Something (rather than nothing)

Christopher St. John is an artist and curator living in Eugene, Oregon. His work touches on the the incredible luck we have in living on a planet with a biosphere, the joy of form, and the importance of listening. Animals make regular appearances in his work.Christopher St. John’s work has been exhibited and collected across the United States and internationally across Europe, Japan, Canada, and Malta. He received his BFA from the University of Alaska at Fairbanks. His work is in the permanent collections of two American museums. He is represented by Row Boat Gallery in Pacific and Galerie Biz’Art Biz’ Art in France.He is currently preparing for an exhibition in January at Eutectic Gallery in Portland, Oregon, and an exhibition in February at Sidestreet Arts in Portland, OR.St. John WebsiteSRTN Website

DANGUOLE LEKAVICIUTE is a creative living in Portland, Oregon.  Born in Lithuania and raised/educated in Reno, Nevada, she found her creative outlet via a food and cocktail recipe blog that allowed her to hone her writing voice and photography skills that also formed a foundation for creative discipline. Pursuing that on the side, she spent 6.5 years post-college graduation working in state government in Nevada before moving to Oregon and slowly building the bones of a career in the creative industry.  She currently serves as Creative Director of a food and beverage marketing agency and occasionally finds time to create personal work that refuses to pick a lane, ranging in themes from: the American West, the cosmos, nature, humor, and combinations of all of the above.DanguoleSRTN Website

Mystery/Thriller Writer ALLEN ESKENS!Allen Eskens is the bestselling author of The Life We Bury, The Guise of Another, The Heavens May Fall, The Deep Dark Descending, The Shadows We Hide, and Nothing More Dangerous.He is the recipient of the Barry Award, Minnesota Book Award, Rosebud Award (Left Coast Crime), and Silver Falchion Award and has been a finalist for the Edgar Award, Thriller Award, and Anthony Award. His books have been translated into 26 languages and his novel, The Life We Bury is in development for a feature film.Allen has a journalism degree from the University of Minnesota and a law degree from Hamline University. After law school, he studied creative writing in the M.F.A. program at Minnesota State University-Mankato, as well as the Loft Literary Center and the Iowa Summer Writer’s Festival. Allen grew up on the hills of central Missouri. He now lives with his wife, Joely, in greater Minnesota where he recently retired after practicing criminal law for 25 years.His websiteSRTN Podcast

"Seamus Murphy grew up in Ireland and is based in London. He is the recipient of seven World Press Photo awards for his photographic work in Afghanistan, Gaza, Lebanon, Sierra Leone, Peru and Ireland. He received The World Understanding Award from POYi in the USA for his work from Afghanistan and a film he made based around this work was nominated for an Emmy and won the Liberty in Media Prize in 2011. His work has been published and exhibited widely. He has made films for The New Yorker and Channel 4 Television in the UK. He is the author of four books including 'A Darkness Visible: Afghanistan' (Saqi Books. 2008) is based on 12 trips to the country between 1994 and 2007 and is a chronicle of Afghanistan’s extraordinary recent history. 'I Am The Beggar of the World' (Farrar Straus Giroux. 2014) offers a rare glimpse into the lives of Afghan women through their anonymous Landay poetry. He has collaborated with musician PJ Harvey on projects for 'Let England Shake' and 'The Hope Six Demolition Project,' for which he won a Q Award for Best Music Film in October 2016. Patti Smith listed Murphy’s film for Harvey’s 'The Words that Maketh Murder' as one of her Top 10 artworks, saying “... this unheralded piece (directed by Seamus Murphy) is a wisp of humanity celebrating the small things. “ Murphy and Harvey together published 'The Hollow of the Hand' (Bloomsbury. 2015) a book of his photography and her poetry. An exhibition and live presentation of 'The Hollow of the Hand' work took place at the Royal Festival Hall, London in 2015 and at Les Recontres d’Arles in France in 2016. His latest book 'The Republic' (Allen Lane. 2016) is an immediate and personal portrait of Ireland and was exhibited at The Little Museum in Dublin in 2017.His latest film 'A Dog Called Money,' another collaboration with Polly Jean Harvey, is currently screening around the world.VideoSRTN

