Work with us!

Portuguese Artists Colony is looking for a Producer and Marketer. This may be one fabulous person or two separate brilliant people.

Producer description:
- Research and contact potential readers and "live writers" to perform at bi-monthly shows.
- Research and contact musicians who can play at PAC shows.
- Communicate with guests as the show approaches: gather bios and URLs, let them know what to expect, etc.

- Create each show's printed program and supervise printing.
- Day-of-show support, including: donations, book sales, room set up, live writing prompts.

Our ideal producer will have contacts within the San Francisco literary community, but will be able and willing to look beyond the usual circle of local readers. We love to pair lesser-known but wonderful authors with more well-known authors. We also seek all sorts of diversity: discipline (non-fiction, fiction, poetry, rant), race, gender, orientation, and subject matter.

Marketing description:
- Facebook promotion
- Press releases
- Newsletter
- Website updates
- General promotion of events, and post-show wrap-up.
- Monitoring for press about PAC, as well as pictures and videos of shows, for promotion on PAC website.

Our ideal marketer will have contacts in the press world and know how to spread the word. Some familiarity with Blogger for light website updating would be lovely.

This is a/these are volunteer position(s). No salary is available at this time, but any perks that come our way will be shared. This is, however, an opportunity to take an active role in the Bay Area literary scene and meet our extended circles of artists and writers, and introduce us to yours.

If you're already attending readings/live music on a regular basis, this won't require much more of your time - no more than 10-15 hours a month.

Asterisk Magazine had this to say about Portuguese Artists Colony:
"PAC is easily the classiest reading series in the city. What is special about this reading is how well the program fits together, and how thoughtfully curated the whole event is. You never once get that, Oh my god, did I just wear a beret to an open mic? feeling. More likely you'll get the feeling that you gained special access to literary pilgrims at work, as they pen swords all over the battlefields of the imagination."

Be a part of something beautiful!

To find out more, email caitlin (at) portugueseartistscolony (dot) com.

Narrow places

You took the turn, pretending certainty, and when asphalt turned to cobblestone and the street curved upward through a stairstepped neighborhood, you looked at your wife with your Isn't This An Adventure face, and her smile was overbright. The houses were tall and narrow, walls of shifting color, and tiny European cars parked on both sides of the road now. You're creeping forward, just half-revolutions of the wheels until you stop. No way to pass without scraping cars on both sides, and a men in heavy mustaches gather, arms crossed over paunches, watching, you can't back up, not with that steep curve and it's a miracle you got this far, you feel the chill of sweat under the arms of your shirt and you want to start swearing, fuckstick assfiddle needledick, but your wife puts a hand on your arm and you try to take in a breath.

Let Portuguese Artists Colony guide you home Sunday, July 22nd. Featuring guest readers:

Craig Clevenger was born in Dallas, Texas. He is the author two novels, The Contortionist’s Handbook and Dermaphoria. He currently lives in San Francisco and is at work on his third novel.

Lauren Eggert-Crowe has written for Salon, The Rumpus and L.A. Review of Books. She is the author of two forthcoming poetry chapbooks: The Exhibit and In The Songbird Laboratory. She's also the managing editor of Ask A Socialist. (If you'd like to ask a socialist out, follow Lauren on Twitter @LaurEggertCrowe.)

The ever enchanting Ethel Rohan, victorious in May's live writing contest, returns with her finished piece!

Sweet live tunes from musical guest Jascha Hoffman.

Live writing:
Vote on a prompt as you enter the show, and four writers will write on the winning topic while you watch them sweat, swear, and get inspired. Each writer will read what he/she wrote, and you get to vote on which piece you'd like to see developed into a finished story/poem/rant to be read at the next PAC performance. It's a thrill - place your bets now!

Claire Hennessy
Marianne Lonsdale
Jeremy Ravdin  
Trent Tano 

Sunday, July 22
Hotel Rex
562 Sutter Street
In the Salon, just behind the Library Bar
San Francisco
Show at 5:00 pm    

Elsewhere

Portuguese Artists Colony is taking a stroll.

It all begins Sunday, July 8, 5:00 pm at Stories, with the maiden appearance of PAC Los Angeles' Roar Shack.
Featuring Chiwan Choi, Jillian Lauren, Shilpa Agarwal, Live Writing with J Ryan Stradal and Ameni Rozsa, and music by Scott Shriner.

