POETY FLOATS: a workshop with Kris Demeanor
DATE: Wednesday, August 14, 2013 TIME: 9:30 am – 3:30 pm
PLACE: EPCOR CENTRE for the Performing Arts in the Arts Learning Centre (main floor of Centre Court). Afternoon on Olympic Plaza.
COST: FREE but registration is required. Interested participants please email tmcgrath@epcorcentre.org by August 9, 2013. Include your first and last name, telephone number and email address. To ensure that as many people as possible can participate, registrants are asked to provide 48 hours’ notice to cancel their participation so that if anyone is on the waiting list they can be added to the class. Enrollment is limited.
(PAPER-BOAT BY GERMAN CONCEPTUAL ARTIST FRANK BOLTER)
WORKSHOP INFORMATION: Poetry is like an octopus, or Medusa, or an umbrella! It is creative language that speaks to the universal, the personal, and the imaginative, and it can come in many forms. In this workshop, explore poetry in classic poem form, rhythmic spoken word (Slam!), song lyric and storytelling. Discover the differences in the ways these form are crafted and performed, and which style best suits you in expressing your joy, your rage, your fascination.
The goal will be to write a piece as a group and perform it, and if there’s time, give each participant a chance to write a personal poem or song. We’ll start off by Kris Demeanor giving examples of his own work, talking about how he approaches writing, and sharing tricks of the trade for novices and intermediate writers alike. We will get as weird, wild, earnest, descriptive, and hilarious as we can in our time together.
Participants will be invited to write their poems on waterproof paper and create paper boats. The boats will be released onto the water in Olympic plaza and the public is invited to take the boats with them.
RECEPTION: All participants of the Poetry Floats workshop are invited to attend the Papergirl reception on August 14 from 6pm – 8pm on the same day. For more information about the fantasticPapergirl Calgary Giftervention (the art of giving art!) please go to: http://papergirlcalgary.tumblr.com/gifterventions

Kris Demeanor Bio
Calgary songwriter Kris Demeanor delights in exposing the underbelly of western Canadian culture- gambling, drug use, murder, religion, the suburbs. His work explore the darkness and absurdity of these corners of Alberta life, offering songs, poems, and stories for audiences who like to think, laugh, weep, dance and party.
Kris has been increasingly active in the theatre, spoken word, and literary scenes in Calgary and around the country. Career highlights include taking the award winning short film based on his song ‘I Have Seen the Future’ to the Sundance and Toronto film festivals, collaborating with the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra on the 2011 event ‘Acres of Dreams’, and sharing a beer with David Byrne.
Kris is the first Poet Laureate of the City of Calgary.