Co-Creating Some Pathways Towards Liberation

Our Co-Creators are co-creating myriad pathways towards liberation, and we'd love for you to join them (AND US!) this Spring. Here's how.

Jan 27, 2022

Dear Artists, Organizers, Educators, & Comrades:

Finding comrades isn’t always easy. Add in the exhaustion, fatigue, and stress of constantly navigating complex health & safety-based decisions and even the steeliest nerves are frayed. It’s making meeting new people even more stressful and anxiety-producing even when we want, need, and desire more human connection.

At Queering Dreams, we understand just how messy this whole process is, and we want to offer y’all some space and time to dream, be, and connect. We provide an opportunity to slow down for a moment, let go of perfection, and discover what’s possible when we center listening & care.

And so too do the Co-Creators in our growing Queering Dreams Network of artists, organizers, educators, and comrades. In fact, they are diligently at work crafting virtual spaces to grow, develop, and be outside the confines of oppressive systems. It’s quite astounding all that’s being created even amidst an omicron surge that further reveals just how callous our government is towards death, disease, and expounding inequity. It reminds us that, truly, all we have is each other.

That’s why we want to share with you some upcoming opportunities to join Queering Dreams & our fabulous Co-Creators.

More after the jump.

Add Our Google Calendar to Yours!

Paul's Queerly Complex World: A silhouette of a person with shorter hair and their arms stretched out wearing the All We Have Is Each Other tee that has a pink glow around it. They are set against a manipulated photo of a succulents. The main colors of the background are a pale sea foam green, a golden yellow, and a light periwinkle.

A Space for Dreaming: Opening Hearts

We are back with a monthly A Space for Dreaming starting Friday, February 11, 2022, at 5:30pm PT / 8:30pm ET.

We’ll hold space & time for comrades to come practice communal, dreaming. First, we'll seed our dreams with the question, "How can we open our heart?" We will then hold space to dream & time to reflect. We'll bring everyone together in circle and those who desire to share with each other can. As we close, comrades will be invited to share ways they can open their heart in their own life, practice, community / communities.

Won’t you join us for some dreaming?

Introducing the Tea with Rupy & Jason, an Immigrant Artist Network Event

Tea with Rupy & Jason is an invitation to immigrant artists1 to join us, Rupy C. Tut & Jason Wyman, in conversation about home / not home & what is rejuvenating / not rejuvenating, learn more about the Immigrant Artist Network, and sign-up for a free, cohort-based, 8 Session Immigrant Aritst Salons launching in March 2022.

This intimate tea time offers a bit of respite from the constant hustle of both being an immigrant & being an artist.

Here’s what others shared at our last tea:

Three slides with pull quotes. Harjot Ghuman-Matharu, “There’s a Sikh principle of ਸੰਗਤ, sangat, of community, that is very important to me and is at the core of what I do in my work as a community organizer, and also what I try to express in my art.” Han Qin, “Rejuvenation is being alone, being able to put all of my energy into myself.” Juan Carlos Escobedo, “Now, I feel home is me. I’m a compilation of all these spaces that I’ve inhabited. Before I was trying to find a space, right? I am the space.”

Join us for tea.

Small Sweet Steps Coaching with TM Davis (aka Momos Cheeskos)

TM Davis co-created 60-Second Advocacy & Improv Gateway (for new & seasoned players) with us last November, and everyone who attended walked away an invigorated sense of self. Whether working out how to talk about something your passionate about or finding ways to loosen up your body, mind, and tongue, TM makes trying something new fun.

Now, TM Davis offers Small Sweet Steps Coaching to help folx develop their artistic and humanistic talents. TM provides a great service “helping you grow & develop your own skills and become more aware of your perceptions, beliefs, and habits.”

A digital flyer for Small Sweet Steps Coaching. It reads, “People come to Small Sweet Steps Coaching becuase they are interested in brining their goals into physical reality. They stay because they experience transformation and shift their ideas into concrete actions & take steps with clarity, focus, ease, and grace,” in black text on a bright red background. There is a picture of TM Davis, a Black, queer woman with a tie around her black hair. TM is smiling and looking directly at the camera. TM is wearing a blue scoop neck shirt. TM is set against a gray background.

Visit Small Sweet Steps Coaching

ArtBiz Circle with Nadïne LaFond

Are you looking for a community of artists learning & working together to make progress on their art projects? Then, join artist & educator Nadïne LaFond in her monthly ArtBiz Circle! It’s an affordable & supportive way to kickstart that thing you’ve been wanting to do.

ArtBiz Circle meets the second Saturday of every month at 7am PT / 10am ET. It’s a fabulous start to your Saturday, and puts you in an artistic state of mind for the entire weekend. Even if you’ve still got work to do, like a whole bunch of us.

PLUS! Queering Dreams own Jason Wyman plays Zoom Co-Pilot! You know you’ll be in good hands with the team of Nadïne & Jason.

A digital flyer for ArtBiz Circle. It reads, “A new vision. Crafting a Whole New Year with STRUCTURE for our creative practice. Let’s GO!” in black text against a white background. There is an image of a Black woman with auburn curly hair pulled above her head and wearing a navy tank top sitting at a table drawing on a piece of paper. Two other Black folx frame the image on the left and right side. They are looking away and down respectively. Another light skinned woman with long dyed hair and wearing a sun dress standing between the Black woman at the table and the Black person sitting on the right. They all look like they are in a classroom.

Art as Inquiry Workshop at Arts as Life

Fellow Queering Dreams Co-Creator of Sketchnoting Dreaming Abolition Todd Berman has a workshop coming up as part of the Arts as Life virtual conference on Wednesday, February 2, 2022. It is designed specifically from students, educators, and artists, so if you are any one (or maybe all) of those identities, this is a workshop & a conference for you.

Building on decades of supporting Bay Area teaching artists, the Arts as Life conference brings together all 5 arts disciplines, diversity, equity & inclusion, SEL, and trauma-informed practices.

Learn More about Arts as Life

Volunteer with Queering Dreams

We have got a lot coming up in 2022! And we definitely could use some help in making our queer dream of accessible space & time outside the confines of oppressive systems a reality for more comrades & neighbors. Could you help?

Help we need:

Simple video editing, incuding adding intros & outros, cutting clips for social media, embedding captions, etc. We can even help show you the ropes using a web-based video editor.
Editing transcripts / captions. We’ve got some great tech to help with this.
Spreading the word. We have hella, hella content from Queering Dreams & our Co-Creators & we want to spread the word like gospel.
You got another idea? We are always up for a great idea.

We will be hosting our first (of many) Queering Dreams Volunteer Orientation on Thursday, March 3, 2022.

immigrant artists encompasses artists who are immigrants, first generation or second generation immigrants, artists creating work focused on immigrant issues and life, and draw from the immigrant experience in their creative inquiries.