Singer-Songwriter Noe Venable: Pilgrim at Creativity’s Spring

Singer-songwriter Noe Venable has been called “a homegrown, full-blown musical visionary” (Puremusic.com). Her gorgeously layered songs, rich in myth and poetry, speak to the wilderness in each of our souls. Although she’s still young, she’s already had a rich and varied career, releasing the first of her eight albums when she was just twenty years old. In this conversation, intercut with excerpts from Noe’s diverse musical catalog, host Tanya Shaffer talks with Noe about the mysterious give and take of the creative process, the ways the stages of her life have impacted the evolution of her musical style, why she left a thriving musical career to attend divinity school, and what brought her back to the creative life.f her musical style, why she left music and attended divinity school, and what brought her back to the creative life.

Music, SongwritingTanya ShafferJuly 9, 2020music, musician, Singer-Songwriter, Songwriting, creativity, arts, performing arts, spiritualityComment

Playwright-Performer-Visual Artist Herbert Sigüenza: White Jesus Was the Original Fake News

Herbert Sigüenza is a founding member of the brilliant, hilarious, and politically incisive group Culture Clash, the most produced Latino performance troupe in the country. He’s also the playwright-in-residence at the San Diego Repertory Theatre and has appeared as an actor in theatre, tv and film. He served as a cultural consultant and the voice of the lead character’s two deceased uncles in the Academy-Award-winning film Coco. In today’s episode, he chats with host Tanya Shaffer about a range of topics, including Culture Clash’s beginnings in San Francisco in the ‘80’s, how they create hit shows, his ongoing commitment to progressive politics, and how he remains engaged and excited about his art 35-plus years into a long career. He also shares a delightful monologue from his solo show A Weekend With Pablo Picasso and a thought-provoking soliloquy based on an interview with a Black preacher in Washington, DC.

Directing, Visual Arts, Playwriting, ComedyTanya ShafferJune 24, 2020Culture Clash, theater, theatre, performance, comedy, Latino, arts, performing arts, visual artsComment

Poet Athena Kashyap: Where A Poem Lives

Athena Kashyap is the author of two exquisite books of poetry, Crossing Black Waters and Sita’s Choice. In this episode, host Tanya Shaffer talks with her about her writing process and they mysteries of courting the muse. They also discuss some of the themes Athena explores in her books, including the immigrant experience, the push and pull between freedom and responsibility, and women’s particular suffering, desires, and joys, in India and beyond. She also reads three of her gorgeous poems, including the one the episode is named for!

Poetry, WritingTanya ShafferJune 10, 2020creativity, poetry, writing, poets, Indian, India, South Asian Comment

Multidisciplinary Artist & Disability Rights Activist Gwynneth VanLaven: Am I Allowed to Laugh at This?

Multidisciplinary artist Gwynneth VanLaven uses photography, installation, performance, writing, and social engagement to challenge stigma, which she says “takes the real experience of real people and squashes it flat into stereotypes and presumptions.” Through work that is both playful and dark, layered with irony and mystery, she seeks to break down the binary thinking that separates “the well” from “the sick” and “the disabled” from “the non-disabled.” In this wide-ranging discussion, host Tanya Shaffer talks with Gwynneth about her improvisational photographic process, her interactive public experiments, and the humor and awkwardness of being fully embodied in art and life.

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Photos and text © Tanya Shaffer, 2018.

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