Escape Into Life

Allison A. Davis is a poet, novelist , essayist and lawyer. She has written extensively on San Francisco performance/multimedia art in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s. She just finished her first novel and is working on her second. She lives in both San Francisco and New Orleans.

Ashley Devick is a fiction writer, painter, editor, and aspiring photographer. Graduating with a degree in Creative Writing, she currently works in Commercial Real Estate, while doing some freelance writing, event planning, and public relations on the side. Ashley will never be caught without a camera and always makes time for the arts, philanthropy, and travel.

Aurelio Madrid is an observer and fan of art theory and history, whose intellectual and artistic enthusiasms ignite through experimentation with art’s contradictory possibilities across multiple genres. He is an autodidact who discovered his talent early on. Madrid prodigiously creates art, while he continues to question its mysteries and ideas all the same.

Athena attained her MA in Psychology at Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center. She is also an artist and designer, where you can find her work on her website "Athena's ARTfest".

Basel Al-Aswad, father of EIL founder Chris Al-Aswad, is a yogi trapped in an Orthopedic Surgeon's body. His main loves in life include reading, hiking/enjoying nature, meditation, and spending time with his large iraqi family.

Christopher Aris is an artist, born New Year’s Day. He has an affinity for art and music. After living in Spain and being inspired, he returned to his home town, Austin, Texas, to study fine arts at St. Edward's University. Much of his art includes drawing and mixed media. Currently, Christopher lives in Austin, teaching drawing and painting.

I love cooking and art. Also architecture, photography, poetry and graphic, object and interior design. Before setting up my Bologna based cooking school, I worked in teaching adults and educational administration, and then managed cultural/educational organizations. I also love travel and have lived at least 3 years in each of Malta, Lisbon, Cairo, London and Barcelona.

Christian Harder is an undergraduate writer at Virginia Tech in literature who believes in innovations in form and style. He believes politics, preaching, and political correctness have no place in art and remains wary of the effect large cultural institutions and popular trends have on an otherwise intelligent public. He anticipates attending graduate school come next year.

Chris aims to expose viewers to some of the most legit tunes of the times, peeling back the layers of what's relevant in current music events, with up-to-date posts of new artists and releases. Living in Chicago, Chris manages his own blog dedicated to new music releases, clips of new musicians, and announcements of upcoming shows at cool venues.

Christopher H Paquette is a photographer and writer living in Philadelphia, Pa. In 2006 he founded PHOTO/arts Magazine, an online journal of photography and visual culture. Paquette's photography work explores the contemporary American social landscape and has been widely exhibited.

Chip (Charles, Σhip, (hip, et al.) is a multimedia artist, essayist, poet, and thinker. His work is often eclectic due to his emphasis on process and intention over medium. Paradox, absurdity and linguistics are common in his work. He believes that in the land of the blind, the man with the hippest music collection is king.

Christina Wegman is a painter, freelance writer, music teacher, and art event coordinator currently residing in Alabama. Born in Los Angeles, California, she has traveled widely throughout Europe and studied in both the U.S. and Canada. In addition to the arts, her interests include languages (particularly German and Latin), philosophy, textiles, and a fine cup of tea.

David Maclagan is a writer, artist, lecturer and retired art therapist, living in W Yorks. He has published numerous articles on Outsider Art, art and imagination and psychological aesthetics (the title of a book published in 2001 by Jessica Kingsley). His latest book Outsider Art: from the margins to the marketplace has just been published by Reaktion Books.

Fred Shively was born in the USA, but has lived and worked most of his life in Europe. His current base is Spain. His background of writing and creative direction in advertising and corporate communications exposed him to some of the world's most talented photographers, designers, musicians and film-makers, all of whom influenced his work. Fred is now primarily involved in photography.

Gretta Barclay is a passionate reader, writer, and lover of art in all its forms. She writes essays, short stories, poems, and novels. Her first novel, “To See a Sundog”, is an adventure story that takes place in a small Midwest town. She is in the process of writing her second novel.

The Jealous Curator has a BFA in Visual Arts, and a post-grad diploma in Interactive Design. She has worked as a designer and Creative Director for almost fifteen years, but has never stopped loving, and creating, fine art. After years of secretly thinking "Damn, I wish I thought of that", in 2009 she finally decided to say it out loud, and just like that “The Jealous Curator” was born. She finds work that makes her feel like she’s been punched in the creative gut, and then writes about why she loves it.

My aspirations were all over the map growing-up, everything from a cartoonist to a movie star. They were all about creating experiences for people. I knew that’s what I wanted to do, long before I knew who I wanted to be. Experiences define us. They’re the subtext of our emotions and our choices. So creating experiences touches every part of my life: home, family, friends, art, work. It’s at the heart of my relationships. My priorities. My poetry. And it’s why I feel equally at ease as a copywriter and an artist at a reading.

John Holt is an artist/writer. Cultural theorist. Interests in non western contemporary art; art of the "marginalized" and the value of the creative process in itself. Founder of A.I.M. (Artists in Mind) an arts and mental health charity based in the UK.

