Topia Arts Center presents

"A Cast of Cowries"

performed by
Luisah Teish

Saturday, May 5th and Sunday, May 6th at 5p

at

Topia Arts Center

27 Park Street, Adams, MA 01220

$15 includes admission and a DVD of the performance

Laugh, cry and sit entranced as performer and author Luisah Teish
brings to life African Creation Stories of the Yoruba tradition
with live music performed by John Hughes on African kora and drums
and Charlie Tokarz on saxophone and wind instrument.

The recording of these performances will become a DVD intended to benefit
Teish's family who are still being impacted by Hurricane Katrina.
Take this opportunity to help and to be a part of this audience.

 

Luisah Teish is a writer, performer and ritual events planner. She is the author of several books, notably “Jambalaya: The Natural Woman’s Book of Personal Charms and Practical Rituals” a women’s spirituality classic. She has published articles and interviews in numerous anthologies and magazines such as Essence, Ms., Shaman’s Drum, and the Yoga Journal. Some of her works have been translated into French, Spanish and German. 

She has served as a consultant and a performer on scripts with cultural, racial, gender, and spiritual themes. They include ”The Sanctified Church:The Works of Zora Neale Hurston” at Life on the Water Theatre in San Francisco. Club Termina: A Play on Women and Breast Cancer with Indecent Exposure Theater in Hollywood, California; "Nzinga the King-Queen", at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York; "From Whores to Matriarchs: Black Women Survivors on the Edge", at the Lorraine Hansberry Theater, and the American Conservatory Theater’s award-winning production of "PECONG" in San Francisco.  

Ms. Teish was a member of the Katherine Dunham Dance Company at The Performing Arts Training Center in E. St. Louis Illinois; and was the choreographer for The Black Artist Group in St. Louis, Missouri. Presently she is the Artistic Director of Ase Theater and “The Women in White Peace Performance Group” in Oakland. Her film and television performance credits include , the Oprah Winfrey Show, the Rob Nelson Show , the Rosanne Barr show (with Eartha Kitt), the Other Side, ”Not A Love Story” and the "Goddess Remembered" film series (Canadian film board).

She is an initiated elder and Womanchief in the Ifa/Orisha tradition of Southwest Nigeria and the chair of the International Committee on Women’s Issues. Presently she is the Chair of the World Orisha Congress Committee on Women’s Issues. She was awarded a Ph.D. in Spiritual Therapeutics from Open International University’s School of Complementary Medicine in Colombo Sri Lanka in 1993.