How To Build A Fire (December) @ Open Source Gallery
STORYTELLING
Thursday, December 21st, 7-9pm
@ Open Source Gallery
306 17th St, Brooklyn, NY 11215
Theme: Kujichagulia: Self Determination
December at Open Source is How to Build a Fire and Open Kitchen, a simple dinner for community members spiced up with storytelling! The HTBAF hosts will provide the food, you bring your appetite … for good stories and camaraderie. There is no show in the gallery this month, a wide open space to fill with your ideas. Our theme for December (as we lead up to Kwanzaa) is Kujichagulia: Self Determination. In the midst of turmoil, we are bringing this year to a close and launching ourselves into the new one. What choices are we making to shape our lives as we desire, to live according to our values and beliefs, to realize our visions, whatever they may be?
Storytellers:
Vanessa Jackson
Vanessa Jackson is a writer for SNL.
Joe Pontillo
Joe Pontillo has been on MTV, Sirius XM, Gotham Comedy Live, and Amazon Prime. Most recently he dropped a YouTube Special in 2023 called ‘No One Asked For This’ His jokes have appeared in Timeout NY, the Washington Post and on ESPN.com. Go to his website or Instagram for more!
How to Build a Fire is a community storytelling series where a diverse group of individuals share real-life, personal narratives centered around a different theme each last Thursday of the month. At times funny, at times sad, their stories weave together a broad illustration of the human experience. How To Build A Fire will takes place at Open Source Gallery -a welcoming, nurturing, intimate, safe environment- where, monthly, one can see a new exhibition installed by an array of up-and-coming and established visual artists.
How To Build a Fire was founded by Terence Degnan. This year Stacie Evans and Lana Siebel will be co-curating and co-hosting.
Stacie Evans writes in long hand. With a fountain pen. Because she’s that girl: the wannabe homesteading, selectively Luddite girl who is addicted to her phone and regularly overshares online. She met James Baldwin in Paris … which will ever and always be the most glamorous and dramatic thing about her. Her writing has appeared in New South, After Ferguson, Bellingham Review, and The Rumpus.
Lana Siebel performs all over the US, including NYC, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, NJ, and Washington DC. She was selected as a featured comedian at The Connecticut Comedy Festival along with comedians such as Gilbert Gottfried, The Headliner Series in NY, The Punch Line Comedy Club in Philadelphia, as well as the Fairfield Comedy Club in Connecticut. As an actress, Lana is featured in numerous films and off Broadway plays. She studied acting at Lee Strasberg Institute and HB Studios with Austin Pendleton. Lana was also a competitive International Latin style Ballroom dancer ranked internationally and 7th in the US! She immigrated as a refugee from Kharkiv, Ukraine when she was seven years old with her family to Brooklyn, NY where she grew up and now resides.
This program is supported by the Puffin Foundation
