Almah LaVon

Dreams of Hope's speaQ presents a soft place for myself: a radical self-love gathering with Almah LaVon! In this creative expression workshop, we will craft altered/altared self-portraits and love letters to the self 🥰💕 Meet us Tuesday, Feb 10th at 6 pm on Zoom! Visit dreamsofhope.eventbrite.com for the materials list and to register. Need materials? Local folks can pick up kits at @creative_reuse Pittsburgh Center for Creative Reuse during store hours (11 am-5 pm) from Sunday, Feb 8th to Tuesday, Feb 10th. Ten kits are available and provided on a first come first serve basis. Creative Reuse Address: 214 N Lexington St, Pittsburgh, PA 15208 #SelfLove #Workshop #Creative #Queer #LGBTQ #DreamsOfHope #speaQ

a rare opportunity to eavesdrop on a conversation about mycofuturity, among other things, between @agentsubrosa and me up at @lareviewofbooks today sweet to have been visiting LA for the first time last week on this tour of California swipe for some fungal beauties of the Pacific Coast / #fearlesssleeplessdeathless

My performative text has been included in @__firmino__ 's "Through the Obsidian Mirror: Onto-Corporeal Experimentations at Twilight" within the just-released book, Decoloniality in the Break of Global Blackness. I was truly honored to be included in the cross-border (multilingual, transnational) ceremony with my hermana and many beautiful others. Her article reflects "Oxlaval Aq'b'al" (Ixil Maya, 13 Twilight), a "collaborative multi-sited performance experiment," in which we dreamed, danced, sang, and raged into the twilight, the daily blurrer of binaries and borders. This "durational experiment" included firekeeping -- and the extrajudicial murders of Black folks were at the center of the flame, particularly George Floyd, so the release of this work around the five-year marking of his execution is just.... The embers are not yet cold.

When @aravensgrace asked me to co-weave a woodland creature photoshoot, I didn't have to get ready because I have been waiting for the invitation my entire life. You see, Maria is my mycelial familiar (shout-out to the brilliant Zachari Curtis for the phrase!). And she's the author of the forthcoming holy book, Fearless, Sleepless, Deathless! I wanted to write all of the beautiful words about this debut but The Hyphae holds them all. See the pinned post at @aravensgrace for preorder info! FROM THE BLURB "Naturalist, forager, and educator Maria Pinto offers a stunning debut book that uncovers strange and beautiful fungal connections between the natural and human worlds. She mingles reportage, research, memoir, and nature writing, touching on topics that range from Black farmers’ domestication of the unforgettable aroma of truffles to the history of mycological poisons wielded by enslaved people against their enslavers. Pinto brings a new perspective and a distinctive literary voice to this mix of environmental and lived history, and every page sings with her enthusiasm for the networks in which we are embedded: fungal, ecological, ancestral, and communal. Join her in pursuit of beautiful, perplexing, delicious, and deadly mushrooms as she explores this understudied kingdom's awe-inspiring diversity and discovers how fungi have been used by people, especially those on the margins, for survival, pleasure, revelation, and revolution."

Take me where the trees swim and leave me there.

Two postcards from my #PostcardsforthePeople series. Thanks to all the Black Beloveds for joining the postal parade, and to mixed-media drum major extraordinaire, @beatofblossoms ! Shellac-based pigment ink (@federalcolor ), crayons, colored pencil, tea, and tissue paper. Impish image is from a 1930s photo booth. Whimsy is ancestral. Believe that.

Outside the digital world, diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives are being dismantled on corporate and federal levels led by an executive order from Trump. The decree led the Pentagon’s intelligence agency to pause special events and programs related to Black History Month, Juneteenth, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Pride Month and Holocaust Days of Remembrance. But that absence of heritage and history isn’t felt during “Postcards for the People," a global postcard swap specifically for those of African descent. These postcards can’t be found at gift shops or travel centers. They are homemade keepsakes – mementos of Black love and empowerment mailed off from one sender to another. Mixed-media artists Jamila Zahra Felton, of Washington, D.C., and Almah LaVon, of Pittsburgh. Read the full story on @agentsubrosa x @beatofblossoms #postcardsforthepeople from @starrdunigan at the link in our bio!

Fresh off the presses from @blackjoyreckon ! Thanks to @starrdunigan for reaching out and chatting with us! Link in bio. @beatofblossoms

Create and connect with @agentsubrosa + @beatofblossoms IG LIVE, Monday, January 20 @ 11:30a. We’ll be talking #radicalgenerosity, #postcards, #mixedmedia, #collectivecare + more! Sign up for #PostcardsForThePeople. Link in bio. #postcardswap #Blackart #collage #mailart #snailmail #postcardart #Blacklove #Blackjoy #Blackliberation #hello #erykahbadu

Join #PostcardsForThePeople. Create and send radical postcards to other Black folks in this new year of love and liberation. Sign up link in bio. Led by @agentsubrosa and @beatofblossoms #postcardswap #mailart #snailmail #postcards #postcardart #Blackart #collectivecare #mixedmedia #Blacklove #Blackjoy #liberation

My brief profile of art-wonder Aaliyah Taylor. Support and follow her work! Posted @withregram • @craftindustryalliance Kids can be the best creative consultants, according to Aaliyah Taylor (@exaltinginbeauty ). The jewelry designer holds a day job as a children’s librarian, and her young patrons don’t hold back with their innovation expertise. She says, “They’re like, ‘Ooh, well, Ms. Aaliyah, you should do this, or maybe add this color or maybe make it this big.”⁠ ⁠ Making it bigger, bolder, and brighter is Taylor’s apparent anthem, and more than a few admirers are singing–and styling–along.⁠ ⁠ To read more about how Aaliyah Taylor makes bold jewelry from Perler Beads, click the link in our bio.⁠ ⁠ #jewelry #crafty ⁠ #jewelrydesign #jewelrydesigner #statementjewelry

My Afro-eco-ero short story, "The Wormho(l)e" is out! If you'd rather not read about Black queer pleasure, skip this one. ;-) Image is a combo of my analog work with alcohol ink and digital alchemy in the wilds of space-time. Link in bio (and in the comments).