Upcoming reading at the Zohrab Information Center

Dana Walrath, a writer, artist and anthropologist, likes to cross borders and disciplines with her work. After years of using stories and art to teach medical students at University of Vermont’s College of Medicine, she spent 2012-2013 as a Fulbright Scholar in Armenia where she completed her first book, Like Water on Stone a verse novel about the Armenian genocide of 1915. Loosely based on the story of her grandmother, Like Water on Stone is a Notable Book for a Global Society Award Winner, a Bank Street Best Book of 2015, a Vermont Book Award finalist, and more. Her just released graphic memoir, Aliceheimer’s about life with her mother, Alice, before and during dementia, has been featured in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Review of Books and the Philadelphia Inquirer. She has spoken extensively about the role of comics in healing throughout North America and Eurasia including two TEDx talks. She has also shown her artwork in a variety of venues throughout North America and Eurasia.

Her anthropological work on childbirth, genocide, and the end of life has appeared in edited volumes and anthropological journals and she is a co-author of one of the leading college textbook series in anthropology. Her recent essays have appeared in Slate, Somatosphere and Foreign Policy. She holds a PhD in Anthropology from the University of Pennsylvania, an MFA in writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts, and a BA in visual arts and biology from Barnard College. She lives in the mountains of Vermont.

Co-curator Lola Koundakjian enjoys her poetry diplomacy, touring the world to read at poetry festivals, and, promoting Armenian culture through the Armenian Poetry Project. This fall she is reading in three venues around New York City: in September as part of National Translation Month in the Inkwell series at the KGB Bar, a literary institution in the East Village neighborhood of New York City; in October, in the Americas Poetry Festival; and in November at the ZIC. She is the author of The Accidental Observer (2011 USA) and Advice to a Poet (2014 Peru; 2015 USA)

Shahé Mankerian is the principal of St. Gregory Alfred and Marguerite Hovsepian School in Pasadena and the co-director of the Los Angeles Writing Project. As an educator, he has been honored with the Los Angeles Music Center's BRAVO Award, which recognizes teachers for innovation and excellence in arts education.

His poems have won Honorable Mentions in 2011 Allen Ginsberg Poetry Award and Arts & Letters Journal of Contemporary Culture. Shahé was a Semi-Finalist for the Knightville Poetry Contest. He was the first place winner of 2012 "Black and White" anthology series from Outrider Press.

Mankerian's most recent manuscript, History of Forgetfulness, has been a finalist at four prestigious competitions: the 2013 Crab Orchard Series in Poetry Open Competition, the 2103 Bibby First Book Competition, the Quercus Review Press, Fall Poetry Book Award, 2013, and the 2014 White Pine Press Poetry Prize. His poems have been published in numerous literary magazines.