Louis
Place
Journeying with Mermaids, Oracles, and dem Blessings
A seven-week generative writing workshop
with Sharon Bridgforth
Wednesdays, July 2-August 13, 2025
9:30am PT / 12:30 ET / 6:30 CET
“I believe that through the act of sharing our stories: of opening, of being present while being vulnerable, of revealing who we are/where we come from/what we dream...of trusting ourselves enough to push beyond limits of what we think we know, of following the roads that the right questions can take us on—strengthens our capacity to hear and see one another, to hold space for each other, to connect more authentically, be better artists, to create the lives we most want to live. Ultimately, sharing our stories is an act of generosity, and compassion. These are things we do to be of greater service. To be ourselves more fully. To Heal. We do this even if it scares us.” —Sharon Bridgforth
Join us in a summer of writing / drawing / collage / moving / breathing. Centered in Bridgforth's “Theatrical Jazz Aesthetic,” the course will focus on creative process, the art of being present, and deep listening, along with opportunities to share work and ask questions.
Everyone will be encouraged to honor their capacity, to take care of themselves, to follow joy/curiosity, and passion. Drawing from dat Black Mermaid Man Lady, Bridgforth’s oracle deck, performance installation, novel, and tool for “communal wisdom and self-determination through art-gatherings-and resource sharing,” this class offers tools for expansive exploration for writers working in any genre or discipline.
Attend as many or as few sessions as you are able. A portion of each session will be recorded and shared for those wishing to participate asynchronously. Open to everyone who writes at Louis Place (Not a member? Join us!)
Everyone will be encouraged to honor their capacity, to take care of themselves, to follow joy/curiosity, and passion. Drawing from dat Black Mermaid Man Lady, Bridgforth’s oracle deck, performance installation, novel, and tool for “communal wisdom and self-determination through art-gatherings-and resource sharing,” this class offers tools for expansive exploration for writers working in any genre or discipline.
Attend as many or as few sessions as you are able. A portion of each session will be recorded and shared for those wishing to participate asynchronously. Open to everyone who writes at Louis Place (Not a member? Join us!)
Our time together will be guided by:
SUPPORT
in unearthing, receiving, holding, walking with, releasing, creating through what surfaces. Support yourself in ways that feel whole and Loving. That might mean calling a friend, a therapist, a spiritual teacher . . . going sleep or to virtual yoga, mediation, etc.
SPACE
to journal, draw, paint, sing move, paint, plant (respond in whatever way feels most authentic to you) to the prompts that will be Offered. There is no right or wrong. Follow your inner Knowing.
TIME
to respond to the prompts. If you have the capacity to - and to walk with wants to move through.
THE TRUTH
honor what you know to be real. Notice how you treat yourself.
Be kind. And patient. And Loving. Ask yourself, “what wants to happen.”
ALSO
It is okay if you don’t do any of this.
We are living in unprecedented times.
You might tend to every aspect of this process.
It might take a long time to return to it.
Or you might not ever have the capacity to engage fully.
Just ask yourself, “am I avoiding - or am I Lovingly giving myself what I need.”
Again there is no right or wrong. Just tell yourself the truth.
About Sharon Bridgforth
Sharon Bridgforth is a writer who collaborates with actors, dancers, singers, visual artists and audiences to install moving soundscapes of her texts in celebration of African-American southern migration stories/queerly.
Raised by southerners in South Central L.A., Sharon lived in Austin, Texas from 1989 - 2009. In Austin, thanks to the mentorship and support of many people Sharon grew into her Soul's calling as an artist/activist. Thanks to their generosity in 2025 Sharon is proud to say that she was inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters.
A 2023 United States Artists Fellow and a 2022 Winner of Yale's Windham Campbell Prize in Drama, Sharon's work is featured in: Dr. Omi Osun Joni L. Jones's book, Theatrical Jazz: Performance, Àṣẹ, and the Power of the Present Moment; Volume 110, No. 4, Winter 2022 of The Yale Review; Teaching Black: The Craft of Teaching on Black Life and Literature edited by Ana-Maurine Lara and drea brown; Mouths of Rain an Anthology of Black Lesbian Thought edited by Briona Jones; and the creative contribution section of Feminist Studies Volume 48 Number 1 honoring 40 years of This Bridge Call my Back and But Some of Us Are Brave! curated by Alexis Pauline Gumbs. Sharon's bull-jean & dem/dey back and All These Things: A Conversation by Sharon Bridgforth & Daniel Alexander Jones are published by53rd State Press. 53rd State Press and The Sledgehammer Series (an imprint of Tripwire Harlot Press) will be releasing publications of Sharon's work in 2025/2026.
