Victoria Canady-Anderson holds a BA in fine arts from Florida State University. She has worked as a music teacher at Jacksonville Heights Elementary, where she also led as a teaching artist for the CAP chorus program. She produced and directed four musical performances with the Singing Eagles Chorus there. She is an all-around musician who performs in a band, as well as mixing, mastering, and writing for other artists. She is currently Program Manager for the Cathedral Arts Project.
Victoria will star when, on Friday evening, October 28, 2022, the JaxbyJax Literary Arts Festival kicks off with a dramatic reading of Featured Playwright Bobbie O’Connor’s “Screams Echo” in the Lecture Hall at the Jessie Ball duPont Center. Doors open at 6 p.m. The play will start promptly at 6:30 p.m. and run until 7 p.m., followed by a talkback with the playwright and cast and a discussion led by 904WARD until 8:00 p.m.
Bobbie O’Connor’s 50 years as an advocate for social justice have fostered a deep commitment to create change through writing. She has written and performed Screams Echo as well as pieces for the Florida Times Union about violence against women and her own white privilege. She performed Gender in a Binary World at the Coming Out Monologues to increase understanding and diminish transphobia. She is focusing on women reclaiming their voice and self-authority after sexual abuse.
On Friday evening, October 28, Bobbie’s play, Screams Echo, will be performed as a dramatic reading in the Lecture Hall at 6:00 PM, followed by a round-table discussion led by 904WARD. Bobbie will narrate the play, which includes original music composed and performed by Tahirah Whittington and acting by Victoria Canaday-Anderson.
Andres Rojas, born in Cuba, came to the U.S. at 13. He currently edits for $ – Poetry Is Currency and has served as poetry editor for Compose and Bridge Eight, as well as reading for New England Review. He is the author of two poetry chapbooks and a full-length book, Third Winter in Our Second Country (Trio House Press, 2021). His poetry, featured in the Best New Poets anthology, was in AGNI, Barrow Street, Colorado Review, Diode, Mass. Review, New England Review, & Poetry Northwest.
He will once again present the Dr. James Robert Cobb Student Writer Awards at the Student Showcase from 12:30 – 2:30 PM on Saturday, October 29 on the Loading Dock stage. There will be three poetry winners and three prose winners. Cash prizes are $250 for 1st place, and $125 each for 2nd and 3rd places.
Poet Andres Rojas will host student poetry readings in the Loading Dock stage, while UNF Professor Tricia Booker will host student prose readings in the Rooftop Garden.
Rojas says, “These awards are given to selected student writer participants at JaxbyJax in memory of Dr. James R. Cobb, a professor at Florida State College at Jacksonville’s Kent Campus for over 20 years. He was a life-long educator and supporter of higher education for all who aspired to it. Dr. Cobb was a mentor and a model for broad-minded but rigorous thought to his students.”
JaxbyJax is grateful to Rojas for honoring the memory of a beloved teacher by encouraging student writers and celebrating their work.
Born and raised in Jacksonville, Florida, Franklin Ritch has been pursuing a career in film since a very young age. During high school, he met Britt McTammany, who would become his longtime friend, mentor, and cinematographer. Together, they produced several short films and web-series, assembling a tight crew of talented local artists. In 2014, he founded Last Resort Ideas, an independent studio dedicated to producing unconventional and insightful narratives through the medium of film.
Franklin will participate in a panel workshop entitled, “Screenwriting in Jacksonville” at 10 AM on Saturday, October 29 in Northern Trust Seminar Room 219.
Then he will also join in a Featured Screenwriting Panel Discussion in the Lecture Hall at 5:00 p.m. To see the Event Guide, click here.
