City of Asylum
Giving Voice.
Anita Levels’ presents “ConverSing,” a presentation of thought, conversation, and music, exploring the origins of jazz music from the Black American experience.
This program features a screening of "EXODUS: Mass Migration and the Ripple Effect in the Americas," a series of three short photo documentaries based on Rosso’s work, directed and produced by Jose Muniain.
To live is to tell stories. Embracing that truth, Story Club Pittsburgh (created by the former producers of The Moth Pittsburgh), organizes and hosts a monthly nonfiction storytelling series at City of Asylum. The theme for April 2023 is "Late Bloomer."
Lifelong activist Ruchira Gupta shares her debut novel, "I Kick and I Fly." This outstanding work of young adult fiction draws inspiration from Ruchira's experience making the Emmy-award winning documentary "The Selling of Innocents."
In support of his project “Four for Mingus,'' AJ Johnson kicks off the first in a series of four concerts. These performances are dedicated to visionary musician Charles Mingus, centering on political and protest music, spirituality and self-reflection, Charles Mingus’ own expansion of the blues, and the inspiration he took from Duke Ellington.
2022–24 Poet Laureate of Allegheny County, Doralee Brooks, leads this two-part writing workshop. The workshop focuses on the practice of ekphrasis, a literary device accomplished through detailed descriptions of visual art.
HarmoniZing presents a new formation consisting of Mimi Jong (erhu), Huda Asfour (oud), and Bailey O'donnell (tabla). The trio shares a passion for intercultural collaboration, creating music mostly based on the Chinese, Arabic, and Indian traditions fused with today's global perspective.
Reel Stories is a free monthly film series dedicated to showcasing international queer cinema presented in partnership with Reel Q, Pittsburgh’s LGBTQ+ Film Festival. April's screening presents "Being Thunder," a moving documentary directed by Stéphanie Lamorré.
In this virtual fourth installment of our International Reading Series curated by Anderson Tepper, City of Asylum welcomes Yanick Lahens and Lyonel Trouillot. Yanick, Lyonel, and Anderson will discuss the authors’ recent novels and explore the concept of Haitian literature as a whole.
2022–24 Poet Laureate of Allegheny County, Doralee Brooks, leads this two-part writing workshop. The workshop focuses on the practice of ekphrasis, a literary device accomplished through detailed descriptions of visual art.
This performance is part of the Stephen Philip Harvey Octet (SPH8) tour celebrating the release of their debut album, Elemental. This collection of music is inspired by the natural and spiritual elements of water, air, earth, and fire.
Jazz Poetry 2023 welcomes the master of rhythm, James Brandon Lewis, back to City of Asylum to kick off this festival of life. Accompanying James and his quartet in this overture are poets Terrance Hayes, George Abraham, and Cynthia Dewi Oka.
This workshop for music educators and musicians is led by Jazz Poetry Month musician Elina Duni. Subject matter will focus on the art of making music and the ways it can be adapted to suit mood or theme.
City of Asylum welcomes critically acclaimed Swiss-Albanian singer Elina Duni, who shares the stage with poets Mj Shahen, Yalie Saweda Kamara, and Oleksandr Frazé-Frazénko
We welcome back Elina Duni her second night of Jazz Poetry. She is joined by poets Ben Okri and Jorge Olivera Castillo, whose fresh performances serve to reshape and reimagine this compelling refrain.
The fourth night of Jazz Poetry presents a refreshing and lively collection of performances. Brazilian-American singer-songwriter Alexia Bomtempo, literary trailblazer Eileen Myles, Chicana poet and activist Rachelle Escamilla, and writer-in-residence Olena Boryshpolets supply a night of emphatic verse and sound.
This workshop is designed for teens and young adults, and will be led by Jazz Poetry Month performers Gaia Rajan and Rho Bloom-Wang. The workshop will focus on poems of formal confinement and escape, exploring the ways queer people and people of color negotiate their relationship to established forms by warping them into something of their own.
In this program, we welcome renowned Hungarian saxophonist Mihály Borbély. He is joined by accomplished poets Ariana Benson, Gaia Rajan, and City of Asylum writer-in-residence Rania Mamoun.
This workshop, led by renowned saxophonist Mihály Borbély, is for anyone interested in jazz and the making of jazz. Mihály will discuss his Hungarian, Central, and Eastern European cultural and musical identity, providing an intimate and exclusive presentation of his experience as a versatile multireedist musician.
Mihály Borbély returns for a second night of Jazz Poetry. He shares the stage with advocate and activist poets Cameron Awkward-Rich,Tabassam Shah, and City of Asylum writer-in-residence Anouar Rahmani.
The final week of Jazz Poetry Month begins with a deep breath, a respite ushered in by the Dyer Rosenbloom Kitamura Trio. They share the stage with acclaimed poets Sumita Chakraborty, Rosebud Ben-Oni, and Poet Laureate of Allegheny County, Doralee Brooks.
Violist Melanie Dyer returns for her second night of Jazz Poetry, this time amid the ranks of WeFreeStrings. The sextet is joined by poets Desiree C. Bailey and Roy G. Guzmán.
Our Jazz Poetry Finale welcomes artists who bring the spirit of this festival into the future: the Hip Hop Orchestra and our 2023 Youth Poet Laureates and Ambassadors, Rho Bloom-Wang, Aja Lynn, Jade Davis, and Audrey Alling.
This program welcomes author Andrey Kurkov, whose books are often full of black humor and are mostly set in post-Soviet reality. This is the third installment of our Ukrainian Artist Series.
Join us for a conversation on intersecting marginalized identities in Appalachia with Lambda Literary Award Finalist Neema Avashia, author of "Another Appalachia: Coming Up Queer and Indian in a Mountain Place," and Namita Dwarkanath, a University of Pittsburgh law student and prior advocate for gender-based violence prevention.
This program is the second in a series of three classical music concerts performed by the Clarion Quartet. This concert honors composer Erwin Schulhoff, a multi-faceted and multi-genre innovator in music, far ahead of his time.
As part of his project “Four for Mingus,'' AJ Johnson presents the second in a series of four concerts dedicated to visionary musician Charles Mingus. This concert will feature his music reflecting energetic black Christian worship practices and music reflecting Mingus' own self-reflection.
Debut author Amelia Possanza asks: How could lesbian love help us reimagine care and community? What would our world look like if we replaced its foundation of misogyny with something new, with something distinctly lesbian? The result is "Lesbian Love Story," an intricate tapestry of lesbian histories, seamlessly cinched together with threads of Amelia’s own story.
What do we want future generations of queer people to know about our time? In this workshop, we will create individual digital archives of our own lives, and, as a group, we will gather them all together to make a queer time capsule.
As many of you know, since 2010, June at City of Asylum means the return of one of the most popular annual poetry events in the city—Cave Canem’s Faculty Reading. This coincides with the week-long Cave Canem Retreat, their long-standing flagship program.