AdeRisa Productions produced the bull-jean & dem/dey back Los Angeles Book Party Documentary directed by Adelina Anthony. This short documentary is based on a live event hosted by Leigh Robbie Gaymon-Jones from The Nest in Los Angeles. It features a conversation between Sharon Bridgforth and Daniel Alexander Jones, along with interviews and readings by Omi Osun Joni L. Jones, Sonja Perryman, Virginia Grise and Priscilla A. Hale.
A New Dramatists alumnae, Associate Company Member at Pillsbury House + Theatre (PHT) in Minneapolis, MN., and a Doris Duke Performing Artist, Sharon is a 2020-2023 Playwrights’ Center Core Member, a 2022-2024 McKnight National Fellow and has received support from Creative Capital, MAP Fund, and the National Performance Network. A touring artist since 1993, Sharon’s work has been featured at: New York’s SummerStage Festival; Rites and Reason Theatre’s Black Lavender Experience at Brown University, The New Black Festival at The Lark, Pillsbury House + Theatre, The University of Texas at Austin’s John L. Warfield Center for African and African American Studies and Links Hall. Sharon’s dat Black Mermaid Man Lady/Home - a Creative Capital project - launched in Minneapolis, MN May 2018 in partnership with Molly Van Avery, City of Lakes Community Land Trust and the Powderhorn Park Neighborhood Association. dat Black Mermaid Man Lady/Performance Installation premiered at allgo in Austin, TX in August 2018 and dat Black Mermaid Man Lady/The Show premiered at Pillsbury House Theatre in Minneapolis, MN in June 2018, and is streaming on Twin Cities PBS (Episode #131).
A MAP Fund Scaffolding for Practicing Artists Coach, Sharon is a long time member of Pangea World Theater and Art2Action's National Institute for Directing and Ensemble Creation. In 2023 Sharon had the privilege of serving as Guest Facility for Macondo Writers Workshop and as a Mentoring Artist for Atlantic Center for the Arts. She has served as Artist In-Residence for: Thousand Currents; Brown University’s MFA Playwriting Program; University of Iowa’s MFA Playwrights Program; The Theatre School at DePaul University; The Department of Performance Studies at Northwestern University; and has taught for The University of Texas at Austin African & African Diaspora Studies Department. Sharon was a writer and performer in Amara Tabor-Smith’s REVIVAL: Millennial Remembering in the Afro NOW and has served as a writer, dramaturg and voice over performer for Ananya Chatterjea Dance Theatre (ADT) and mentor for ADT's NextGen ChoreoLab program: Chawrchā. She was as a dramaturg for: Marjani Forté-Saunders + Everett Saunders 7NMS; the Urban Bush Women Choreographic Center Initiative’s Choreographic Fellowship program; Maria Bauman-Morales’, Desire: A Sankofa Dream; Ni'Ja Whitson's, Dark Matter Cypher Residency of The Unarrival Experiements; Rebecca Mwase & Ron Ragin's workshop of Vessel's at June Bug Productions; and was Embedded Writer for Marjani Forte-Saunders’s Memoirs of a…Unicorn residency and dramaturg for Leslie Parker's Divination Tools: imagine home residency - both at Florida State University in Tallahassee at the The Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography in partnership program with the Urban Bush Women Choreographic Center Initiative’s (CCI) Choreographic Fellowship program.
Thanks to funding from Solidaire Networks’ Black Liberation Pooled Fund Sharon and her wife, Dr. Omi Osun Joni L. Jones have created Called By Water, which includes a cohort of people of African descent gathered to use ancestral exploration, somatic insights, creative process, truth telling, and Joy making towards the development of a world that leads with Love, generosity, gratitude, and authentic connections of every kind.
The Sharon Bridgforth papers, 1989–2015, Sc MG 845, are archived at The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, The New York Public Library, New York, NY. Sharon Bridgforth papers, 1970 - 2024, are at the African American Community Archivist Austin History Center-Austin Public Library.