John Ladd is a writer, poetry student, and confirmed geek living in Alexandria, VA. The most notable objects of his geekery include formal poems, postmodern plays, crossword puzzles, the Internet, and dead languages. He is the author of Paradise Tossed, a blog that talks about what happens when poetry and technology collide.

Jason Reynolds holds three degrees, a BA in Language, Literature, and Culture from Antioch College, and an MA in English Literature and an MFA in Creative Writing, both from McNeese State University. He currently is a Professor of English and Literature at Sinclair Community College. Jason was also the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Fiction Weekly, an online literary journal.

Jessica Rosen writes short stories in a wide variety of genres. She's also at work on a series of romantic suspense novels. After a several year hiatus from writing, Jessica returned with gusto in 2008. Five novels and dozens of short stories later, she is honored to join Escape into Life.

Julie Andrijeski recently completed her first novel, an urban fantasy, and is in progress on two more. She has worked on a number of short independent films and is in progress on a graphic novel, in addition to work as a freelance journalist. She currently lives in Portland, Oregon with a disgruntled rabbit named Hazel, and a bird named Philemon who runs the joint.

Kate Sherrod is a recovering politician, essayist, poet, amateur entomologist, and budding graphic novel author currently residing in Cheyenne, WY. She is the author of Suppertime Sonnets, a blog on which she composes and publishes at least one pseudo-Shakespearean sonnet a day.

Klaus-Dieter Knoll, born in 1963, living in Berlin, Germany. Professional printer, he is a self-employed graphic-designer and web-designer, now. Being always interested in arts and writing, he combined the two and writes for the German online art-magazine Art&Events as art-critic and art-journalist. In his own blog he mainly writes about graphic-design and social-media marketing.

Art Director, photographer, and lover of all things art & design. You can throw coffee and music in there too...

Kathleen is the author of three poetry chapbooks: Selected Roles (Moon Journal Press, 2006), Broken Sonnets (Finishing Line Press, 2009), and Living on the Earth (Finishing Line Press, 2010, New Women’s Voices Series No. 74). Her work appears in numerous print and online journals, including Apparatus, Ekphrasis, Greensboro Review, Leveler, Poems & Plays, Spoon River Poetry Review, and Willow Review.

Laura Lawson paints when writer's block strikes and writes when painter's block strikes. She has studied fine art at LCAD and is pursuing a degree in journalism. Recently diagnosed with the degenerative eye disease retinitis pigmentosa, she strives to bring hope to those without vision through her blog. She is currently working on her first book about coping with vision loss.

Lara Cory is a freelance writer, blogger and co-founder of MOTIF Magazine. Classically trained in piano and a degree in Communications, Lara’s main interests are music, books, film and art.

Founding editor of Escape into Life 1979-2010 This website is a tribute to artists Chris Al-Aswad and his mother Rosalind Al-Aswad.

An Art History major and Studio Art minor gave Lesley Frenz a foundation of knowledge to back up her love of art and design. Working in art licensing, art consulting and helping curate a successful gallery gave her the experience to sift through thousands of images and find the gems. She’s now travelling the Pacific Northwest with her husband and using her eye to curate Artsy Forager, a daily art blog showcasing the exceptional art she digs up in her travels and on the web.

Lou Freshwater loves literature, existential philosophy, spicy food, and the Delta Blues. She considers herself to be a life-long student of these and other things. She has written a screenplay, and she writes poetry and fiction at her blog and at Fictionaut. Her creative work has been published in numerous journals, and she has also published an essay on the Existentialism of Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams in the Arthur Miller Journal.

Luke Grundy is a fervent assimilator of media living amid the bright lights of London, England. If he’s not watching films or listening to music, he’s probably asleep, eating or dead. An aspiring writer, journalist and musician, he is the creator of movie/music blog Odessa & Tucson and lives for epistemology.

Linnea West writes about contemporary art, culture, and travel--all subjects she feels passionately about. She lives in New York City--except for those times when wanderlust gets the better of her. This happens often. Fortunately her laptop travels well. She is finishing her first novel.

Mandy Al-Aswad is a product manager, responsible for working with end-users to drive product innovation that will enable VivaKi agencies to gain a competitive advantage in search. Outside of work, she enjoys running, live music, and spending time with her family and friends.

Londoner. 20 years working within the music counter-culture, currently working within the freedom of expression NGO world. Autodidact writer, interrogator of language. Live performer. Debut novelist. Three others completed, further one in progress. Ex-playwright. Kids soccer team manager.

Maureen E. Doallas has been a writer, editor, and features reporter for more than three decades, working in fields as diverse as international healthcare, education, and employment law. Now retired, Maureen owns her own small business, Transformational Threads, licensing images of original fine art for reproduction in limited-edition hand-embroidery in Vietnam. Maureen blogs daily at Writing Without Paper about poetry and other literary, visual, and performing arts.