I am so excited about this episode. Can't hold it back!This week on 'Something (rather than nothing)' VICKO ALVAREZ VEGA - in her words -***I never planned on being a comic artist. I never planned on being a teacher. I never planned on being an organizer or an activist. But I am so happy that I have done all that and more.I’m a native Tejana that has called Chicago home for 12 years and the creator and illustrator of the ScholaR Comics web and zine series. The comic follows the lives of ScholaR, Rosita, and Masir as they wrap their heads around their own tough realities. ScholaR has a few anger issues, Rosita is learning what it means to be undocumented, and Masir is coming into his own as a mixed race boy who doesn’t feel very “boy-ish”. Altogether, they’re a reflection of my friends growing up, the youth I’ve had the privilege of teaching, and the childhood stories that we all carry with us as adults.My latest comic zine, "Rosita Gets Scared", recounts Rosita coming to terms with her fear of deportation. The comic also serves as an activity book to be utilized in classrooms and with youth groups as a tool to encourage culturally relevant social and emotional learning. Weeks into its release, the comic was covered by Telemundo, Newsy, and Radio Vocalo, and has been ordered by activists, educators, and parents across the country. I’m very excited to have found community in people of color comic cons and I’m very happy about the growing opportunity to connect with like minded educators.My workshops and discussions cover a variety of topics including  Comics / Art as Activism   Becoming and Independent Woman/Latinx Artist   Immigrant and people of color portrayals in comics + literature   Do It Yourself (DIY) zine making and publishing   Career days and art workshops for middle school and high schoolers   Drawing and Writing as therapeutic practiceSRTN 

Another great listen this week with Artist VERONICA CASSON!"I'm Veronica, an illustrator and queer mom, living the dream with my family in Portland, Oregon.After being born on the east coast and spending many years in New York City, San Francisco and Mexico, I have recently moved to the Pacific Northwest.I am an award-winning graphic designer, illustrator and comic artist. My webcomic, Claviger, was nominated for and Ignatz Award at the Small Press Expo.Currently I am working on the remastered version of Claviger as well as a new comic, Grind Like a Girl, which shares my experiences in the world as a transgendered woman.Ways you can support my art: buy a print, Patron on Patreon, or hire me for your next project. Cheers!"

Zora Von Pavonine was born on a full moon and raised on 20 acres.Surrounded by animals, held most dear was the peacock family that allowed her to follow them around, telling stories, inventing all kinds of life. Momma Pavonine saw the creative spirit encapsulated in her precocious little Scorpio and encouraged music, dancing, painting and writing across the early years. Zora spent her teenage chapter foreshadowing her eventual participation in burlesque with another solo activity crafted beautifully from the mind and body, performing as a decorated cross country and track athlete, breaking records and holding others to this day.  Her deep appreciation for this output, mental tenacity, just the self and the body, stuck with her long after she left the track and immersed herself fully in hip hop dance.  She found grounding and heaven in hip hop and had been teaching the format for years when she found burlesque and she knew: she knew she had mined the gem, a dynamite composition of effort, passion, expression and self. A published poet, holder of a handful of intellectual property patents and a few degrees in the creative arts, Zora needles on towards creating smart, impassioned acts wrapped in costumes that speak to her tremendous love of fashion and design, reflective of her hip hop roots and the unmistakable dedication of a distance runner… It has been said that her sparkle can be seen from outer space; it has been rumored that one night in Zora’s audience will have you discovering confetti in all your places for a month on… with pasties so small, even the most veteran of show-goers blush, they come to see the tease and leave with an eyeful of feathers… she is the Queen With The Peacock Tattoo.Here is a film of ZVP by SRTNSRTN Website

Great chat this episode with Joey Bauer!JOEY BAUER is a musician under the alias Theo B. Veeus (can be found on Bandcamp). His albums are great journeys. I highly, highly recommend you travel these roads.Bauer also manages the great ***Darkside Cinema*** in Corvallis, Oregon. Listen in to hear about the intertwining of sound and image. This discussion really got me thinking about language and how we, as humans, speak and hear.Bauer is married and has two youngsters. The importance of film and music in his life really comes through as we discuss the psychological aspects of creating art as well as whether something can come from nothing.Thanks for supporting "Something (rather than nothing)"!!!Theo B. Veeus SRTN

