Shunyu Huang and the Memory Quilt Project:
Thursday, July 13 | Scent & Taste
Thursday, July 20 | Sound
Thursday, July 27 | Sight & Touch
Advance tickets are now closed; walk-up tickets will be available at the door.
Doors at 6:30pm
Stories at 7:00pm
Community Quilt Making at 8:00
Tickets starting at $10 | Please pay what you can! Your generosity goes to underwrite our Story/Arts residency program which champions BIPOC, LGTBQIA+, and individuals from other historically marginalized communities by providing a platform for their work, an artist stipend, creative resources, community support, and more.
Join Story Parlor for the first iteration of its summer Story/Arts Residency, welcoming local artist Shunyu Huang for a month-long celebration of sense memory.
For this first event, we’ll bear witness to locals in the community as they share memories inspired by scent and taste through the transformative power of art and stories. This event will feature Sam Soemardi, Leslee Nichol Johnson, and Ben Phantom alongside Shunyu Huang.
Then, Shunyu will lead the audience in a community circle where guests are invited to share their own stories and memories rooted in the evocative senses of taste and scent. Folks are welcomed and encouraged to bring food, drink, and other olfactory items to share to further thread the needle in this community quilt-making project.
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Along with your stories, please consider bringing food, drink, and other sensory items related to this week’s memory theme!
As different people, we sometimes forget how much more common we have than we are different. The Chinese Proverb 求同存異 (Qiu Tong Cun Yi) sums it up: "Seek similarities while preserving differences". This Story/Arts residency presents the inspired vision of Shunyu Huang in an effort to bring the community together through the connective tissue that exists between storytelling and memory.
Quilt-making, to Shunyu, is a fascinating Appalachian tradition that serves as a powerful storytelling art form, weaving together narratives, memories, and cultural heritage through intricate patterns and carefully chosen fabrics, preserving history and fostering intergenerational connections. Each stitch carries the essence of the maker, telling stories that transcend time and inspiring a deeper understanding of our shared human experiences.
What if we come together and share these memories that affect us deeply and shape us into who we are?
What if we pull out those old photos, tapes; that song that your grandma hummed in the kitchen; that smell from your neighbor's favorite tea; and talk about why, somehow, that lives in you?
“Let’s make this Memory-Quilt together. One memory and stitch at a time.”
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Shunyu Huang was born in 1989 in a Southern China city Zhuhai in Guangdong Province.
Before getting her Bachelor’s degree in Ecology, She travelled to Tibet, southwest China and southeast Asia with her film cameras in search of a connection of different peoples and their homeland.
She had found that, as different peoples, we sometimes forget how much more common we have than we are different. The Chinese Proverb 求同存異 (Qiu Tong Cun Yi) sums it up: Seek Common, Exist Difference; While she mingles in the local communities in Asheville, she finds herself marveled by how close our hearts can get by sharing our memories.
It could be playing in the creek with childhood best friends and forgetting to go home;
It could be sitting by the kitchen table listen to mom’s mumbling about a rough day;
It could be watching an unforgetable sunset with a lover on a strange city;
In this community that we long for and are building together, Shunyu desires to use storytelling, here as memory-sharing to unify us.
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Sam Soemardi
Sam was born in Pittsburg while his father was on sabbatical from the university of Indonesia and then raised in Jakarta Indonesia for the majority of his childhood. After returning to the states for college, he studied acupuncture in Massachusetts and is now a community acupuncturist dedicated to providing affordable care to those who need it. He lives in Enka in a small house where he tends to his many plants and garden. He has a son named Quin and a dog named pig.
Sam will be sharing a memory about the smell of a soap that’s used to wash batik clothing. This scent brought him back to his parents’ closet and into his childhood. This memory was recalled by a visit to a batik store in Jakarta with his son.
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Leslee Nichol Johnson
Leslee Nichol Johnson is a writer and educator. She teaches in the Humanities and First-Year Writing Programs at UNCA where she also serves as the Director of the Prison Education Program. Her creative nonfiction foregrounds the personal against the backdrop of larger sociopolitical constructs to explore how we both wound and heal ourselves and our world. On Fridays, she facilitates the 12 Baskets Cafe writing collective, The Cheese Alliance. She lives with her son, Cormac Ulysses, a rising 5th grader at Oakley Elementary.
Leslee will be sharing a short essay on her favorite gift of late summer---Tomatoes.
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Ben Phantom
Ben Phantom is a filmmaker, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, traveler, and long distance hiker. His work carries a strong message of hope and resilience; his mission is to tell stories that heal and create sustainable community. With a professional understanding of both music and video, the willingness to take creative risks, and an intuitive ability to connect, Ben has a unique ability to create meaningful, story-driven art.
Born Benjamin Binh Phan, the son of a Vietnamese immigrant and grandson of a Holocaust survivor, Ben has searched for truth within himself and all over the world. His path, driven by creative fire, has taken him from the North American wilderness to Vietnam, Cambodia, Israel, Central America, and finally to his mountain home in Asheville, North Carolina. As a Vietnamese Jewish American, he seeks to bridge cultural barriers, honor the past, and create a better future.
Ben will be sharing an intimate story on Phở, a poem and a music video of his father's homecoming trip to Saigon, Vietnam.
Music Video : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UbZbvsufq9Q
Website: https://benphantom.com/
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Story Parlor’s residencies exist to champion the creative work of locally-based artists and art groups hailing from BIPOC, LGTBQIA+, and other historically marginalized communities in the quest to amplify and bridge together the diverse fabric of voices in Asheville.
Specifically, the Story/Arts residency aims to provide a platform that showcases the transformative and healing powers of storytelling through all art mediums, while tending to the core values of Story Parlor’s mission, which include:
• Connecting audiences and artists from varying creative backgrounds and interests
• Informing, inspiring, and invigorating through the arts
• Promoting and fostering self-inquiry and mindfulness
• Cultivating creative exchange and cultural insight
• Fostering authenticity and inclusiveness
In addition to public performances and/or workshops, artists-in-residence receive dedicated rehearsal time in the space; an artist stipend; creativity coaching sessions; marketing and promotion; and more.
Applications are accepted on a rolling basis, with preference given to applicants who cross disciplines, embrace collaboration, and present a residency proposal that embodies the core elements of storytelling through all art forms. More info can be found here.
Story Parlor would like to thank ArtsAVL and Buncombe County for providing funding support for the Story/Arts Residency program.