Morris Berman is well known as an innovative cultural historian and social critic. He is the author of a trilogy on the evolution of human consciousness–The Reenchantment of the World (1981), Coming to Our Senses (1989), and Wandering God: A Study in Nomadic Spirituality (2000)–and in 2000 his Twilight of American Culture was named a “Notable Book” by the New York Times Book Review.

Matt Dye has four degrees, a BA in English and one in Psych from the University of Tennessee, and an MA and MFA from McNeese.  Matt's been teaching college English now for six years and has served as Faculty Senate President at his current college for the past two. He is also Founding Member and Editor-at-Large of Fiction Weekly. Currently Matt lives in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and hangs out with his dog Wyatt while doing local theatre and ranching.

Meredith Rosenberg currently lives in New York City where she is the Gallery Director at BravinLee programs. She loves working as a literary contributor for Escape Into Life for those who can’t make it to major art openings, art fairs and exhibitions. Some of her recent reviews include exhibitions of Thomas Nozkowski, Matthew Chambers, Sascha Braunig and Bo Bartlett. Coming soon: a new review from Art Basel Switzerland.

As an artist I am trying to get new ideas all the time by talking to people and collaborating with others. My Portrait Project has brought me and my work into the homes of hundreds of Chicagoans. ChicagoArts has brought art from Chicago to people all over.

Mark Kerstetter writes poetry, fiction and essays on art and literature. He loves to draw and make art out of wood salvaged from demolition sites, and samples it all on his blog: The Bricoleur.

Reinaert is an enthusiastic amateur artist and seriously addicted to culture. His interest for anything cultural reaches far and deep, ranging from Japanese cult movies to religion and comedy. He loves the ancients and classics, but is open to innovation, the exotic, and modern experimentation in art. He studied philosophy specializing in art philosophy, but also holds a bachelor in cultural anthropology.

Nini Baseema is a creative geek who enjoys spreading her passion for the good things in life all around the online world. She is constantly on the hunt for striking artwork, life-changing photography, marvelous designs, elevating performances, inspiring phrases, mindblowing literature and heartbreaking songs! In the present, she is usually found hiding behind her nerdy glasses and writing for several art blogs.

Nick Martin is a writer from Urbana, Illinois. His primary interests are pop-culture criticism, graphic novels and comicbooks, contemporary fiction, and 20th century history/philosophy. When he's not writing, Nick likes to trim his mustache and tell jokes.

Portia Iversen is a Los Angeles eclecticist whose interests include the visual arts and writing, as well as neuroscience. Besides winning an Emmy Award for art direction, she worked as a TV writer, and founded a nonprofit foundation for autism research. Iversen also published a book in 2007, (Strange Son, Riverhead Press). Her latest interest is writing about art.

Scott Rothstein is an artist who writes primarily about self-taught art and artists informed by traditional culture. His own work can been seen in several American museums, including the Art Institute of Chicago; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Rothstein has lived in Philadelphia, New York City, New Delhi, and Tokyo. He is currently based in Bangkok.

Stacy Ericson is an editor and photographer who has been writing poetry since she was a child. Her work often reflects her interest in other cultures, ancient languages and religion, and visceral passions. She says, “To me poetry is a very serious undertaking involving studying poets that have gone before, the changing styles and goals of different time periods, specific imagery, unexpected juxtapositions, and a consciousness of meter and trope."

Simon Kartar writes short, flash and novel-length fiction about the spaces between us. An anthropology graduate, Samba drummer (he plays Timba), and accidental endurance athlete, he also runs, cycles and kayaks through these spaces. He lives in southern England with his fabulous, energising family.

Stefano Vieceli abandoned a successful television production career to follow his passion for photography, fine arts, foreign languages, and travel. A proud New Yorker and lover of life & laughter! You can follow Stefano on Twitter @elJetSet

Stephen Pain was born in London in 1956. He studied art at Herefordshire College, later went to UEA and studied literature. He worked abroad then came back to do a law degree. He has had poetry published in New Poetry, Snakeskin, Dada, Pif etc. Currently a researcher in zoosemiotics based in Denmark.

Teia Pearson is diving back into her passion of writing after a car accident in 2003 leaving her with fibomyalgia and vertigo. Her former education is in radiology and literature. Currently she is works on her memoir while writing and editing for the arts in Chicago, IL.

Thomas Orszag-Land (b. 1938) a poet and award-winning foreign correspondent covering Eastern Europe and the Middle East for global syndication. His most recent book 'Christmas in Auschwitz' translated from the Hungarian of András Mezei (Smokestack, England, 2010). Currently writing an anthology of Holocaust poetry. Thomland111(at)hotmail(dot)com

Tony Thomas was born in England in 1939, and is a retired bureaucrat living in Brisbane, Australia. He has an Australian wife, two adult daughters, a dog and a cat. He holds a degree in economics from the University of Queensland. His interests are catholic, and include: philosophy, writing fiction, poetry, and blogging political diatribes.