Passport to the Middle East
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Hold Your Workshops, Classes & Seminars at Levantine Cultural Center. Call 310.657.5511.

Event Rentals


Middle East Hip Hop sponsored by LCC. Read a review.
Transcending Nationalism
Read about Transcending Nationalisms, June 30, 2007 at the Fowler, UCLA

Levantine Center recommends Sally Potter's YES

Iraqi-American Playwright and Actor Heather Raffo and Her One-Woman Show, "Nine Parts of Desire," Are the Talk of New York and Los Angeles


"In the Mirror of the Sky."
New membership gift!
Al-Andalus to Jerusalem:
Levantine Festival at the
John Anson Ford



Al-Andalus
with Tariq Banzi, Julie Banzi
and flamenco dancer Ana Montes

 Click Here To Read
Three Articles on the Concert

A 9/11 Gallery
A 9/11 Gallery
Read brief article on this event in the Daily Pilot
Printable Flyer

On March 5, 2007, a bomb exploded on Mutanabbi Street, the bustling center of Baghdad bookselling, filled with lively bookstores, cafés and book stalls. 30 people were killed, more than 100 wounded.

Artists for BaghdadLevantine Cultural Center, Newport Beach Library and the Mutanabbi Street Coalition, along with cosponsors Los Angeles Poetry Festival, PEN Center West, Red Hen Press and Writers at Work invite Orange County residents—and Angelenos who want to get out of town for the afternoon— to memorialize the blast's wounding of Baghdad's literary-intellectual heart, with live music by the Saadoun Al-Bayati Ensemble and readings by Beau Beausoleil, Doris Bittar, Michael Datcher, Sesshu Foster, Sam Hamod, Dima Hilal, Janet Sternberg and Carina Topal. Read about original Los Angeles event.

A short documentary of Mutannabi Street will be screened and the event concludes with a light Middle Eastern reception. A donation of $20 per person will be requested. Seating is limited and advance reservations are strongly suggested.

Saturday, March 29, 3-6 pm, Newport Beach Central Library, 1000 Avocado Avenue, Newport Beach. Ample lot parking. RSVPs in Orange County, call 949.548.2411. In Los Angeles call 310.657.5511. Or reserve in advance now by donating online (suggested donation $20 per person):

$

Artist Bios

Beau Beausoleil is a poet and radio host in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is also a bookseller and one of the cofounders of the Mutanabbi Street Coalition. He has authored books of poetry, including Concealed In Language, What Happens and Aleppo
.
Doris Bittar is an artist and writer who was born in Baghdad, Iraq of Lebanese parentage. Her early childhood was spent in the outskirts of Beirut; her experience of Lebanese culture itself is intertwined with European culture, particularly the French, because of the colonial relationship. Her family immigrated to New York where eventually she studied Fine Arts. In the United States, Bittar's observations both coincided and clashed with the portrayal of the "exotic Orient" and the various images of Arabs, Jews and Europeans. The cross-pollination between these cultures has created a hybridized tangle of perception that is played out in her paintings.

Cafe Al-Shahbender
Cafe Al-Shahbender, Mutanabbi's literary café, was destroyed by a car bomb in March 2007. Photo by Hadani Ditmars
Bittar received her Masters of Fine Arts from the University of California, San Diego. She has had solo exhibitions at the Alternative Museum in New York and in California at the David Zapf Gallery and at various colleges and universities. She has shown in group exhibitions throughout the United States, in Europe and Mexico. In 1995-96 she was a fellow at the Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Study Program. Most recently Bittar was a recipient of the California Arts Council Fellowship. Bittar currently resides in southern California with her husband and two sons. Visit her site.

Michael Datcher is a poet as well as the author of the critically acclaimed New York Times bestseller Raising Fences. His most recently produced play Silence was commissioned by and premiered at the Getty Museum. His poetry is widely anthologized. He is a frequent news commentator who has appeared on Nightline, Dateline and the BBC. He teaches poetry, literary nonfiction and journalism courses at Loyola Marymount University and is the cohost of "The Beautiful Struggle" on KPFK 90.7FM.

Sesshu Foster has taught composition and literature in East L.A. for 20 years. He's also taught writing at the University of Iowa, the University of California, Santa Cruz, the California Institute of the Arts and Naropa University. His work has been published in The Oxford Anthology of Modern American and, recently, XCP:
Streetnotes. His last readings at St. Mark's Poetry Project NYC are Mp3 archived at Salon.com and at Cal State Northridge. He is currently collaborating with artist Arturo Romo and other writers on the website, www.ELAguide.org. His most recent books are the novel Atomik Aztek (City Lights, 2005), and World Ball Notebook (City Lights, 2008).

Sam Hamod is a poet who has served in two wars, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry, has published 10 books of poems, including After the Funeral of Assam Hamady and Dying With the Wrong Name: New and Selected Poems, 1968-1979. He is a winner of the Ethnic Heritage Prize for Poetry, and has taught at The Writers Workshop of The U. of Iowa, Princeton, Michigan, Howard and edited Third World News in Washington, DC. He now lives, writes and teaches in San Diego.

