The X Page:
A Storytelling Workshop
Click here to visit the web site!
Season four runs May – July 2022.
Ticket info coming soon for the 2022 live in-person performance, Sunday, July 24.
I co-founded the workshop in 2019 with Dr. Lamees Al Ethari. Our first season took flight thanks to the collective energy and effort of a large team of collaborators, sponsors and supporters. Each season has been different, as we’ve adapted to changing circumstances during the pandemic.
While our Season Two performance, “Stories in Transit,” had to be cancelled due to COVID-19, we were grateful that the stories had already been written.
“Stories in Transit” were published online by The New Quarterly in May 2020.
For our 2022 season, we are thrilled to be back together again in person.
I look forward to sharing photos, updates and links from season four!
The 2022 X Page Team also includes: Anandi Carroll-Woolery, editor, and season 2 performer; Pamela Mulloy, editor of The New Quarterly; Melissa Durrell, vocal coach, and founder and owner of Durrell Comm; Maha Eid, stage manager, and season 1 performer; Cecilia Vizcaino, peer mentor, and season 3 performer; Eleni Zaptses, administrative coordinator, and Nada, assistant director. Tarunima Mittal returns as artist-in-residence.
The X Page is an interdisciplinary community arts project that connects women who are immigrants or refugees with artists in Waterloo Region, who assist and mentor them in writing and performing their own stories.
In the spring of 2019, The X Page performed our Season One show “Quilt of Stories” for a live, sold-out theatre audience.
The stories were published by our partner, The New Quarterly literary magazine, in a special online feature.
Our third season, in 2021, was held entirely online.
The 2021 stories and a recording of our live online performance “Little Things” are available for you to read, and to view!
Our twelve-week workshop sessions include both writing and performance practices, and are guided by writer Tasneem Jamal (Where The Air Is Sweet) and director Pam Patel, artistic director of MT Space theatre company.
Our workshop uses writing and drawing exercises based Lynda Barry’s teachings and philosophy, including “The X Page.”
We like to say that “The X Page” is the opposite of a blank page. It’s the space where we enter into an image using all of our senses. “The X Page” has been a solid foundation for our workshop’s trust-based collaborative creative process.
Thank you, Lynda Barry.
