Fleshed Out: An embodied writing & movement workshop

Posted on by Ryan Collins

This workshop aims to connect minds to bodies and encourage self-empowerment. Our bodies are our homes and in our daily lives, we are forced to separate body from mind. In this two-part, one-day workshop, we will get to know our bodies and connect our creative lives to our physical lives.

Through a holistic and empowered lens, burlesque performer Mary Quite Contrary will lead participants through one hour of burlesque movements that will connect sensuality to the day-to-day. There will be a water and snack break, following which, writer Sarah Elgatian will follow with a writing practice that uses the body as a grounding space for our physical work.

Narrating Grief Through Poetry #2 – Workshop led by Becky Nakashima-Brooke & Ryan Collins

Posted on by Ryan Collins

Following their “Narrating Through Grief” workshop in November, MWC and Illuminate Healing Studio will host a writing workshop centered on grief: writing into and through it, using sound and poetry as tools to both capture and release it in creative ways. Hosted by Becky Nakashima-Brooke and Ryan Collins, the program will feature a sound bath, brief readings and discussion, and time to write and share as a group. This workshop will feature different readings and writing prompts than the last one, FYI.

Please email Ryan Collins (mwc@mwcqc.org) to register. Cost for the workshop is “pay-what-you-can” at the door on the day of the event; if you can’t pay anything, no problem.

Support MWC for Giving Tuesday on 12/3!

Posted on by Ryan Collins

We are writing, like so many other nonprofits are, to ask for your support this Giving Tuesday (December 3, which kicks off our year-end giving campaign) by renewing or starting a membership so that we can continue to provide high-quality, low-cost literary programming to our community as we have for going on 45 years.

In 2025, we will continue our traditional programming: both the Collins Writers’ Conference and the Young Emerging Writers Internship will celebrate their 20th anniversaries in 2025, and we’re planning some special events to celebrate. Writers’ Studio (our twice-monthly critique group) will continue as it has for over 50 years, The SPECTRA Reading Series returns in the spring with four events, and we have a number of terrific workshops coming up. We will be publishing an anthology on the theme of “Being Human in the Age of AI” in partnership with Galvin Fine Arts, in addition to two  the Foster-Stahl chapbooks and The Atlas. We also want to bring more writers to the Quad Cities, host more workshops, and continue to grow our partnerships with other organizations throughout the community. And we cannot do that without you.

SPECTRA Reading Series | Final Event of 2024: 12/7 fea. Jacob Saenz & Narratives QC

Posted on by Ryan Collins

SPECTRA Lives! The Quad Cities longest-running reading series returns to Rozz-Tox on Saturday, December 7 for its last event of the year, featuring award-winning poet Jacob Saenz and local writers from Narratives QC.

Saenz, whose book Throwing the Crown, won the 2018 APR/Honickman First Book Prize, will also lead a free community write-in at 6:00 p.m.; there will be short reading, followed by a prompt written by Saenz. Copies of the reading will be available at no cost, and there will be time for participants to write and briefly discuss their work, followed by an open mic. Then at 8:00 p.m., three writers from Narratives QC will read from their work – Lynn Carsten, Tanner Jordan, and Nathan Wirth – with Poet and Creative Arts Specialist for Narratives QC Chris Britton introducing. A feature reading from Jacob Saenz will close out the evening.

Application Bootcamp: How to get the residencies, fellowships, grants, and other opportunities you want – Virtual Workshop led by Jeffrey Wolf

Posted on by Ryan Collins

As Virginia Woolf once wrote, any successful writer needs financial support and a room of one’s own. For today’s writers, this often means winning grants, fellowships, and residencies (including MWC’s own Great River Writers Retreat). But how do you find these opportunities? Where should you apply? How do you approach writing cover letters and proposals? This class will be a crash-course in applying for things as a creative writer.