A native Vermonter, Ethan attended the Maine College of Art and graduated from the Joe Kubert School of Illustration and Design in '98.Ethan has self-published his own comics since Year 2000,  taught a youth program for intro to comics at a day camp for Burlington City Arts for five years, has had work published in roughly a dozen role-playing game books for AEG and many more for 3rd party publishers, Ethan has had exceedingly minor success involving the Comic Book industry (inked a 5 page back up in B.Clay Moore's Battle Hymn for Image Comics back in 2000).Ethan moved to Portland, Oregon in 2008 where he met and volunteered with several the local comic scene enthusiasts that were involved in making Stumptown Comics Fest. In 2015, Ethan illustrated and inked the first issue of the comic Dark Anna & The Pirates of Kadath - a comic which is created and written by local Portland writer, Aaron Duran. Ethan continues to write & draw his own comics for an upcoming anthology called The October Ages as well as working freelance doing spot illustrations for role-playing games. Ethan currently resides in Portland, Oregon with his wife and two studio cats. EthanSRTN Website

Don't miss this episode!This week we talk Hip-Hop, Art, Comics, Chicago, Rap history, women in geek culture, action figures, sci-fi, fantasy, Oddisee, Little Brother, Rapsody with . . . SEAN WYNN A.K.A. Baddwolfe A.K.A. CeriusBlaq A.K.A. Hank McCoy Beast MC Comic enthusiast, Hip Hop Junkie, Marketing Nerd, Activist. General in the Preytorians Army. Owner of Strange Solutions Marketing & Consulting. A Chicago Native that has been residing in Portland for the last 10 years making a name for himself the professional nerd industries.Listen to the sound of the Preytorians hereSRTN Website

Joanna C. Valente is a ghost who lives in Brooklyn, New York. Joanna is the author of Sirs & Madams (Aldrich Press, 2014), The Gods Are Dead (Deadly Chaps Press, 2015)  Marys of the Sea (The Operating System, 2017), Xenos (Agape Editions, 2016), Sexting Ghosts (Unknown Press, 2018), and No(body) (Madhouse Press, 2019). They are the editor of A Shadow Map: Writing By Survivors of Sexual Assault (CCM, 2017), and received a MFA in writing at Sarah Lawrence College. Joanna is also the founder of Yes, Poetry, as well as the senior managing editor for Luna Luna Magazine and an editor for Civil Coping Mechanisms. Joanna has been featured in Brooklyn Magazine, Them, Prelude, BUST, Columbia Journal, Electric Literature, Joyland, Tarpaulin Sky, The Feminist Wire, Spork Press, Ravishly, The Rumpus, VICE, The Brooklyn Rail, VIDA, The Huffington Post, among others. Joanna also currently teaches courses at Brooklyn Poets. In addition, Joanna has also spoken or given lectures for/at SUNY Purchase College, Sarah Lawrence College, the National Eating Disorder Association, AWP, Brooklyn Book Festival, Shout Your Abortion, Ravishly, Luna Luna Magazine, Monstering Magazine, Winter Tangerine, and more.Joanna BioSRTN

CLAIRE PAPOULIS has always been interested in the path of holistic healing, forging a personal mission from a very young age to bring wellness and balance to her own life. After discovering the Amma Therapy program at The Wellspring School for Healing Arts, these values began to blossom as a career path. As a therapist, she strives to create a comfortable space in which clients can explore and enhance this path for themselves through education, healing, and relaxation. She continued her training in herbal medicine in the Professional Herbalist program through the East West School for Planetary Herbology. It is her priority to treat each client through a holistic model, addressing all elements of mind and body in unity.Alongside her career, Claire has always valued the arts, striving to maintain creativity as a presence in her life. Growing up with her father the NYC-based composer Jim Papoulis, she was exposed to music from day one and developed an awe with creative figures and the creative process. Although she has experimented with different mediums, her recent life has brought her back into mentorship under sculptor Greg Steinsieck with whom she is exploring creative expression through visual art. She holds a strong belief in the important interaction that occurs through stimulating different parts of the brain by engaging in a variety of both intellectual and creative mediums.Something (rather than nothing) Website

Check out the newest episode with poet Bunkong Tuon. We delve into (or at least mention) - Bukowski, The State of Nirvana, Cambodian Genocide and Diaspora, War, Censorship, What to do about Morrissey, The State of Poetry, Something, Nothing, Emily Dickinson, Amherst, Family.Bunkong Tuon is a Cambodian-American writer, critic, professor, and, most importantly, father. He is the author of Gruel (NYQ Books, 2015), And So I Was Blessed (NYQ Books, 2017), and Dead Tongue (with Joanna C. Valente, from Yes Poetry), as well as a contributor to Cultural Weekly. Nominated for the Pushcart numerous times, his poetry recently won the 2019 Nasiona Nonfiction Poetry Prize. He has completed a book of poems about raising his daughter in contemporary America. He is an associate professor of English and Asian Studies at Union College in Schenectady, NY.BKSomething Rather Than Nothing

