Roberta Branca’s day job is the night shift, as a reference and instruction librarian at Hesser College in Manchester, New Hampshire. Her first-ever published work of fiction appeared in the July 2009 issue of the online journal, The Litchfield Literary Review. Her past writing experience includes journalism and technical copywriting and editing. Writing fiction has been her pleasure, pastime, and pet peeve since childhood. She is currently part of a writing group, 4-C Coasters, in Dover, New Hampshire. She was encouraged to join the project by three-time SPARK participant Jewel Beth Davis.

Peg Bruhn says art making has always been part of her life, from that first swiped lipstick and white wall. Nowadays she’s lucky to have time, a place, and lots of great art materials. She is surrounded and supported by family, friends, and a great community of artists at the Torpedo Factory Art Center, and SPARK is the latest addition to that.

Charisse Cecil is a writer and artist in Alexandria, Virginia.

Sarah Ciston lives in Oakland, California, but her flash fiction novel lives at sarahciston.com.

Caroline Crawford is director of publications at Saint Michael’s College and has edited the college’s magazine for nine years. When she’s not at work, she reads, writes, cooks, runs, spends some time in downward facing dog, and herds her two young children. Born and raised in Staten Island, New York, she lives in Burlington, Vermont.

Tamara Danoyan lives in Northern California and holds a non-creative job in academia. She does photography and dances Argentine tango for fun and self-expression.

Jewel Beth Davis is a writer and theater artist who lives in Rollinsford, New Hampshire. She has earned an MFA in Writing at Vermont College, and an MA in theater and movement. Her work has been published in Compass Rose, SN Review, Moondance Literary Magazine, Cezanne’s Carrot, Bent Pin Quarterly, READ THIS: MSU’s Literary and Art Publication, The Sylvan Echo, Midway, Lilith and American Diversity Report.

Luisa DiPietro has been shooting commercial assignments and fine art photography for two decades. She lives with her husband and various companion animals on a farm in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Her studio is located in Silver Spring, Maryland. Luisa is available for commissioned photography of all kinds with a special interest in horses. She has shown in local galleries and won best in show on a national level. Recent projects include photographing privately owned collections of Mexican Silver and Chanel for table top books.

Jim Doran lives in north Baltimore with his wife, Dawn, and two lovely daughters, and works as a web developer for Johns Hopkins University. Jim loves to draw and founded the junk mail art movement on Flickr.

Kathy Doran founded WORDrunner, Inc., a professional writing business in May 2000 providing content development for corporations, nonprofits and government agencies. She recently went to work as an intelligence analyst for one of her clients and continues to run her writing business on the side.

Lisa Eldridge enjoys baking banana bread using a recipe from The King Arthur Flour 200th Anniversary Cookbook. Unfortunately, the recipe calls for a 9-inch loaf pan, and all Lisa has are two 8-inch loaf pans. Luckily, she has discovered that if she increases the recipe by one-half, she can make two 8-inch loaves, thus increasing her banana bread enjoyment by 100 percent.

Jacqueline Gaulin is a writer who lives and works in Washington, DC, with Jester and Oscar, her two well-read, quite patient, and creative Bearded Collies who provide endless comic relief. She received an MA in fiction writing from Johns Hopkins University and is currently at work on a short story collection.

Jane Hulstrunk lives in Williamstown, Vermont, with her husband. She dabbles in photography for creative expression.

Robert Haydon Jones lives with his wife, Alice, in Westport, Connecticut.

Lin Jorgensen, an Alexandria, Virginia-based freelancer, is also principal of her start-up, Ingenious Communications. She specializes in developmental and substantive editing and Web content advisory, including proprietary styleguides. The Elements of Internet Style, for which she was lead editor, was judged a leading reference book by Foreword Magazine in 2008.

Dale Leffler is a writer, poet, lifestyle coach and workshop presenter. He lives and works in New Jersey while his children afford him the opportunity to travel to Denver, Burlington, and Virginia Beach to see and hug his five talented and inspirational grandchildren. Dale escapes to Monterey, Tennessee, every chance he gets.

Sheri Leseberg has been an artist for 10 years. Her medium is mixed now, but she started out as oil painter, moved into acrylics, and now blends in papers, photos, painting, and more, hence the name of her blog: Blended Colors. You can see items for sale at her Etsy Shop.

