovers in your life, here are some First Person-inspired ideas.


Does that special person in your life love…


…First Person Arts StorySlams?
Get them a 6-Pack of tickets to any of our 2010 Slams!


…graphic memoir?
Order a copy of Josh Neufeld’s A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge and/or get them tickets to see Josh in person at Warning: Graphic Content, the first program in our 2010 Salon Series.


…some good ol’ folk music?
If you saw Sara Lee Guthrie live at the First Person Festival, why not share one of her CDs?


…irreverent, anti-corporate shenanigans?
The Yes Men Fix the World was a huge hit at the Festival. Bring it home!


These are just a few thoughts. Feel free to share more in the comments section!


P.S. Did anyone get Thea a menorah?

Ben Drinen, one of our StorySlammers, is featured in Full of Crow Quarterly Fiction. The short story is titled Snake.


And you can see Ben do his storytelling thang below. His style is unique: a little bit prose, a little bit poetry, a lot of cool.

Today’s FlashSlam… our new Intern Rudy!

In anticipation of our 2010 StorySlam series (now at World Cafe Live AND L’Etage), let’s take a walk down memory lane. I’ll be posting videos of our 2009 Slams over the next few weeks, whetting your appetite for January 11th and Home for the Holidays.


Enjoy our January winner Eun Strawser (not Lynn, not Noelle, but EUN) as she shares the story of her “bad idea.”

So, you know how we’ve been talking about 2010 and making a big deal about our FIRST EVENT? “Come to the First StorySlam of the year!” “It’s at L’Etage!” “It’s on January 26th!”


Well, we’re big fat liars.


Because the first event of 2010 for First Person Arts ISN’T the StorySlam at L’Etage.


See… when our people tell us they like something, we listen. When our people pack L’Etage month after month for StorySlams, we notice. And it makes us feel like we should do more, give more of what the people want. We wondered: why have one StorySlam each month, when we can have TWO?


Announcing… First Person Arts StorySlams at World Café Live! Second Mondays of every month from January through October 2010. This is an all-ages event. There’s parking, plus great food and drink from the World Cafe Live menu.

And this is in ADDITION to StorySlams at L’Etage, the fourth Tuesday of every month.


This means that the actual, for reals, honest-to-God, very very FIRST First Person Arts event of 2010 will be our inaugural StorySlam at World Café Live on Monday, January 11th. The theme is Home for the Holidays and our host is Philly actor and musician, David Sweeny. Some of you may already know David as Johnny Showcase, last seen in the 2009 Fringe Festival hit, Purr, Pull, Reign: A Litigious Fantasy in D. He’s a funny fellow, that David Sweeny, and he’s going to make a great host.


You can find the nitty-gritty on showtimes, tickets and more here.
Info on dates and themes for all 2010 StorySlams can be found here.

The First Person office is a small one. Vicki, Dan, Karina, Nick and Eva create the core of the First Person community. With so few of us and so much to do, we are eternally grateful for the interns and volunteers who enter the First Person orbit and make our lives easier and often more entertaining.

Last Friday was our super fab intern Cathy’s last day with First Person. Cathy came to us through an awesome “semester abroad” program at Kalamazoo College. While Philly isn’t a foreign country, it is very different from Kalamazoo, Michigan. We shared her with the Norris Square Neighborhood Project, a fantastic community center in North Philly. That’s Cathy on the left with some of the adorable kids she worked with there.

As part of her academic requirements, Cathy created a blog, documenting her work and play in the City of Brotherly Love. I only worked with Cathy briefly, so I didn’t know she was on a quest for the ultimate Philadelphia coffee shop. I also didn’t realize she was working on a Photo of the Day project. We loved Cathy’s help on our blog and with other marketing initiatives. Plus, she was just a great person to have around the office. Thanks again for all your help, Cathy!

If you are interested in joining the First Person community as an intern, contact Dan at dang@firstpersonarts.org. We are currently looking for 2010 interns to help with marketing, blogging and audio/visual work!

In celebration of the first evening of Hanukkah, here is Amy Malissa’s story of finding Judaism in an unlikely place from our February 2009 StorySlam at L’Etage.

Or you could just buy a menorah for Thea.

Marianne Bernstein - fresh from curating the First Person Arts-produced Welcome House and Shelter exhibit - has a new book out, Tatted. With the diverse landscape of South Street as her terrain, Bernstein photographed tattooed individuals she would meet along the way. Her pictures are accompanied by handwritten notes on the tattoos by the subjects themselves.

She presented the project at a First Person Salon in February 2009, which Andrew (former Marketing Coordinator) liveblogged about. Turns out that Marianne doesn’t have a tattoo herself (though maybe this has changed? Marianne, care to share?) and Philly was home to the first legal tattoo parlor. I don’t find this surprising; we do seem to like our ink in the ‘illadelph.

Tattoos have never really gone out of style, but more serious attention is being paid to them lately, between Tatted and the current (and very cool) exhibition at the Philadelphia Seaport Museum, Skin & Bones: Tattoos in the Life of the American Sailor. At the very least, a greater recognition of the stories behind the pictures seems to be in play.

Meet Marianne and other tattoo practitioners and admirers tonight at the Tatted launch party, 7-10, Free, at the Pure Gold Gallery in the Piazza at Schmidt’s (1050 N. Hancock St.). And after you finish chatting up the cutie with the hot sleeve, stop by the Philebrity Awards Show and say hi to me (Karina) and Nick.

Our 2008 project, the Philadelphia Complaint Choir, is featured in yesterday’s New York Times! The article looks at the history of complaint choirs around the world and puts special attention on the Philadelphia group.

The Philadelphia Complaint Choir brought together individuals from all over the city to engage in two of the most universal of acts: kvetching and music-making. Under the guidance of composer Evan Solot, the choir performed original music based around specific complaints brought in by choir members. After collectively creating their repertoire, the choir performed in Rittenhouse Square, outside of Liberty Place, Suburban Station, and other nontraditional venues.

Rather than having me keep talking about the Philadelphia Complaint Choir, you should just take a listen to their complaints first-hand!

Philadelphia Complaint Choir Performs!

We are super excited for this mention, but do wish that our wonderful partner in crime, Shelley Spector had gotten a shout-out. Shelley introduced us to the idea of complaint choirs in the first place and was an important part of the project throughout the process. Silly New York Times for forgetting about Shelley! Well, we haven’t forgotten, so thank you Shelley and to everyone else who contributed to the project.

I hope you’re planning on joining us at L’Etage on January 26, 8:30pm, for our first StorySlam of 2010! You know to get there early. You know that it’s going to be awesome. But unfortunately, we had to kick up the prices to $10 for non-members. (Trust me, we didn’t want to have to do it, either.)

But here’s the good news…

Members get discounts on ALL First Person Arts events this year–including StorySlams. Members’ Slam tickets stay the same price as 2009, a mere $8. That means if you attend all of this year’s Slams, it’s like getting 2 tickets for free!

As always, members get FREE tickets to StorySlams and Salon Series events depending upon their membership level, discounts on every First Person event–including the Festival–and our enduring love and affection. Oh, and if you were one of the masses shivering in the cold last month, members also get reserved first seating at the Grand Slam.

Join today! Your membership not only keeps our events below the cost of a movie ticket, it also makes sure some of them are free…and, as our members will tell you, we usually throw in a free surprise or two to show the love, like this year’s Festival Speakeasy.

PS: If you have any questions, Eva, our Development Manager, is here to answer them at eharris@firstpersonarts.org or 267.402.2019.

PPS: Photo from our 2009 Member’s Party!