On Monday, July 9, we're wandering across the ocean to host the participant open mic as part of Dzanc Books/CNC DISQUIET International Literary Program in Lisbon, Portugal. This is our second year as part of DISQUIET, and we're mighty pleased to return. Live Writing in a 150-year old literary club. What could be sweeter? Grémio Literário, at 6:00 pm.

We're back to our original home in San Francisco on Sunday, July 22, with a wonderful lineup:
Craig Clevenger and Lauren Eggert-Crowe
Musical guest: Jascha Hoffman
Live writing winner: Ethel Rohan 
Live writers: Claire Hennessy, Marianne Lonsdale, Jeremy Ravdin, Trent Tano   
Sunday,  July 22
Hotel Rex
562 Sutter Street
In the Salon, just behind the Library Bar
San Francisco
Show at 5:00 pm  
Sliding scale $5-10

Take your medicine

You've had it coming for a while. Your wife asked about the smell on you when you crept in between the sheets last night, you'd hoped she wouldn't notice. Just that, her voice coming calm out of the dark, and it was clear she knew. She turned her back on you to sleep, but you can't, you'll lie awake all night.

Man up with Portuguese Artists Colony on May 27 at Hotel Rex. We'll hold your hand in the grim morning-after light.

Featuring guest readers:
Local singer Songwriter David Berkeley wrote most of the songs from his latest album Some Kind of Cure while living in a 40-person village in the mountains of Corsica. He also penned a memoir called 140 Goats and a Guitar, which tells the stories that inspired those songs.

Jane Ganahl has been a journalist, author, editor and arts producer in San Francisco for 30 years. She is the co-founder and co-director of Litquake, the West Coast’s largest independent literary festival. She is also the author of the memoir Naked on the Page: the Misadventures of My Unmarried Midlife.

Plus! We have two live writing winners:
Actual Portuguese-American Linette Escobar won March's live writing with the prompt, "She craved nachos."

"Not-a-writer" Kevin Hunsanger returns with his winning piece about a hoarder from February's show.

Live music from the wonderful Erma Kyriakos. Listen to her songs here, and watch for the full-length album!

Live writing:
Vote on a prompt as you enter the show, and four writers will write on the winning topic while you watch them sweat, swear, and get inspired. Each writer will read what he/she wrote, and you get to vote on which piece you'd like to see developed into a finished story/poem/rant to be read at the next PAC performance. It's a thrill - place your bets now!

Julie Greicius
Douglas Henderson
Ira Marlowe
Ethel Rohan

Sunday, May 27
Hotel Rex
562 Sutter Street
In the Salon, just behind the Library Bar
San Francisco
Show at 5:00 pm  

Reality show

There's a camera behind your bathroom mirror, another over your bed, behind your left ear, under your tongue. You're being watched by millions, over dinner, faces lit by the screen. Your whole life is a reality show. You're the dickhead on a power trip, the weakling who pisses himself under pressure, the compulsive crier. Under the eye of the camera, as under God's obsessive stare, you are your worst self. Every time you pick your nose, every stupid confession to your boyfriend is tallied on the crawl at the bottom of the screen.

So why not let it all go? Why not go flamboyant, give the gods of your world some real entertainment? Bring out the pogo-stilts and the flamethrower. Join Portuguese Artists Colony on March 25 at Hotel Rex as we blur the line between life and performance, if there ever was a line in the first place.

Featuring guest readers:
Sally Ashton is a poet and Editor-in-Chief of the DMQReview. She teaches creative writing and is the current Poet Laureate of Santa Clara County, blogging at poetlaureateblog.org

Dean Rader’s Works & Days received the 2010 T. S. Eliot Poetry Prize, was a finalist for the Bob Bush Memorial First Book Prize, and won the Writer’s League of Texas Book Award for Poetry. Verse Daily named his poem “Ocean Beach at Twilight: 14” one of the best poems of 2010, and another of his poems will appear in Best American Poetry 2012. He is a professor at the University of San Francisco.

PLUS!
Sona Avakian lives in San Francisco and has had work published or forthcoming in ZYZZYVA, Sonora Review, Instant City and Sand Hill Review. 

Live music from the fabulous Sadie Contini of The Invisible Cities.

Live writing:
Vote on a prompt as you enter the show, and four writers will write on the winning topic while you watch them sweat, swear, and get inspired. Each writer will read what he/she wrote, and you get to vote on which piece you'd like to see developed into a finished story/poem/rant to be read at the next PAC performance. The live writing gets more exciting with every show. Place your bets!