I have been lucky to have so many wonderful artists join me in these early episodes, including Nicole J. Georges - a deeply funny and wise soul. Here is more about Nicole - Nicole J. Georges is a writer, illustrator, podcaster & professor from Portland, OR.Her Lambda Award winning graphic memoir, Calling Dr. Laura, was called “engrossing, lovable, smart and ultimately poignant” by Rachel Maddow, and “disarming and haunting, hip and sweet, all at once” by Alison Bechdel, author of Fun Home. 'Allô, dr Laura?' was an Official Selection at the Angoulême International Comics Festival.Nicole’s latest book, Fetch: How a Bad Dog Brought Me Home, is the recipient of 2 Oregon Book Awards, and a Lambda nomination for best Graphic Novel. It received starred reviews from Publisher’s Weekly and the Library Journal, and was voted a 2018 “Great Graphic Novel for Teens” by ALA. “Nicole Georges makes my favorite art about love and vulnerability”. -Jill SolowayNicole won the Sunburst Award for Excellence in Arts Education in 2012. She was the 2013 Fellow at the Center for Cartoon Studies, the 2015/16 Donaldson Writer in Residence at the College of William and Mary, and currently teaches at California College for the Art’s MFA in Comics Program.She has been publishing her own zines and comics for 20 years, and has toured the country extensively, including two appearances on Michelle Tea’s Sister Spit tour.Nicole currently splits her time between Portland and Los Angeles with her chomeranian best friend, Ponyo Georges. She is the host of the podcast, Sagittarian Matters.www.nicolejgeorges.comSomething (rather than nothing) Web

Aunia Kahn is a multi-faceted creative entrepreneur and a globally awarded, collected, and exhibited figurative artist/photographer, published author, instructor, and inspirational speaker. She is also the owner of Rise Visible a full service creative digital marketing agency and Create for Healing.Her work has been in over 300+ exhibitions in over 10 countries; at places such as San Diego Art Institute, Los Angeles Center for Digital Art, iMOCA, St. Louis Art Museum, Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, Mitchell Museum, and the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art. She has also been a guest on podcasts like Entrepreneur on Fire, with 70 million downloads & 1 million monthly listens.Aunia has curated several internationally recognized books and projects, including Silver Era Tarot, Inspirations for Survivors, Obvious Remote Chaos, Minding the Sea: Inviting the Muses Over for Tea, Avalanche of White Reason, XIII: The Art of Aunia Kahn, Witch’s Oracle and the Witch’s Oracle 2nd Edition, Moon Goddess (Modern Eden Gallery) exhibit, Tarot Under Oath (Last Rites Gallery), Lowbrow Tarot Project (La Luz De Jesus Gallery), etc.Her forthcoming projects include; An Epidemic of Retrospective, Disintegrating Stars, and the Ethereal Realms Tarot.She loves Animals, Prussian blue, Psychology, Design, Miracles, Hummingbirds & Life.https://auniakahn.com/Something (rather than nothing) Website

Very excited this month to debut an episode with Hannah Hull - an English artist and musician (check out her TED talk entitled Mad Love!) Two approaches to explain her work - “I make situation-specific art and undertake social research. My practice catalyses dialogue & change for socially-excluded and at-risk groups.  My approach is dynamic and responsive: an open mechanism that allows things to be made, reformed & challenged. The outcome of this process might be an action; it might be an object; or it might be words.” Also - about Burning Salt’s music - “Burning Salt is a collaborative music project headed by Hannah Hull, singer-songwriter and artist.  Hull is known for her startlingly honest songs and distinctive low-register voice. Fans have described her unusual vocal style as ‘scraped out of an ashtray somewhere in the early 90s,’ and ‘Friday night meets Sunday morning.’ Poetic, raw and alive, Burning Salt’s sound draws on folk, country and blues. A genre-bending approach in the vein of PJ Harvey, Nick Cave and Tom Waits.  Burning Salt is an independent project releasing on Hull’s own label, Lullaby Records.https://burningsalt.com/about/Something (rather than nothing) Website