Buffalo Rising Online

Joel Lewitzky’s work evolves out of a stream of consciousness approach, and his images are intended to amuse the viewer and provoke thought about the ways we live and interact with others.

Joel has been concentrating on printmaking for a number of years - woodcut being his medium of choice. For the exhibition at Betty’s he’s given the term Mono-relief to these works, which are relief prints, but essentially mono-types. The process is much like a wood or linoleum block print, but Joel has creatively adapted a plastic material to use as the block/plate. This thin material allows him work with more immediacy than in wood. He is able to cut out elements and apply different colors before placing the imagery together again - like a jigsaw puzzle – prior to running it through the press. Catch the opening reception tonight.

Joel studied at SUNY Purchase as an undergrad and has is MFA from UB. After residing in NYC for 8 years Joel has recently returned to live in Buffalo. He works as a Teaching Artist at Starlight Studio and Art Gallery, 340 Delaware Avenue, Buffalo, NY. The Starlight Studio and Art Gallery provides individualized art instruction for adults with learning disabilities and neurological impairments.

Image: Lactose Intolerance

Wordflight, the monthly poetry series, returns to the Crane Branch Buffalo and Erie County Library at and features two multi-talented performers, Alex Mead and Janna Willoughby. This series features local poets and slots for open readers (sign-up at 6:45). Writers from the community, whether novice, emerging, or established, are invited to participate. Light refreshments will be served after the reading.

Alex Mead is a local poet, rapper, author, illustrator, and musician. His poetry volume, Invisible Fire: The Poems of Alex Mead and Anna Walsh, from AmProSoft, was published in 2005. He has also written two science fiction novels, McEmpire and Smash Your TV. His autobiography How to Care About Humans is published online. He has also released an album of digital music, Ambient Light. He is a riveting and popular performer who has been the featured performer at reading series such as the Allen Street Hardware Cafe Spoken Arts. He has performed with his band "Blood Thirsty Vegans" and as "My Rap Name is Alex" at "Dance Alive" and other venues.

Janna Willoughby, has been writing poetry since she was 5 years old and was first published when she was 16. Since then she has had poems in Paperkut, Pulp Literary & Art Magazine, WWC Facebook, ISP: Best Poets of 2003, Theater of the Mind, and the anthology, Living Spiritually in a Consumer Society. She is a graduate of Warren Wilson College in Asheville, NC, with a BA in Integrative Studies: Art & Business. She performs in poetry slams and was in the top 5 slam poets in Buffalo for two years running. She is an artist as well as a singer/songwriter who plays guitar and does political hiphop. A mesmerizing performer, Janna has been featured reader in both the Spoken Arts and the new/reN.E.W series, as well as many other venues. She is currently a co-editor of Earth's Daughters Magazine/ Collective, and has performed with them at the Screening Room, the Buffalo Small Press Bookfair, and Olean Public Library.

Just Buffalo/Talking Leaves/UB English Department/Buffalo State College present Exhibit X Fiction and Prose reading and book signing featuring Dave Boling and his work Guernica: A Novel.

Dave Boling, well-known sportswriter from the Pacific Northwest, unveils his first novel with a reading and book signing in Buffalo. Guernica is an extraordinary epic of love, family and war set in the Basque town of Guernica before, during, and after its destruction by the German Luftwaffe during the Spanish Civil War. Calling to mind such timeless war-and-love classics as Corelli's Mandolin and The English Patient, Guernica is a transporting novel that thrums with the power of storytelling and is peopled with characters driven by grit and heart. History and fiction merge seamlessly in this beautiful novel about the resilience of family, love, and tradition in the face of hardship.

The Exhibit X Fiction and Prose series is curated by Greg Gerke of Just Buffalo, Christina Milletti and Dimitri Anastasopoulos of UB English Department, Alan Shelton of Buffalo State College, and Jon Welch of Talking Leaves Books.