Dima Hilal is a poet and writer, born in Beirut and raised in California, where she studied at the University of California at Berkeley. Her work has appeared in various publications, including the San Francisco Chronicle, Orion literary journal, Aramco, The Poetry of Arab Women: A Contemporary Anthology, edited by Nathalie Handal (Interlink Books, 2001) and Scheherazade's Legacy: Arab and Arab American Women on Writing, edited by Susan Muaddi Darraj (Praeger, 2004). Most recently her poetry appears in the new anthology of Arab American poets, Inclined to Speak (U. of Arkansas 2008), edited by Hayan Charara. Her numerous readings include radio appearances on KPFA, KXLU and KPFK. She has been featured at the Beyond Baroque Cultural Center, World Stage, Levantine Cultural Center, Autry Museum and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. She has been invited to lecture and read at venues such as UC Berkeley, the Association of Writers and Writing Program's Annual Conferences and the Alexandria Library in Egypt. Last year, her libretto, Raheel, was a finalist in the Oakland East Bay Symphony's Words and Music Project. Hilal currently resides in Dana Point, California where she is working on a collection of poetry.

Janet Sternburg is a poet and essayist, best known in the literary world for editing the classic two-volume set, The Writer on Her Work, long recognized as a groundbreaking work on women and writing. Norton issued a special anniversary edition in 2000 with a new introduction by Julia Alvarez. The Writer on Her Work has been named one of the 500 Great Books by Women: Thirteenth Century to the Present, and has been recognized by the Literary Guild, Writers Digest Book Club, Quality Book Club and the Common Reader. She is also the author of Phantom Limb, a meditation on loss and consolation that has been described by Bill Moyers as "the perfect metaphor for. . .the ultimate inevitabilities of life." Her latest work of poetry is Optic Nerve (Redhen Press 2005). Sternburg served as Director of Writers in Performance at the Manhattan Theatre Club and she also produced the prize-winning film "Virginia Woolf: The Moment Whole". Her photography has been featured in one-person exhibitions in New York, Los Angeles and Mexico, as well as in Aperture and Art Journal. As former Vice-President of PEN USA, she currently serves on its board, as well as on the Visiting Committees for the Writing Programs at CalArts and Antioch University. Sternburg was selected by The Utne Reader's annual arts issue as one of 40 creative people chosen for innovative work in the arts.

Carine Topal won the 2007 Robert G. Cohn Prose Poetry Award for her prose poem, "The Favourite Poet, 1888." Carine participated in the grassroots organization California Poets in the Schools. Since 1982, she has anthologized the poetry of special needs children. Her first collection of poems, God As Thief, was published by The Amagansett Press, NY. Her work also has appeared in Water-Stone, Caliban, The Best of the Prose Poem, Pacific Review, The Louisville Review, and many other journals. She was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2004, and awarded a residency at Hedgebrook, as well as a fellowship to study in St. Petersburg, Russia, 2005. Carine conducts on-line mentoring workshops and private workshops in and around LA.
Volunteer with Levantine Cultural Center's Programming Committee

Bring your ideas, enthusiasm and support to the Center by participating in our Programming Committee, which cooperates with our Board of Directors in creating new arts programs in the months ahead. Visit our volunteer opportunities page. To get on the reservation list for the next meeting, email us now!
Levantine Cultural Center Seeks Community Leaders

Levantine Center's Board of Directors is continually seeking to work with new volunteers who may be invited to join the board. We welcomes inquiries—we are actively searching for more people with our passion and conviction! Our core group of volunteers consists of diverse members of the community who are of Middle Eastern/Mediterranean heritage or who have a strong professional or artistic interest in furthering our mission. Our volunteers work on literary, film, fine art, music and educational programming.

Our Advisory Board is also in formation. Advisory board members are known professionally in their own communities and offer valuable counsel and services to the organization; they are eligible to attend the organization's annual retreat and receive other benefits.

Please contact us at 310.657.5511.

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To join/support Levantine Cultural Center, simply go to our membership page and fill in the blanks, use your credit card, or print and mail in your check for $60 or $120 or $250 annual membership dues to: Levantine Center, 1012 S. Robertson Blvd., Suite C, Los Angeles CA 90035-1537.

LEVANTINE CULTURAL CENTER
Cultures of the Middle East & Mediterranean
1012 S. Robertson Blvd., Los Angeles CA 90035
310.657.5511/657.5522, info@levantinecenter.org
Founded in 2001, Levantine Cultural Center is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that advocates for, educates about, and in general promotes and supports Middle Eastern and Mediterranean contemporary arts and traditional cultures. We present or cosponsor programs of music, literature, art, film/video, publications, new media and more, often from educational and historical perspectives. While acknowledging the value of entertainment, we emphasize scholarship and substance. We are strongly multidisciplinary and non-sectarian, do not embrace any political or religious doctrine, and are committed to the principle of cross-cultural cooperation. We support the strengthening of ties between all cultural, ethnic and religious communities of the Middle East/West Asia/Levant, as well as between all peoples of Middle Eastern descent in diaspora.
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