BGSQDBureau of General Services—Queer Division
BGSQD
Join us for the launch of Jason Schneiderman‘s anthology Queer: A Reader for Writers, the first freshman composition reader built entirely around queer topics. Charles Rice-Gonzalez moderates a discussion amongst fellow contributors Justin Vivian Bond, Mark Doty, Ebony Smith, and Schneiderman.
Suggested donation of $5 to benefit the Bureau. No one turned away for lack of funds.
Mx Justin Vivian Bond is a writer, singer, painter, and performance artist. Bond’s debut Cd Dendrophile was self-released on WhimsyMusic in 2011, and was followed by FCA-supported Silver Wells in 2012. In 2011, Bond’s art exhibition The Fall of the House of Whimsy was presented at Participant Inc., New York. Bond’s theatrical endeavors include starring as Warhol Superstar Jackie Curtis in Scott Wittman’s production of Jukebox Jackie: Snatches of Jackie Curtis (2012) as part of La Mama E.T.C.’s 50th Anniversary Season; originating the role of Herculine Barbin in Kate Bornstein’s play Hidden: A Gender (1991); touring with the performance troupe The Big Art Group, and appearing in John Cameron Mitchell’s film Shortbus (2006). Bond’s memoir TANGO: My Childhood, Backwards and in High Heels, was published by The Feminist Press in (2011). With funds from V’s Grants to Artists, Bond made a down payment on V’s lease and was able to self-release the CD, Silver Wells(2012).
Bond has held performances at The Kitchen, Abrons Art Center, Performance Space 122, The Zipper Factory, The Delacorte Theater, Central Park, New York; The Sydney Opera House, Australia; Soho Theater, London, Helen Hayes Theater, New York and the Royal Albert Hall, London.
Prior to V’s 2012 Grants to Artists, Bond received a an Obie Award for Kiki & Herb: Jesus Wept (2000), a New York Dance and Performance “Bessie” Choreographer/Creator Award for Kiki & Herb(2004), The Ethyl Eichelberger Award (2008), and The Peter Reed Foundation Grant (2011). Bond received a B.F.A. from Adelphi University (1985), and an M.A. from Central St. Martins College in London (2006).
Mark Doty is the author of several collections of poetry, including Fire to Fire: New and Selected Poems, which received the 2008 National Book Award.
Charles Rice-González, born in Puerto Rico and reared in the Bronx, is a writer, long-time community and LGBT activist, co-founder of BAAD! The Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance and a Distinguished Lecturer at Hostos Community College – CUNY. He received an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Goddard College. His debut novel Chulito(Magnus Books 2011) has received nearly a dozen awards including a 2013 Stonewall Book Awards – Barbara Gittings Literature Award Honor from the American Library Association and a “Small Press Highlights” mention from the National Book Critics Circle. He co-edited From Macho To Mariposa: New Gay Latino Fiction (Tincture/Lethe Press 2011) and his award-winning play I Just Love Andy Gibb will be published in Blacktino Queer Performance: A Critical Anthology (Duke Press 2016). He serves on the boards of the Bronx Council on the Arts and the National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures.
Jason Schneiderman is Associate Editor of Painted Bride Quarterly and Poetry Editor of Bellevue Literary Review. His poetry collection Primary Source (Red Hen Press, forthcoming April 2016) won the 2014 Benjamin Saltman award, and his poetry and essays have appeared in numerous journals and anthologies, including American Poetry Review, The Best American Poetry,The Poetry Review, and The Penguin Book of the Sonnet. He is an Assistant Professor of English at the Borough of Manhattan Community College and lives in Brooklyn.
Ebony Smith, originally from California, is currently a student at the Borough of Manhattan Community College and a member of the Phi Theta Kappa honors society. She is studying liberal arts while exploring psychology and criminal justice. Ebony loves to travel and has visited countries in Asia, Africa, and Europe. She enjoys writing and hopes to publish a book in the future. She is a very strongly opinionated, artistic, and creative young woman who has dreams of helping others and flourishing in the career she desires.