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Meet THe Team
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The accordion fold is one of the simplest forms of an artist’s book, and one of the easiest to make. They work well for housing a travelogue or scrapbook, for example, but their applications are endless, and the form itself may lend structure to an idea you’ve been noodling on but haven’t found form for just yet. Above all, they're a fun, accessible way to bring image and text together.
In this three-hour workshop, we’ll first look at a number of accordion books for context and inspiration, do some prompt-based generative writing, and then we’ll make an accordion book of our own. You may even create more than one book, depending on how you choose to use the time. Basic supplies and tools—chipboard, glue, Exacto knives, scissors, paper—will be provided, but you’ll want to bring papers and elements of your own like magazines, pens/markers, watercolors, stamps, memorabilia, needle and thread, and so on. (If it seems like it might be fun to work with, bring it!) We won’t be very fussy with these books; the point is not to make them perfect but to play with the form and see where it takes us. (You are free to be fussy later, if you want.)
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Susannah Felts, co-founder of The Porch, is a fiction writer, freelance writer, teacher, editor, and native Nashvillian. In 2009, after many years away from her hometown, she returned to put down roots with her family in East Nashville. Previously, Susannah taught creative writing at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Watkins College of Art, Design & Film, and in several other youth and community settings. Her first novel, This Will Go Down on Your Permanent Record, was published in 2008 by Featherproof Books.
Susannah was the recipient of the Tennessee Arts Commission’s Individual Artist Fellowship in Fiction for 2013. She has been awarded the Tennessee Williams Scholarship to the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, as well as residencies at the Ragdale Foundation, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and the Hambidge Center for Creative Arts and Sciences. Her work has appeared in publications such as The Oxford American, Literary Hub, Longreads, StorySouth, The Sun, Quarterly West, Hobart, Five Chapters, Wigleaf, Quick Fiction, and others. She earned her BA with Highest Honors in Creative Writing from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and holds an MFA in Writing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Susannah is also a contributing writer for Chapter 16, Humanities Tennessee’s site devoted to literary culture.
"Susannah is fantastic! Encouraging, authentic, and insightful. I came away with so many useful ideas for improving and deepening my writing practice. I'm already putting them to use! Her prompts for re-visioning previous drafts were especially helpful."
"Susannah was great at loosening up the group and encouraging us to volunteer our work and our feedback for others' work. She set the tone for the class's constructive spirit and guilt-free approach to engaging new techniques for creativity and trying out new writing and revision methods. It was great!"
"Susannah really personified empathy. From the first class, I felt challenged and accepted."
