Join us as we cozy together to conjure stories of seasons and holidays past. Local storyteller Chuck Fink will host a cozy winter evening of stories with humor, pathos, and joy. It'll be an evening of connection and inspiration you'll long remember.
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Chuck began telling stories as soon as he could talk, although he learned the true craft for performance by taking a class on Personal Storytelling at OLLI in 2012.
Chuck tells personal stories filled with comedy, drama, and most of all hope.
He teaches classes on personal storytelling for performance at OLLI and The Weaverville Community Center.
Chuck is past president of The Asheville Storytelling Circle, and a member of The North Carolina Storytelling Guild, The National Storytelling Network and other regional storytelling groups.
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Donna Catton-Johnson has regaled family and young audiences for decades with fairy tales, myths, and legends. She has told stories at schools, libraries, churches, assisted living facilities, festivals, parks, and public gardens.
More recently, she has developed her own personal narratives as well. Donna is currently the VP of Membership for Asheville Storytelling Circle and a member of the North Carolina Storytelling Guild.
Donna is an award- winning actress and served as a director in many theater productions. She is a professional mime.
Donna especially enjoyed her 18 years acting in Murder Mystery Dinner Theatre at the M.B. House of Blues. She has worked on TV and short films.
She has served on the board of directors for four arts organizations, including a division of Toastmasters International.
Donna lives in Mills River, NC, with her husband, David, and two cats.
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Kirsten Mitchell told stories for as long as I can remember. She scare herself and her friends at sleepovers. She entertained younger children in vacation Bible School.
Storytelling came as naturally to Kirsten as breathing. She told stories at summer camps in exchange for camp tuition for her kids, and in their classrooms at school. She enjoys telling to audiences of all ages, from her grandchildren’s preschools to seniors in nursing homes.
During her career as a social worker she specialized in helping folks with dementia. Children’s birthday parties, adult Halloween parties, storytelling festivals, schoolroom history lessons…she’ll find a story that fits the need of the event.
Her own fairly long and eventful life gives her much inspiration.
She believes stories are what makes us human, vehicles for transmitting those deep truths that can’t simply be told in words. The right story, well told, can transform a mundane event into something extraordinary that will be long remembered by everyone present.
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Wallace Bohanan was born and raised in Brooklyn, NY. His father was a Cub Scout Master and Wallace was both a Cub Scout and a Boy Scout.
He ran track in High School where he graduated with no distinguishing merits.
He joined the Army immediately after High School to try and miss the coming war in Indo China. A year before he would be discharged he was sent into combat in Vietnam.
When he returned, he felt alienated. He subsequently joined the Black Panthers, was arrested and jailed three times, earned a BA in Education and an MS in Counseling, and became active in a Spiritual Church.
Now Wallace is a Buddhist.
As a Boy Scout, he loved the woods and later began camping in the mountains with his family. Wallace was drawn to the mountains of Asheville and has lived here for nearly 20 years.
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A creative writer and performer since the elementary years, they have a life-long love for the interplay between artist and audience, and the conversation that occurs in that connection; the questions of what it is to be alive and to be human.