Mary Lucas is a marketing consultant based in Fairfax, Virginia. She studied news and editorial journalism at the University of Illinois then switched to the business side of communications with ad agencies (JWT and DDB Needham Worldwide) and as a Director of Marketing and Sales on the corporate side. She started studying creative nonfiction when her only child left for college in the fall of 2008.

Rusty Lynn is an artist reborn and unbound. After a 40-year career in ministry, social work, and pastoral counseling Rusty is once again producing art. He is an abstract painter, collage artist, and sculptor. He is also the co-creator and leader of a new course called Mindful Meditation for Enhanced Creativity.

Brian MacDonald is a media communications professional living in Jericho, Vermont. His creative pursuits include writing, photography, drumming, and supplying his muse with chocolates.

Susan McIntyre is a mixed media artist living in central Iowa.  She likes to do collage, alter almost anything, and paint. Her focus is constantly changing and evolving. Susan uses a method called Bricolage.  You can read about that lovely French word in Susan’s blog.

Jan Irene Miller started painting in high school and studied art history, music, and professional modern dance in college. Influenced by her broad international travels and studies her paintings portray the energy of dramatic change.  She paints with bold color, patterns, movement, and high contrast.

Amy Moffitt is a poet, singer, and blogger who lives in, but is not of, the Washington, DC area. Her travels have taken her as far as Iceland, Guatemala, and (repeatedly) the UK, and she is her happiest when surrounded by people from other countries, belief systems and cultures. A self-identified Presby-Cathlo-Episcopa-Mennonite, Amy is an active participant in the life of Common Table, an emergent church in Vienna, Virginia, and in Emergent Village.

JoAnn Moore now lives on the coast in northern California after far too long in wintery Vermont. She teaches high school English for her day job, walks her St. Bernard, Apollo, daily and writes not nearly enough.

Rachel Morton likes getting her hands into things: manuscripts, clay, and dirt.

Allison Nance is an artist (photography/mixed media) and graphic designer living in Del Ray, Alexandria, with her awesome husband, Kevin, and their mischievous, mini-rex bunny, Francesca. She works as the graphic designer for the Torpedo Factory Art Center and the gallery assistant for their national exhibition space, the Target Gallery.

Maria Margarita Panas, born in Munich, Germany, immigrated to the United States, landing in Brooklyn and subsequently became a naturalized citizen. She attended Wayne State University in Michigan where she met her future husband of 40 years. They have two sons and live in McLean, Virginia.

Melissa Pasanen is an award-winning freelance writer with a focus on food and farming. She co-authored the New York Times notable cookbook, Cooking with Shelburne Farms: Food and Stories from Vermont.

Nick Piche is an Addy-award-winning copywriter in Baltimore, Maryland, but is originally from Troy, New York. He has been writing since he was 8. At least that’s as far back as he can remember. Nick writes poetry, songs, ads, short stories, and useless ramblings. Whatever strikes him at the moment.

Lisa Pimental lives in San Francisco and makes her living as a copy editor and proofreader. Lisa plays with a lot of different types of art — photography, collage, acrylic painting, and more recently, encaustic/wax work — and uses recycled materials whenever she can, out of both a sense of wanting to reuse resources and loving to reinvent things. Lisa likes to camp, hike, garden, cook, and spoil her two cats, and aspires to learn how to play the banjo.

Lisa Reutzel is a writer, teacher, and mother of five who lives in Southern California. She received her MFA in creative writing from The Vermont College of Fine Arts and is currently working on a novel.

Cyndle Plaisted Rials is a busy woman of varied interests. Her days consist of taking care of her seven month old son, writing poetry, and creating new handmade items for her web shop, Frost.

Gabriel Shanks lives in New York City.  A poet, playwright, photographer and stage director, Gabriel was one of the creators of “The Village Fragments,” which received a 2007 OBIE Award. His poems have been published in The Wild Goose Review, Ya’Sou, From Now On, Chopin with Cherries and elsewhere, while his current photography is showcased at GlitterLens and in a long-form collaboration project, Imagining Oscar. The recipient of the Theatre Project Honor for Outstanding Vision, he was named a “New Arts Leader”by the Washington, DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities.

