[carriage return]

 

 

 

dancing girl press & studio invites writer/artists (of all genders) to submit both text and visual based work for [carriage return] the first in what we hope will be a series of 7” x 7” handmade anthologies dedicated to the typewritten word/image. All submissions must include at least some typewritten elements, but may also include other mediums. We are looking for work that explores what is possible both visually and materially possibly using the mode of expression. We will be taking submissions from August 1st –September 30th for this project, which we hope to unveil at AWP Seattle.


Specs: please send 1-3 pieces as .pdf or .jpeg scanned attachments to dancinggirlpress{at}yahoo.com with the subject heading “CARRIAGERETURN/yourlastname”. Poems, prose, lists, letters, vispo, text based artwork, collage, all are welcome.

dgp news & notes

Midsummer and already our 2014 season is filling up with awesome books (though there are still a few slots open toward the end of the year, so keep those manuscripts coming. We are officially open until August 31st.).   What can you look forward to next year?  Not only are we bringing on board a bunch new authors (keep an eye on our FB page as we make introductions throughout the next couple of months), but so far we'll also be releasing second chaps in 2014 from Carrie Bennett, Nicole Steinberg, and a book of poems/drawings from recent dgp-er Yu-Han Chao.

 

In 2014, we will be celebrating our 10th Anniversary, which means lots of festivities, including our AWP Seattle adventure. It's oddly appropo considering I spent AWP 2004 (here in Chicago) running around with copies of the first chap/trial run , my very own Bloody Mary but actually two scared to show them to anyone since I didn't really know what I was doing.  It thrills me to no end that this will be our 4th conference and (hopefully) we've got this thing down.  I'm also happy to be sharing some table space with Misty Publications (and at nearby tables) the folks from Menacing Hedge, Hyacinth Girl Press, Blood Pudding, and the Rooster Moans Collective. So basically it will be whole freakin row of awesome indie  (and female-run) publishing ventures.   Keep an eye out for details on other things that may be happening in terms of panels and readings and such as we know it.

In other news, we are just about to launch two new books this week, Meryl dePasquale's Dream of a Perfect Interface (featuring an amazingly lovely letterpressed cover courtesy of the author and artist Shawn Hebrank), as well as Kyle Law's My Visions Are As Real as Your Movies, Joan of Arc Says to Rudolph Valentino. We are midstride on a couple of other books, with still a whole lot of goodness coming in the remainder of this year.

 

 

The rest of this week is dedicated to getting out all the sale orders from a couple weeks ago (the proceeds from which were awesome and will go along way towards helping us with our Seattle trip next year.)  We'll probably be doing another 3/$10 deal in the fall, so stay tuned if you missed this one. Rumor has it we'll also be hosting another giveaway once we meet 1100 followers on our Facebook Page, so watch that space in the next couple of weeks...

casa

 

 

There is a lot to be said about home base, little as I seem to see of it sometimes between the library and the studio. It's pretty much my favorite place (okay it's a tie with the studio, but here there are cats, so it wins.)  I've lived in the same 3rd floor apartment for nearly 13 years, and despite the occasional ridiculousness of my Loyola U neighbors (who have an occasional tendency towards loud parties and drunken running through the halls), I wouldn't want to live anywhere else.  I am not really one of those transition-friendly sort of people who can up and jump cities or abodes and pretty much even the mere thought of moving gives me hives.   As an adult, I've really only lived in three places: the others: my tiny cozy grad school studio apt. in Lincoln Park, and then a hard-to-find spacious old flat in Rockford (sadly given up when I couldn't find a job to pay for it..I still dream about those glass fronted cabinets and the sleeping porch *sigh*)   Considering I only really looked at one other place before I saw this one and fell in love, and it was a hasty decision that happened over the course of about two weeks when I found out I'd been hired at the library, it worked out remarkably well (despite the noise sometimes and occasional broken elevators, we have an excellent super and mgmt. company compared to other renter's horror stories I've encountered.  Plus my rent has risen at a pretty stable and reasonable rate). 

