Serena Chopra

Writer, Filmmaker, Performer, Teacher

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Serena Chopra is featured in the March 2018 issue of Harper’s Bazaar India’s 9th anniversary issue, which spotlights the ways women are taking control of  global conversations about women.

Chopra shared her perspective on voice, trust and courage in activism:

 As an artist, I am always in the process and practice of listening. Lately, with recent movements and affirmations of female and queer bodies and voices in public spaces, it has become important for me to also recognize my duty, as a woman who has nurtured space for her voice, to speak into the struggle something nurturing, empowering and affirmative—something worthy of listening. Often these notes are chaotic—cacophony into cacophony—but I trust that landing in other’s hearts, minds, bodies, they will begin to arrange themselves toward sense—women and other oppressed bodies will begin to re-imagine ourselves as the future and not secondary to it.

            In this image, I find myself, like many other women, at the threshold—between the interior and exterior, the self and the world, love and rage, vision and re-vision, past and subjunctive tenses, the fragile orders of institutions and the chaotic momentums of change. This ambitious movement over the threshold is depicted in my hair, which follows and trails me in all my moments, holds the winds that rustle me, echoes the gestures that I manifest, transforms in the waters that refresh it; the daylight exposes the vulnerability of my face—one’s vulnerability in having to face the world and the light, our mortality in the face of it all. In the image I am behind an open window, thinking of Jean-Paul Sartre: “There may be more beautiful times, but this one is ours.” And I recognize that progress is not graceful or lovely—it is territory, and women and marginalized folks must claim it as our own.

Ic: A Sociolinguistic Conspiracy Theory
Serena Chopra
Horse LessPress, 2017
“Serena Chopra’s Ic mourns our difficult inheritances and longs after a soaring union with our greatest desires. In her text, “Ic” is a discarded Icarus, adrift among the waves and re-identified as flotsam or jetsam for divers to collect. She recounts Icarus’ tale as a denunciation of a world that gives us wings while demanding that we limit our skies. Chopra acknowledges that this ”Ic” is recognizable to so many of us, whose talents, dreams, and gifts have been pulled down by limiting social histories. In this world, gravity is a “vertical conspiracy.” Yet “Ic” is also a body of possibility: “Ic” is a suffix adrift, free from the words it once modified. Ic bobs and melts into a sonic celebration, demonstrating how illegibility can transform into fluid alterities. Ic cries out to us all–with a full throat that syncopatedly gasps and gives lyric flight.” -Sueyeun Juliette Lee
 
“If a self is partly created through a flow of information, what is the sound of its interruption? What violence has a constrained self endured before escape? What lyrics accompany that endurance? If “tyranny / controls the air,” how does one recover from a shattering? All of the above are questions Serena Chopra’s Ic addresses, suggesting a surviving self creates its own language from the fracturing. Chopra writes: “I am / the human shape /of loving you,” offering us a rhythmic, elemental, gorgeous and modern take on the Icarus myth, a promise of resurrection amid the ancient and perilous process of becoming.” -Khadijah Queen
“Writing in the tradition (but not imitation) of Anne Carson, Serena Chopra re-contextualizes Icarus (“Ic”) and his supposed hubris with searing, hilarious, and tender brilliance. Chopra’s language, too, is not arrogant but fearless in its faith in tensegrity. How thrilling it is to find a syllable hung in midair – becoming and already become. “They/list/en/a/way/the/end.” A name, a word, an I, a body, a narrative – all history and (still) possibility. I love what she is doing here and what she has done. “I can/not imagine/a transparent/white erasing/is drawing too.” -TC Tolbert

 

Burrow Press Review: “Grazing on the Nerves of Forgiveness” by Serena Chopra

Read: “Grazing on the Nerves of Forgiveness” by Serena Chopra

Academy of American Poets: “Garden Variety with Lesbians” by Serena Chopra

Featured on Poem-a-Day: “Garden Variety with Lesbians” by Serena Chopra

Profiled on Revry TV: “Multi-Talented Interdisciplinary Artist, Serena Chopra”

READ: “Multi-Talented Interdisciplinary Artist, Serena Chopra”

