Welcome to a very old-fashioned website! This is a place for writing and art I'd like to share easily.
☙ June (2012) - text for Melissa Dunphy's compositon for solo voice & looper pedal
☙ Philadelphia Devotionals (2011)
☙ I provided artistic direction and project management for Story Seek (2023) an ambitious collaboration between Philadelphia's international literary magazine Cleaver Magazine and the Drexel University Entrepreneurial Game Studio—part virtual-reality game, part immersive theater, part neighborhood poetry slam.
Since 2009 I've been in a deep love affair with static trapeze—both in the many-person ensemble of Tangle Movement Arts, as a static trapeze coach, and as a solo artist. Here's a peek:
I make watercolor works on paper with a special focus on depicting mirror selfies, hands at work, West Philly streets, and domestic objects:
🧮 I love creating wordplay puzzles in the style of the New York Times's "Connections" game:
☙ Game #1 🍬 ☙ Game #2 👈 ☙ Game #3 🧠 ☙ Game #4 ☁️ ☙ Game #5 🌊 ☙ Game #6 🌶️ ☙ Game #7 ⏲️ ☙
🕒🕓🕔🍞✨ Starting with starter: in 2020 I wrote up a friendly guide to sourdough bread.
🎙️ Podcast episodes I've had the pleasure of participating in:
☙ Happy Hour on the Fringe (2020) - interview with Tenara Calem
☙ Ideas on Fire (2016) - interview with Cathy Hannabach
🖼️ For a couple years I kept a microblog including circus photos and random chatter.
Based in Philadelphia, Lo (aka Lauren) Rile Smith is an multidisciplinary artist/arts adminstrator who finds electric connection with bodies in motion and images on paper.
Lo is the founder and producer of Tangle Movement Arts, an aerial-dance-theater company which blends contemporary circus arts with theater, dance, and live music and has presented boundary-advancing performance to the Northeast US since 2011. She coaches trapeze in West Philadelphia with a passion for safe technique and strength training for beginners, and act development for circus artists ready to tell a story.
As an editor and writer, Lo co-founded Cleaver Magazine, was Assistant Editor of the American Poetry Review, and has provided editorial support and writing instruction to numerous students and projects. Her poetry has appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer and Philadelphia City Paper as well as journals including Stirring, Skanky Possum, Apiary, Xconnect, Vocabula Review, and CrossConnect.
As a grant writer and reviewer, she has brought $150,000+ into the arts and cultural community in Philadelphia. By day, she is the Rare Materials Specialist at the Rare Book & Manuscript Library at the University of Pennsylvania with a particular interest in contemporary fine press materials.
☙ contact me
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