 

It's a pretty big building, a 1930's midrise and apparently onetime hotel.  I love the high ceilings, parquet floors, the largish windows and white trim. I even love my pink bathroom tile and my 1950's-era  perpetually-rusting-at-the hardware metal kitchen cabinets (they've been replacing the cabinets over the years as people move out, but they will have to pry my cold dead body off of mine.).  Things also used to be much more of a catastrophe in the dining room before I had the studio with all of the printers and press supplies, but it definitely tends toward more of a controlled chaos nowadays--just my sewing, jewelry, and art supplies mostly-the stuff I work on at home....(the table is pretty battered with adhesives and paint and glitter, so I don't really actually eat dinner there...).  My writing area is actually a corner of the living room, where I keep my laptop and official paper sorts of things, closer to the bookshelves, which are in easy reach.  I do have an abundance of closet space, though the entry closet is ill-used and full of empty boxes, Christmas decorations, and various décor detritus that should have been thrown out.  I've been meaning to clear it out and store my off-season clothes there since things are getting dicey in the bedroom closet.

 

I have also been long enamored of my neighborhood, which feels like a glorious little secret nestled here near the lake. (it's like right there on the other side of Sheridan.)  There isn't much happening in terms of nightlife or attractions in Edgewater unless you head inland toward Andersonville, but there is an entire city out there for that (though increasingly my little corner has been hosting more and more food-related delights and antique/thrift stores.) 

 

Kiki Smith

 

Today is one of those interesting and maddening swirly sort of days in which I feel brimming with ideas and at the same time frustrated that there never seems to be time to tackle them.  So I make lists.  And lists of list. Rip them up.  Start over.  Or more often, don't even know exactly where to start.  I place my finger down right at the midpoint of summer every year and every year, I feel like it should be more.  More productive. More organized.  More creative. More something.  Just more.

I feel myself being pulled more in the direction of prose than poems of late.  And in that, all flush with ideas for projects and in need of some sort of tether, some sort of line through them and out the other side. so I make lists of them.  Rip them up.  Start over.

notes, etc.

1. Thankfully, the heat broke over the weekend, so I'm planning on being ever so much more productive than last week (I kept having to call it an early night when it was too warm to work without losing my mind.)  So, thus I'll be playing catch up all this week and mostly doing some production rather than design work which is actually nice since I don't have to think much and just work with my hands.

2.  The weekend was 1 part bookmaking and an equal part napping all day on and off Sunday, which of course means there was very little happening in the creative productivity department. (I'd meant to dive back into the ghost landscape poems.)  I did arrive home on Saturday to a big stack of loveliness in the form of my author copies of beautiful, sinister.  I plan on doing some sort of giveaway in the next couple of weeks so stay tuned...

 

3.  Because I spent a lot of late last week longing for cooler temperatures, I did turn an eye toward fall and its wardrobe possibilities.  (as if I need to buy more clothes..)  I spent some downtime fleshing out my little pinterest board in terms of color combinations and things I'd like to wear / hunt down this fall.  Also, some time at Polyvore, playing with some color combos. 

4.  I did manage to send out another batch of acceptances for the 2014 series yesterday afternoon.  We'll be introducing all of our newest acquisitions on the facebook page throughout the summer, so check them out..

Another week and I am feeling very much in the thick of things.  But the only way out seems to be through, so I'm going with it.  And it's hot, the gross sort of heat that makes my lettuce soggy as soon as it's out of the fridge and the cats lie around bellies-up in a stupor. I am also still a/c less at the studio since they are working on the brickwork on my side of the building, so I'm pretty much hot everywhere but the library (where of course I freeze all day). The only bonus in the studio is that is the humidity makes the paper extra malleable, so I get a really nice fold on things.

But I am self-medicating the heat with strawberry/kiwi smoothies from the sushi place on the corner and the daily reminder that in 6 months, I'll be begging for this sort of weather. Otherwise,   I have been reading more dgp submissions, tweaking layouts on upcoming books, and playing with some cover ideas for upcoming titles.

