LifePieces To Masterpieces

I have decided to start spotlighting organizations that are in line with what I consider: Seeking truth. They are doing a fantastic job creating support for young black men.

Check out their website: www.lifepieces.org


Life Pieces to Masterpieces was founded in the summer of 1996 by youth advocate, Mary Brown, and native Washingtonian and professional artist, Larry B. Quick. Started primarily as an arts organization, with seven young participants on a shoestring budget, LPTM took its name from the unique style of art the participants (called apprentices) collectively created. The technique of painting canvas, cutting it into various shapes, and sewing the pieces together allowed them to tell their powerful stories. This innovative form of art encouraged the apprentices to process challenging life experiences and served as a metaphor for positive development – the “masterpiece.”

Since its inception, Life Pieces to Masterpieces has grown into a multi-faceted developmental organization whose mission is actualized on a daily basis via the use of a unique and effective 4-part Human Development System (referred to as LPTM Basics.) It is through these “basics” – PURPOSE, PREMISE, PROCESS, and DECISION-MAKING TOOL that we give rise to a generation of youth and future adults who will influence positive change and demonstrate social responsibility.

Reading List/ Update

I went to the Capital Book Festival. I spent most of my time at the panels. The highlight was Ethelbert's interview. I didn't particularly care for the interviewer... not sure who she was but nonetheless I didn't feel like she quite fit the bill.

I was in a particularly introverted mood so I bought a few books which include the following:

CHE: A Revolutionary Life
Jon Lee Anderson

** I just got done reading Death of a Revolutionary: Che Guevaras Last Mission by Richard Harris

The Collected Poems of Audre Lorde ( about 300 poems... thank God I was breezing through her other books. I highly recommed Sister Outsider & Undersong)

The Listening:
Kyle Dargan
He has a new book: A bouquet of Hungers

Black Power: The Politics of Liberation
Kwame Ture and Charles V. Hamilton




Other Books I have collected over the last few weeks:

Where are the Love Poems for Dictators
Whispers, Secrets and Promises

Ethelbert Miller

For Colored Girls who have considered Suicide/ When the Rainbow is Enuf
A Choreopoem by Ntozake Shange

Impossible Flying:
Kwame Dawes

****

I was also able to unpack most of my books
I busted out a few oldies that I love

The Seagull
Anton Chekhov
translated by Tom Stoppard

Oh yeah,

The Maverick Room
Thomas Sayers Ellis

* I went to his reading at University of Maryland last week.