Calm Slam Workshop: Inspired by Art

Open the Door is our annual writing festival for women, where we celebrate contemporary creatives whilst also shining a spotlight on three historical writers. Inspired by Glasgow’s long history of bold, creative women, our theme is writers who are artists and artists who are writers, and we’ll be celebrating how creatives weave these two practices together. Our Open the Door Calm Slam is a safe space for poets who are ready to step out of the shadows and take their writing to the next level and this year, we’re blending art with words to create the perfect place for all budding poets who have yet to find their audience.

Inspired by Art, Wednesday 14th April, 2pm to 3.30pm, Online, Women only

In this poetry workshop, short writing exercises will act as a prompt for exploring your own creativity and freeing your imagination. We’ll be taking inspiration from visual images related to the three historic writer/artists celebrated as part of this year’s Open the Door festival: Wendy Wood, Zarina Hashmi and Edith Simon.  This workshop is facilitated by Jane Yeh and is open to both beginners and more experienced writers. You might even generate ideas or work to enter into our Calm Slam competition!

Our Calm Slam competition is open until Friday 30th April – find out more here.

Jane Yeh is a lecturer at the Open University and has taught poetry workshops around the UK. Her first collection of poems, Marabou (Carcanet, 2005), was shortlisted for the Whitbread/Costa, Forward, and Aldeburgh poetry prizes. Her latest collection, Discipline (Carcanet), was named a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and one of the best books of 2019 by The Guardian. Born in America, she has lived in London since 2002.

Open the Door 2021 is supported by the Open University in Scotland, University of Glasgow and the British Council.

Event Outline

2pm: Welcome from GWL team member Nadine and Jane from the Open University, who will lead the workshop

2.10pm: Introduction to the Calm Slam competition and the artwork prompts

2.15pm: First writing exercise

2.25pm: Optional sharing

2.35pm: Second writing exercise

2.45pm: Optional sharing

2.55pm: Comfort break

3.05pm: Third writing exercise

3.15pm: Optional sharing

3.25pm: Questions about the Calm Slam competition

3.30pm: Thanks and goodbye

Booking

This event is fully booked. To add your name to the waiting list, please email emily.ilett@womenslibrary.org.uk

The event is free and for women only*. To attend, please book below and we will share an email invitation with you.  If you would like to make a donation to Glasgow Women’s Library, you can do so here. Please note that booking will close on Tuesday 13th April.

*All women-only events are inclusive of Trans and Intersex women, as well as non-binary and gender fluid people who are comfortable in a space that centres the experience of women.

Accessibility

This session takes place via an online video call link. If you would like to attend, please book below and we will share an email invitation along with simple and straight forward instructions on how this will work. If you have any concerns about how this will work for you, please do get in touch and we’ll do all we can to support you in joining the session.

An automated live transcript using Otter.ai is available during this event.