The Oxford American crew is venturing out of Arkansas and down the Mississippi to bring not one, but two electric events to the Crescent City on the night of Thursday, March 29th. Please join OA at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, 6-8 pm, with a party celebrating the success of the Oxford American’s new “Visual South” issue as part of the Ogden After Hours featuring Aurora Nealand. Pop over to the Circle bar, 8-11pm, to celebrate the talent of L. Kasimu Harris, writer and photographer of OA’s new online column Parish Chic; tunes by DJ Kristen of the Mod Dance Party.

From the Room 220 interview with writer and physician Dean Paschal:

Bleeding to death is not painful if it’s pure bleeding, because the nerve-endings for pain are not in most blood vessels. Pure bleeding means pretty much that the blood is coming from an internal location—a bleed from the G.I. tract, from the kidney, a leak inside the brain. The most common internal bleed is G.I bleeding, by way of a spontaneous rupture of a venous plexus or an artery. The bleeding can be massive, pints and quarts of blood. The patient will be a sweaty—we call it “diaphoretic”—anxious, worried, even embarrassed (as I think I mentioned in the story). But they are never screaming in agony. If, however, the internal bleed is triggered by an external trauma, such as a gunshot wound to the abdomen, those people will be in agony.

Paschal reads tonight at the Antenna Gallery with Michael J. Lee.

Francine Prose, from her introduction to New Orleans author Michael Jeffrey Lee’s new short story collection, Something in My Eye:

“Three or four stories into Michael Jeffrey Lee’s Something in My Eye—I believe it was right after I read the phrase, ‘The motel had complimentary toilet paper’—I became aware of feeling what I can only describe as a rush of gratitude, pure and simple. I was drawn to Lee’s lineup of loners and drifters, imperiled children and haunted psychos neither because I want to hang out with these bad boys, nor because I plan to cross the street when I see them coming, but because the invitation to inhabit their minds, to see the world through their eyes, and to watch their often unsettling stories play out in space and time enables Lee to do all sorts of extremely interesting things with consciousness and language.”

Michael Lee will celebrate the launch of Something in My Eye with a event as part of the Room 220 Live Prose at the Antenna Gallery reading series, Thursday, March 15, at 7 p.m. He will be joined by Dean Paschal, author of the local cult classic By the Light of the Jukebox. More details at Room 220.

At the start of Prospect.2 New Orleans in October, artist/architect/wonderful guy Bob Tannen invited all interested parties to help paint a series of canvases at his Art House on the Levee studio in the Holy Cross neighborhood. The result is a 12-part, 200-ft. mural created by 300 artists, students, children, friends, family and neighbors.

The canvases will be on display starting this Saturday at The Ideal Auto Repair Warehouse, 422 Girod St. through Jan. 29.

above: Photo by Michael Smith.

Constance wishes to thank everyone who came to the Winter Commencement of Avant Garden. If you missed it- we have posted a number of photos from the day. 

If you wish to contribute to the photo pool- please email us at: weareavantgarden@gmail.com

Big time New Orleans artist, MOMO creates beautiful geometries on walls around the world. He will be making deals at Avant Garden this weekend, presented by Constance.