Missy Church
Linette Escobar
Gary Turchin
Matthew DeCoster

Sunday, March 25
Hotel Rex
562 Sutter Street
In the Salon, just behind the Library Bar
San Francisco
Show at 5:00 pm

I can't hear you

Baby, I can't hear you, she says. You try again, but your words get mangled along the way. There's too much interference, too many years, betrayals, the gap between your pickup basketball game in Chicago and her Kyoto classroom unbridgeable. You open your mouth and all she hears is static, sirens, the thwack of knuckle on cheek. You want to say love, Baby, love, but it turns to roadkill in her ear.

Join Portuguese Artists Colony at our new location, the Hotel Rex, on February 26 to get the message straight.

Featuring guest readers:
Kelly Luce's story collection received the San Francisco Foundation’s Jackson Award and was a finalist for the 2010 Bakeless Prize. Her fiction has recently appeared in The Southern Review, Crazyhorse, and Kenyon Review. This summer she’ll be a resident at Fogo Island Arts Corporation in Newfoundland.

Peter Orner is the author of three books of fiction, including Esther Stories, The Second Coming of Mavala Shikongo, and the recently published novel, Love and Shame and Love, a New York Times Editor's Choice book. He lives in Bernal Heights and is generally against colonization, except in circumstances such as these.

PLUS! Geetha Reddy's winning play from last month's live writing, inspired by the prompt: The restaurant served only meat.

Live music from The Barbary Ghosts. 

Live writing:
Vote on a prompt as you enter the show, and four writers will write on the winning topic while you watch them sweat, swear, and get inspired. Each writer will read what he/she wrote, and you get to vote on which piece you'd like to see developed into a finished story/poem/rant to be read at the next PAC performance. The live writing gets more exciting with every show. Place your bets!

Katrin Arefy
Kevin Hunsanger

Ira Marlowe
Don Menn

Sunday, February 26
NEW LOCATION!
Hotel Rex
562 Sutter Street
In the Salon, just behind the Library Bar
San Francisco
Show at 5:00 pm  

Not loaded

She says it isn't loaded as she passes it to you, but it feels heavy, the metal still warm from her hand. You could open the chamber and check, but that would violate some rule of trust between you. You have to believe her, it isn't loaded. The neighbor kid thought the gun wasn't loaded when he took it out to show his friend, just that little thing, and the shot was heard for years after, the story whispered from kid to kid through two generations. Your uncle must have thought the shotgun wasn't loaded when he leaned it against the fence before climbing over, but we'll never know, his mouth is closed forever.

So it isn't loaded. So you trust her, and put your finger on the trigger. Join Portuguese Artists Colony on January 22 to see what happens next.

Featuring guest readers:
Seth Harwood received an MFA in fiction from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and went on to build a large fan base for his first novel, Jack Wakes Up, by first serializing it as a free audiobook. Across iTunes and sethharwood.com, his work has been downloaded over one million times. His second novel, Young Junius, is billed as "The Wire meets Cambridge, MA in 1987″ and was picked by George Pelecanos as one of his best books of 2010. Seth currently lives in San Francisco where he teaches English and creative writing at Stanford and the City College of San Francisco.

Brittany Perham is the author of The Curiosities (Parlor Press 2012). Her recent work may be found in Southern Poetry Review, TriQuarterly, Lo-Ball, Linebreak, and elsewhere. She is a Jones Lecturer in poetry at Stanford University, where she held the Wallace Stegner Fellowship from 2009-2011. She is a member of the word/music project Nonstop Beautiful Ladies and she lives in San Francisco.

Steven Paul Lansky will return with a long-distance reading of his winning piece from December's live writing, inspired by the prompt, "She saw Jesus."

Live music from "Oakland's sweet little secret," Ira Marlowe.

Live writing:
Vote on a prompt as you enter the show, and four writers will write on the winning topic while you watch them sweat, swear, and get inspired. Each writer will read what he/she wrote, and you get to vote on which piece you'd like to see developed into a finished story/poem/rant to be read at the next PAC performance. The live writing gets more exciting with every show. Place your bets!

MaryBeth Lorence
Geetha Reddy
Duo Von Dagrate
Cary Tennis

Sunday, January 22
Fivepoints Arthouse
72 Tehama
One block south of Howard at 2nd Street
San Francisco
Show at 5:00 pm