I am pleased to announce that
the Clark County Arts Commission has named me Clark County’s first Poet
Laureate. I am very grateful to the commission for this honor, and look forward
to this opportunity to share my passion for poetry with even more members of our
community. I have a lot of ideas about how to do this, which I will share at
the public meeting mentioned in the press release below, as well as a public
address which I have been asked to give at the Vancouver Community Library on Tuesday,
March 12 at 7pm. I encourage everyone who values poetry and its ability to
transform our lives to join us in celebrating this great step forward for the
county. I am very grateful for Vancouver’s poetry community, and for the love
and support of three amazing women: Toni Partington, Mel Sanders, and Leah
Jackson. Without their belief in me, and their own work for the arts community,
none of this would have been possible.
Christopher Luna
February 15, 2013
Contact: Elizabeth Madrigal, Clark County
Arts Commission, (360) 281-1615,
Patricia LaCroix, Clark County
Arts Commission, (360)
606-7104,
Vancouver resident selected first Clark County Poet Laureate
Vancouver, WA
– Christopher Luna, a Vancouver
poet, visual artist and editor, has been named Clark County’s
first Poet Laureate by the Clark County Arts Commission.
As Poet Laureate, Luna may act as
a cultural ambassador, composing poems for special events and occasions. His
main duty is to promote poetry and literature, nurturing public knowledge and
appreciation of the power of words. His work will reflect diverse experiences
in Clark County and the Vancouver-Portland
metropolitan area.
The public can meet Luna when he
is officially installed as Poet Laureate during the commission’s 6:30 p.m. meeting
Tuesday, Feb. 26, in the sixth-floor hearing room of the Public Service Center,
1300 Franklin St.
Luna earned a Master of Fine Arts
in Writing and Poetics at the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University, Boulder, Colo. He serves as a
writing consultant and poetry event coordinator for WSU Vancouver’s Writing Center, where he
teaches a weekly workshop.
His work has appeared in New York
Journal of Books, Poetry Project Newsletter, The Columbian, The Oregonian
and Willamette Week. He co-edited Ghost Town Poetry, a collection
of poems from a popular open microphone poetry reading series he established in
2004. Luna frequently is a featured reader at bookstores, night clubs,
libraries and coffee shops.
For information about the Poet
Laureate position, contact Pat LaCroix, chair of the arts commission, at (360) 606-7104. For more
information on the arts commission visit www.clarkcountyartscommission.org.