I've also just dug in on the proofs for the shared properties of water and stars, which is in the final stages of production. I intend to sit down sometime in the next couple of days and go over it with a fine toothed comb. It's exciting, all these books coming into the world.

beautiful, sinister

My little prose poem chapbook, beautiful, sinister, has been released into the world from the amazing Maverick Duck Press. And it’s only a mere $6 for a book packed with creepy identical sisters, floodwaters, and 1970’s charm…

get your very own here:

thrifty-goodness

In my efforts to get more clothes for less money, I was lucky enough last time I was in Rockford to pick up this most gorgeous sweater, the very perfect blue/grey shade I'd been looking for at a mere $2.99 unworn with the tags still attached.  There were two others (a black with grey embroidery and a white sheer crochet one, but this is by far my favorite.)  A while back, I was also pretty successful at some of the Mississippi stores, mostly since people really don't seem to be buying up all the awesome knitwear when you pretty much have year long summer.  I managed to score a brown shirtdress, a straw tote (a replacement for the bag with the broken handle I took with me), and a pretty amazing overnight bag I've been using for shorter trips that don't require a suitcase.  

notes, etc...

1) It's been a spate of beautiful, mildish weather, and despite the glut of tourists downtown, it's really rather lovely. The last couple of days have included a vet visit for one of the gingers, a lackluster movie of which the best part was popcorn and junior mints, some vintage slip dying (mostly for me, my older ones are too big and falling apart.) and some glorious, glorious sleep. Today I'm up for some housecleaning and waiting for grocery delivery but not much else...

2.)  For the past couple of weeks, I've been idly searching for the perfect denim or chambray dress (one with a nice dark wash, a good shape to it, but not so tight I look like a sausage).  I found it in this number, which I've ordered and am excited to get my hands on. In other random fashion thoughts, this black/grey loving urban dweller has also come to a realization that pastels actually look really good with my skin tone (it's the wayward blonde in me) and I've become a little obsessed with really pale yellows.  I also found myself looking longingly at an orange polkadot dress a couple weeks ago (though I didn't buy it yet..)  I am admittedly also obsessed with polkadots, so that may be the draw more than the orange.

3.) Press-wise, there are books just about ready to drop from Nikia Chaney, Molly Sutton Kiefer, Meryl dePasquale, and Lois Marie Harrod and I'm set to complete another round of layouts this week for other July releases. We are amazingly more or less on schedule (more or less). There are also still a couple days left for  the 3/ $10 sale, so get them while you can.

4) Plans are afoot for an August trip deep into Wisconsin to visit my cousin in Tomahawk for a couple days.  Then a longer stay with my parents (who have assured me that the pool I keep getting denied a swim in due to it being freezing everytime I get home since they bought it, should be tolerable at that point.)  The 4th was all to brief, so I desperately need a little bit more vacating...

oh, july

I am back in the saddle after  good weekend at home, including some productive thrifting exploits (a spectacular vintage dress and a couple of cardigans) in addition to the usual picnic/cookout festivities.  I perfected my white sangria via the extensive use of peach schnapps instead of triple sec, pillaged a sale on nail polish at the Dollar General, and possibly ate enough fried chicken that I may sprout feathers.

But mostly I've been doing press related things since I got back, including another dip in the dgp submissions pool that found a couple of keepers, as well as some cover designs for upcoming books from Nikia Chaney  and Lois Marie Harrod.  Plans are also now afoot on AWP Seattle 2014.  We'll be sharing a table with Misty Publications and (if approved by the AWP Powers That Be) engaging in some paneling  and off-site shenanigans with some other women-at-the-helm ventures.  (we also have a special sale going on to help fund such shenanigans and adventures).  

I am mostly just trying to enjoy summer and pretty dresses and ice cream and trying not to worry about things incessantly (pretty much my permanent setting.)

long weekend

 

 

So I am off for the weekend after a tiny three day week that felt like seven (work is a gross place, not the actual work, but certain backstabbing bullshit .As much as I like my summer evenings, I like very much my evening shift so I don't have to witness it at least firsthand.). In general, I feel like I've been put through a washing machine lately and hung out to dry and desperately need some days where I don't have to think or be a grown-up for awhile, to not have to worry about money and meals and where they come from or what I'm going to cook).  

 

Press-wise, I did manage to finish up a couple of the books that are set to start printing when I get back.    And I'm moving along through edits on the radio ocularia series, plus laying out plans to continue on the landscape text that goes with the tiny paintings.  Wading through submissions continues to find some excellent things for 2014 (I've been previewing some of the authors at the Facebook page if you'd like a peek at what's coming next season.) And there is still so much more this year, as well.  I always think I'm catching up, but we still have a lot going on in the next six months.