Amy Souza is the founder of SPARK and runs the project from her home in Arlington, Virginia.  When she’s not cajoling people to join SPARK, setting up partner pairs, nagging people about deadlines, or working on the website, she writes, edits, paints, and walks dogs. Amy has a master’s degree in radio and television from San Francisco University.

Tavia Stewart lives in Oakland, California, where she works as the Young Writers Program Director for The Office of Letters and Light (National Novel Writing Month and Script Frenzy) and as a co-editor of Watchword Press. She is also the Visual Art Curator of Whole Story, which is a new performance event that transforms a conjunctive gallery and theater space into a life-sized, multi-media diorama in reaction to one short story selected from submissions to Watchword Press. She is proud to be a current member of the San Francisco-based writers collective, More Cowgirl, and to have been published in Smokelong Quartery last spring.

Norma Tennis is an artist and graphic designer who lives by the ocean in San Francisco. Her friends, family, and animals are her inspiration.

Lisa Ventrella is a writer and part-time critical care RN who lives in the Chicago suburbs with her husband and two children. She received an MFA in Writing from the Vermont College of Fine Arts and dreams of living in Montpelier, Vermont, someday. She writes short stories and has recently discovered the challenge that is flash fiction.

Michelle Townsend Wallace is a writer, artist, and musician living in Dallas, Texas. She has a background in counseling and nonprofits, and is always looking for opportunities to integrate her many passions. Michelle has been married for 11 years to her childhood sweetheart, and they have three children.

Paula Tarnapol Whitacre is the principal of Full Circle Communications, a writing and editing firm in Alexandria, Virginia.

Helen Whittaker is a freelance educational author and consultant with a background in primary teaching. Originally from the UK, she emigrated to New Zealand in 2005. By day Helen writes non-fiction for children, but by night she writes fiction and poetry for adults.

Nick Winkworth was beamed by matter transfer from his native England to California’s Silicon Valley in 1989, and has so far found the process to be irreversible. When not marketing computers he makes photographs that owe less to Ansel Adams and more to the modern abstract painters and sculptors he was exposed to from an early age by his parents (both artists).

Janet Yandik lives in Shirlington Village in Arlington, Virginia. Her hobbies include having fun with photography.

Round 1: May 2008

Round 2: September 2008

Round 3: February 2009

Round 4: May/June 2009

Round 5: August 2009 — YOU ARE HERE

I started this project in 2008 to propel myself out of a creative slump and was thrilled to find so many willing and enthusiastic participants. As it turns out, I’m lucky enough to know many talented writers and artists. For some of them, writing or art is their profession. Others tuck creative time into the free spaces of a day—ten minutes here, a half hour there. Many of the SPARK participants didn’t know one another, nor did they ever meet in person, but they all share some common traits:  a desire to gain inspiration in a new way, the willingness to try something new, and an openness to receiving the gift their muse delivers.

The project’s rules are simple. Writers send artists a story or poem; artists send writers an image of their painting, photograph, or sculpture; and musicians send either an MP3 file or a link to their work on another website. Working over a set period of time, each person uses their partner’s piece as a jumping off point for new work of their own. People are allowed to respond to their partner’s work in whatever way they wish (although writers are asked to keep their pieces to 1,500 words or less).

The goal is simply to give writers and artists a challenge, a new way of looking at the world and their work, and a chance to inspire another creative soul. Thus, some of the resulting work is considered final by its creator; some is not. Again, the goal is not to create a perfect poem or a salable work of art, so as you view the work please do not judge what you see as such. In fact, I’d ask you to suspend judgment as much as possible and simply look at these groupings to consider how each person’s work influenced their partner’s.

SPARK rounds take place four times each year. Send us a note if you’d like to join us!

Amy Souza
Arlington, Virginia

SPARK rounds take place in February, May, August, and October, and we want you to join us! RSVP today by filling out the form below with your name and email address.

Questions? Let me know! Or RSVP today! (Fill out the form below with your name and your email address, and let me know if you’re  a writer, an artist, or both.)

Amy Souza
Arlington, Virginia

Or if you’d like to contact a particular contributor, just send me a note and I’ll forward it on.

Amy Souza
Arlington, Virginia