Underneath the Accent of My Skin, 2015 Artist in Community Grant Funded Project by NYSCA/BCA Created by Orlando Ferrand

Bronx, NY, May 13, 2015 --(PR.com)-- A mixed race and immigrant poet, writer and multidisciplinary artist, Orlando Ferrand is interested in exploring the realm of "hyphenated identities" as well as the definitions of "refugee" and "immigrant" through the creative process, in order to move beyond traditional prejudice and bias confinement toward a multiethnic and cross-cultural approach to the text as a visual and/or written narrative, as a permanent record of ancestry, as a depository of identity, and as a catalyst for transformation of both the individual and the community.

No matter where human beings come from, or the circumstances that push them into immigrating to other lands, they become "the other" when they find it possible to relate to one another, only if they could look at their similarities instead of looking at their differences. In a world swamped by the spree of globalization and digital communication, the human notion of identity acquires a multiplicity of nuances through storytelling and visual representations such as clay sculptures, photography, drawing and mixed media. The creative process becomes a vehicle for self-awareness, allowing "hyphenated identities" to acquire a sense of universality through the fabric of singularity.

The Workshop Series:

Hostos Community College, 500 Grand Concourse, Room C-391
Bronx, NY 10451

1.) Session 1. May 16th, 2015 from 12:00 noon – 3:00 PM. What is identity? Can people choose their own? Exploration through journal writing, vignettes, drawing and topic-oriented testimonies of how in global communities such as New York City, and The Bronx in particular, the notion of identity is often challenged by its own denizens and the body of politics.

2.) Session 2. May 30th, 2015 from 12:00 noon – 3:00 PM. Is this a melting pot? Exploration through collage techniques and creative writing of how the notion of identity, based on ethnic and cultural idiosyncrasies, becomes the vessel capable of containing the universality of those very ethnic and cultural backgrounds rooted in individual expression. Human beings live in tales: development of a portfolio of fabulations, based on workshop prompts and musings, that will germinate from the deconstruction of fairy tales, folktales and legends in a journey that will take the participants through Western, Oriental, and Native American tales, and will end with Afro-Cuban patakis.

3.) Session 3. June 6th, 2015 from 12:00 noon -3:00 PM. Artist/Writer as both, spiritual being and socio-political entity. Internal and External Inventories through journal writing, short narrative and storytelling: working with a personal inventory of character traits, familial relationships and even traumatic situations in and around participants' lives, taking into account socio-cultural and socio-political events which have also impacted their lives. They'll be revisiting the concept of "story,” woven since time immemorial into the fabric of universal archetypes, in order to recreate it from an individual perspective by playing with the core elements that have traditionally shaped the notion of fable, tale and storytelling.

4.) Session 4. June 13th, 2015 from 1:30 PM – 3:30 PM. Human beings live in poems: exploration of feelings through metaphors and poetic images invoked by revisiting memory lane: their music, their songs, their rhythms. Development of a series of poems, based on idiosyncrasies and subjective view of themselves, their loved ones, and the world that surrounds them. sculpting of a mask that bears a resemblance to their ancestors and to themselves.

5.) Session 5. June 20th, 2015 from 3:00 PM – 5:00 PM. Open to the Public. Theme: Underneath the Accent of My Skin: Who Are We? Presentation, exhibit and open mic.

For more info, please visit the website: www.orlandoferrand.net