Listen: “Queer Memoir + Rhizomes with Serena Chopra” on This Plus That podcast with Brandi Stanley

@ The Poetry Project

Watch: “this is all // that matters” : South Asian Poets on Diaspora, Kith, Material, and Speech

featuring Serena Rose Chopra, Kama La Mackerel, Aditi Machado, Prageeta Sharma and Divya Victor

Chopra Receives a MacDowell Fellowship to Complete “Dayawati, Of Mercy”

Serena Chopra will attend MacDowell as a Stanford Calderwood Fellow to complete her book, “Dayawati, Of Mercy”

Luiza Flynn-Goodlett & Serena Rose Chopra

The Poetry Project, April 16th, 8pm EST

The Poetry Project: “When we think of the work of queer community and movement building, we think of the poetry and performances of these two writers.”

Watch the Reading

What the Folk: Queering the Age of Aquarius with Dr. Serena Chopra

LISTEN: Episode 16: Queering the Age of Aquarius with Dr. Serena Chopra  [iTunes]  [Spotify] [SoundCloud]

We deep dive with Dr. Serena Chopra, a multitalented and multifaceted teacher and artist. Join us for a fascinating and thought-provoking conversation about the different approaches to time, what we mean when we describe something as “queer,” turning our personal trauma into collective defense, and the role of mysticism in creating what comes next. It’s not just about examining the structures we live in, we also have to turn those structures on their heads to approach them differently. We hope you leave this conversation with the same sky-eyed perspective we did. Afterwards, Sarah is all jazzed up on Aquarius vibes and Emily talks about energy, because we’re both kind of hippies.

Featured poem is “Seduction After the Great Plains” by Dr. Serena Chopra. Featured music is “Love Yourself” and “The Only Point” by our own Emily Yates – a preview of her about-to-drop new album, Notes to Self and Others. All tracks appear courtesy of the artists.

SUBSCRIBE to the Podcast: What the Folk: Real talk and raw tunes for revelationary times!

King County Library, Author Voices Series

Alone Together: Love, Grief & Comfort during the Time of COVID-19

 

Join us for a discussion and reading of the timely and beautiful, ALONE TOGETHER: Love, Grief and Comfort During the Time of COVID-19. The book is a collection of essays and poetry by dozens of literary heavyweights like Nikki Giovanni, Luis Alberto Urrea, and Kwame Alexander, as well as many other vibrant and influential regional writers. The real star behind this collection of unique writings about COVID is Seattle’s own Jennifer Haupt, the book’s initiator and editor. She will be joined by Jennie Shortridge, Donna Miscolta and Serena Chopra, who have each contributed pieces to the anthology. Please register to attend this online event and you will be sent a link to join the program.

All net profits of the book will be donated to the Book Industry Charitable Foundation (Binc) to help booksellers hit hard by the pandemic. The book is available for purchase from Third Place Books here: Alone Together

 

Wednesday, December 2, 2020, 6:30PM – 8:00PM
Online event: REGISTER Here for Free

 

“No Place to Go” reviewed by the Denverite‘s Maggie Donahue

Read: “No Zombies or Jump-Scares: This Artist-Made Haunted House Gives You a Safe Way to Process Day-to-Day Fears”  by Maggie Donahue

No Place toGo is an artist-made queer haunted house co-directed by Frankie Toan, Kate Speer and Serena Chopra

NP2G runs Thursdays-Sundays, October 22nd-November 1st, 2020

Visit No-Place-To-Go.com for information about the artist-made, haunted, queer experience and to reserve TICKETS

More NP2G Press: 

Read: “Drive Through Queer Fear in Immersive Show, No Place to Go”  by Susan Froyd, Denver Westword

Read: “These are definitely not normal Denver haunted houses. Then again, 2020 isn’t a normal year.” by John Wenzel, The Denver Post

Read: “Queer Haunted House Reveals Our Internal Fears Can Be Scarier than Ghosts and Goblins” by Esteban Fernandez, Ms. Mayhem

Read: “No Place to Go Is a Pandemic-Safe Haunted House Experience” by Justine Johnson, Out Front 

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