‘The Exonerated’ is a staged reading at ARTworks
“The Exonerated” a staged reading at ARTworks, produced by Misspent Youth Productions directed by Stephen Murray, February 10 &amp; 11 at 7:30 p.m.; all seats $7. Culled from interviews, letters, transcripts, case files and the public record, “The Exonerated” tells the true stories of six wrongfully convicted survivors of death row in their own words.
Moving between first-person monologues and scenes set in courtrooms and prisons, six interwoven stories paint a picture of an American criminal justice system gone horribly wrong and of six brave souls who persevered to survive it.
In this 90-minute intermissionless play, we meet Kerry, a sensitive Texan brutalized on death row for twenty-two years before being exonerated by DNA evidence; we meet Gary, a Midwestern organic farmer condemned for the murder of his own parents and later exonerated when two motorcycle-gang members confess. We meet Robert, an African-American horse groomer who spent seven years on death row for the murder of a white woman before evidence emerges that the victim was found clutching hair from a Caucasian attacker. We hear from David, a shy man with aspirations to the ministry, bullied into confessing at 18 to a robbery/murder he had nothing to do with, scarred from a youth spent in prison and struggling to regain his faith; and from Sunny, a bright-spirited hippie who, along with her husband, spent 17 years in prison for the murder of two police officers while another man confessed and was ignored by the courts. And we meet Delbert, a poet who serves as the play’s center, convicted of a rape/murder in the Deep South of the 1970s and later freed when evidence surfaced showing that he was not even in the town when the crime occurred.

‘The Pillowman’ is a staged reading at ARTworks
“The Pillowman” a staged reading at ARTworks, produced by The Palmetto Theater Xperiment and directed by Matthew Donnelly, February 17 &amp; 18 at 7:30 p.m.; all seats $7.
With echoes of Stoppard, Kafka, and the Brothers Grimm, “The Pillowman” centers on a writer in an unnamed totalitarian state who is being interrogated about the gruesome content of his short stories and their similarities to a series of child murders The result is an urgent work of theatrical bravura and an unflinching examination of the very nature and purpose of art.
ARTworks applies the many creative tools of The Arts to strengthen artists, and enrich audiences, collectors, and visitors through high quality arts experiences and arts education programs 365 days a year. In Beaufort Town Center, 2127 Boundary Street, www.artworksinbeaufort.org.

Poetry Society of South Carolina presents poet for seminar
Starkey Flythe, one of South Carolina’s most published contemporary poets, will present a seminar at ARTworks on Saturday, February 18, 10 a.m. to noon. Presented by the Poetry Society of South Carolina, the seminar is $10 for society members and $15 for non-members. To register, contact PSSC at http://poetrysocietysc.org and slesin@islc.net.
Starkey Flythe’s literary career spans from Africa to the Saturday Evening Post where he was editor. His poem “Greeks” was published in the New Yorker in 2011 and his short story “New Deal” was a winner of the Piccolo Fiction Open in 2000, in addition to numerous publications, from Ploughshares to books from Furman University’s Ninety-six Press (Paying the Anesthesiologist)  and Snake Nation Press (The Futile Lessons of Glue.) He is a Georgia Poetry Circuit winner, as well as a Yaddo and Breadloaf fellow, and helped found the Sand Hills Writers Conference.
“The Ant &amp; the Elephant” seminar “reduces the poem from Britannica to Pocket Book.” Start with the smallest possible subject (instead of love or time or death,) say with a flea (see the 16th Century poets) instead of a hippo, a hummingbird instead of an albatross. The seminar will be an exercise in moment (see Emily Dickinson,) intensifying emotion, including the extra — murdering, as they say, “your little darling.”

Author C. Hope Clarke to speak about motivation to write
C. Hope Clark, an author and freelance writing business expert, will speak at ARTworks in Beaufort Town Center on Tuesday, February 21, 7 to 8:30 p.m.  The event is presented by Beaufort ProWriters, and tickets are $10, at the door and in advance by calling ARTworks at 379-2787.
A resident of Chapin, Clark is the author of a newly-released novel, “A Lowcountry Bribe,” the first book in the new Palmetto State Mystery Series from Bell Bridge Books. On February 21, Clark will sign copies of her new mystery, and give a presentation on the numerous ways of “finding the motivational and financial means to write,” based on her extensive experience as founder of FundsforWriters.com, an online resource for grants, contests, markets and funding sources for writers. Her site is one of Writer’s Digest’s 101 Best for Writers for the past 11 consecutive years: “writing can be sweet if you decide to make it so.”
Clark’s newsletters at www.fundsforwriters.com reach 42,000 readers each week. She is also published in Writer’s Digest, The Writer Magazine, Landscape Management, Voices of Youth Advocates (VOYA), Chicken Soup for the Soul, and many other online and print publications, and she speaks at conferences throughout the United States.
Beaufort ProWriters is a monthly meeting for professional writers or wannabe professional writers of any genre, from magazine articles to novels to technical writing. For more info, contact Katherine Tandy Brown at ktandybrown@gmail.com or (843) 379-5886.

Award-winning photographer to teach series on Photoshop
Award-winning digital photographer, Phil Dunn will be presenting a three part series on Photoshop.  All workshops in this series will be hosted on Saturdays from 9 a.m. until 4 p.m. on the Historic Beaufort campus, in room #111 in the Sandstone building.
The series begins on February 24 with An Introduction to Photoshop CS5:  Building a Workflow in Camera Raw, enabling participants to master the seven steps necessary to optimize the quality of every image.  In this session, students will become accomplished with Adobe’s Camera Raw interface.
The second workshop in this series, Mastering Tools, Layers, Selections and Curves in CS5, will be held on March 30. This session will focus on acquiring the skills to use basic and advanced features in Adobe Photoshop, and how to manipulate images after optimization.
The final workshop, High Dynamic Range Photography, is scheduled for April 20th.  The focus of this session will be extending your camera’s ability to respond to a wider range of light.  Students will practice using Photoshop to simulate HDR by double processing images and delve into true HDR imagery by combining a range of exposures into one HDR image.
“Moderately priced digital cameras make it possible for individuals to document the world around them in exciting ways,” explains Dunn.  “The challenge is optimizing the image before and after it’s been captured. This series will teach pre- and post-capture workflow that will allow them to realize their photographic vision.”
In order to participate in this workshop series, participants must possess a digital camera with at least a 10-megapixel sensor.  Cost to attend these workshops is $275 for the entire series or $100 per session.
To register, contact Erica Breton with USCB Continuing Education at 843-521-4112 or bretone@uscb.edu.  For more information about Phil Dunn or to view his artwork please visit, www.phildunnart.com.

Thrilling young violinist to perform on Fripp Island
Don’t miss an incomparable musical experience, 5 p.m., Sunday, February 26, when fresh, thrilling violinist Emma Steele takes the stage at Fripp Island Community Centre.
The supremely talented Steele, a senior at Carnegie Mellon University, is a star pupil of the legendary violinist Cyrus Forough.  Selected as concertmaster of the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic because of her virtuosity, she previously was concertmaster of the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra and the Encore Chamber Orchestra. At age 20 Emma was among only six finalists in the prestigious 2010 Sibelius Violin Competition.  This is perhaps THE premier worldwide violin competition, held in Finland once every five years.
Tickets at the door $20; students $10. Your admission includes a sumptuous post-performance reception by Harold’s Catering, at which you can meet other music lovers and chat with the artist in a congenial setting. Free Fripp gate pass for all concertgoers.  More info: (843) 838-6655.