The Fort Gallery offers poetry and music amid visual arts for its February First Thursday event.
Poet Amabile Ranta was born in East Vancouver to Italian immigrants and now lives in Maple Ridge. She has taught elementary and secondary E.S.L., students-at-risk, high school English, and adult education.
Ranta has organized and moderated The Maple Ridge Writers’ Cafe, Poetry Feast (fundraiser for the Maple Ridge Food Bank), and the S.F.U. Philosophers’ Cafe – Maple Ridge branch. Her most recent publication, Quiet Art can be found in the 2014 poetry anthology, Island Magic.
Presently, she is writing creative non-fiction and poetry.
The musical guests are Paula Justus and Friends. Paula’s original songs bring together blues, jazz, country and soul influences in a modern upbeat ensemble that speaks of simple love, blossoming blues, the delicate and wild nuances of humanity, and all things that concern the soul.
The evening features “love and grief” the work of contemporary artist Kristin Krimmel, who has created a 13 panel suite of text-based images to express her passage through love and grief.
This free evening of celebrating local, thought-provoking art takes place 7 to 9 p.m. at 9048 Glover Rd. Go to www.fortgallery.ca for more information
Documentary
The Naomi Klein and Avi Lewis documentary This Changes Everything is being shown at three Kwantlen Polytechnic campuses.
The Canadian-made documentary was filmed in Canada, China, India, the United States and Greece. The filmmakers and well-known Canadian political commentators show people trying to make their communities sustainable.
The movie was shown Feb. 3 at the Cloverdale campus.
The public can also see it at the Langley campus at 2 p.m. on Feb. 4 in room 1804. A showing at the Surrey campus, 12666 72nd Ave., on Feb. 9 at 1 p.m.
A panel discussion follows each showing.
All showings are free admission. For more, go to thefilm.thischangeseverything.org.
