Library Foundation of Los Angeles - Calendar

Raising Support for the Los Angeles Public Library

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[ALOUD] at Central Library

ANN FESSLER

The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Before Roe v. Wade

[ALOUD] at Central Library

DANIEL WALLACE

Mr. Sebastian and the Negro Magician

[ALOUD] at Central Library

NEWER POETS XII

[ALOUD] at Central Library

STORYTELLING WITH THE PAINTBRUSH:

Artists and the Childrens' Book

[ALOUD] at Central Library

JOY HOROWITZ

Parts per Million:
The Poisoning of Beverly Hills High School

[ALOUD] at Central Library

AN EVENING WITH GRAPHIC DESIGNER CHIP KIDD

[ALOUD] at Central Library

Wed, Jul 11, 7:00 PM

ANN FESSLER

The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Before Roe v. Wade

An adoptee who was herself surrendered and recently made contact with her birth mother, Fessler traveled the country interviewing more than one hundred women willing to speak out about their experiences. Augmented by audio clips and area interviewees, she discusses the true story of “sex and the single girl” in the post World War II era

Ann Fessler is a Professor of Photography at Rhode Island School of Design. A specialist in video and audio installation art, she received her BA in Art from Ohio State University, her MA in Media Studies from Webster University, and her MFA in Photography at the University of Arizona. Fessler has been called a pioneer in the realm of reproductive justice for her bestselling book, The Girls Who Went Away: The Hidden History of Women Who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Decades Before Roe v. Wade, which tells the stories of unmarried women who were coerced in to placing their children for adoption, both by their families and a society that insisted single women could not be good mothers. Her own personal journey to find her birth mother’s hometown stimulated her research into the subject of adoption and shaped her visual exhibitions and writing.

Her photographs, installations, and films have been exhibited in major museums, galleries, and film festivals in the US and abroad, including the DeCordova Museum, the Walters Art Museum, Museum of Fine Arts Houston, and the California Museum of Photography.

[ALOUD] at Central Library

Thu, Jul 12, 7:00 PM

DANIEL WALLACE

Mr. Sebastian and the Negro Magician

In conversation with Erika Schickel

Set in the rural south, this ambitious new novel—by the author of Big Fish—features a richly conceived world of illusion that includes a meeting with the Devil, a magician’s blood oath, a decrepit traveling circus and a devastating loss.

Daniel Wallace is author of four novels, including Big Fish, Ray in Reverse, The Watermelon King, and most recently Mr. Sebastian and the Negro Magician. He has written one book for children, Elynora, and in 2008 it was published in Italy,with illustrations by Daniela Tordi. O Great Rosenfeld!, the only book both written and illustrated by the author, has been released in France and Korea and is forthcoming in Italy, but there are not, at this writing, any plans for an American edition. His work has been published in over two dozen languages, and his stories, novels and non-fiction essays are taught in high schools and colleges throughout this country. His illustrations have appearedin the Los Angeles Times, Italian Vanity Fair, and many other magazines and books, including Pep Talks, Warnings, and Screeds: Indispensible Wisdom and Cautionary Advice for Writers, by George Singleton, and Adventures in Pen Land: One Writer's Journey from Inklings to Ink, by Marianne Gingher. Big Fish was made into a motion picture of the same name byTim Burton in 2003, a film in which the author plays the part of a professor at Auburn University. He is in fact the J. Ross MacDonald Distinguished Professor of English at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which is also his alma mater (Class of '08).

[ALOUD] at Central Library

Thu, Jul 19, 7:00 PM

Co-presented with Beyond Baroque Literary Center and The Los Angeles Poetry Festival

NEWER POETS XII

This annual poetry reading for local voices introduces a cross-section of lively, talented writers who are making an impression in the Los Angeles poetry community: Dennis Cruz; Frankie Drayus; Evangeline Ganaden; Yvette Johnson; Elizabeth Ruscio; and Mitch Untch.

[ALOUD] at Central Library

Sun, Jul 22, 7:00 PM

STORYTELLING WITH THE PAINTBRUSH:

Artists and the Childrens' Book

A Panel Discussion with Illustrators David Diaz, Kadir Nelson, and Marla Frazee. Moderated by 2007 Newbery medalist Susan Patron.

[ALOUD] at Central Library

Tue, Jul 24, 7:00 PM

JOY HOROWITZ

Parts per Million:
The Poisoning of Beverly Hills High School

An unsettling and timely investigation into the ties between Beverly Hills, its oil wells, and a local cancer cluster. A compelling legal drama by a journalist and member of the Beverly Hills High School class of ’71.

Joy Horowitz is a freelance journalist and former staff writer for the Los Angeles Times. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, the New Yorker, Los Angeles magazine, and many other national publications. She graduated Harvard cum laude in 1975 and worked as a copy girl, sports writer and investigative reporter for the old Los Angeles Herald-Examiner. After stints as an investigative producer at the local CBS-TV news station in L.A. and feature writer at the Los Angeles Times, she received a Masters in Studies of Law (MSL) degree from Yale Law School in 1982.

She has been the recipient of a Ford Foundation Fellowship, a Pulitzer Prize nomination for her reporting on indoor air pollution for the Los Angeles Times, and Sunday Magazine Editors’ Association award for her Los Angeles Times magazine article “Greetings from Pearlie and Tessie,” which was the basis for her 1996 book, Tessie and Pearlie: A Granddaughter’s Story. Most recently, she received an environmental journalism fellowship at the National Tropical Botanical Garden in Hawaii.

[ALOUD] at Central Library

Wed, Jul 25, 7:00 PM

AN EVENING WITH GRAPHIC DESIGNER CHIP KIDD

Kidd’s book jacket designs for Alfred A. Knopf (where he has worked since 1986) have helped spawn a revolution in the art of American book packaging. “The history of book design can be split into two eras: before graphic designer Chip Kidd and after.” (Time Out New York)

Presented on the occasion of the exhibition “Dancing by the Light of the Moon: The Art of Fred Marcellino” in Central Library’s Getty Gallery.

Chip Kidd was born in Reading, PA in 1964. He lives in New York City and Stonington, CT.