Tickets
Cafe Table Seat: $30 per ticket
(Table can seat up to 4)General Ticket: $25
WORD returns! Celebrate the written word as an art form in this recurring program that invites writers to share works that resonate with an anchoring theme. In its fifth iteration, WORD: Identity, presents a curated selection of writers, poets, and storytellers for an evening of presence and reflection as we meditate on the word “identity” and its many shapes and forms.
Curated by writer, educator and founding director of Hamptons Pride, Tom House, the program welcomes writers, Jeremy Dennis, Ariel Ransom, Christine Sampson, and Lora Tucker to the space to share their contemplations on Identity.
The reading will offer café table seating (limited tables available that seat four guests), and regular seating in rows behind the tables. Stop by our concessions ahead of the performance to purchase a drink or a snack and settle in for an evening of intellect, inquiry, and creativity.
JEREMY DENNIS
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(b. 1990) Jeremy Dennis is a contemporary fine-art photographer, an enrolled tribal member of the Shinnecock Indian Nation in Southampton, NY, and lead artist and founder of the nonprofit Ma’s House & BIPOC Art Studio, Inc. on the Shinnecock Indian Reservation. In his work, he explores Indigenous identity, culture, and assimilation. Dennis holds an M.F.A. from Pennsylvania State University in State College and a B.A. in studio art from Stony Brook University on Long Island. He lives and works in Southampton on the Shinnecock reservation.
ARIEL RANSOM
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Ariel Ransom is a multidisciplinary artist whose work explores identity, transformation, love, power, and the liminal space between the seen and unseen. Ransom draws from spirituality, mythology, and lived experience to examine what it means to become oneself in a world that resists black female authenticity and integration. Her poetry and prose often navigate themes of polarity—divinity and desire, softness and strength, devotion and sovereignty—inviting readers into intimate interior landscapes that mirror the human experience. Ransom’s work treats language as both ritual and revelation.
CHRISTINE SAMPSON
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Christine Sampson identifies as "female," "queer," "overthinker," and "journalist." Her award-winning work spans both print and broadcast formats. She writes personal essays on her website, csampsonwrites.com, and she has written three full-length novels, one of which is slated for self-publishing this fall. In a past life she was a professional dancer and an editor of two peer-reviewed scientific journals, "Physics of Fluids" and "Physics of Plasma." A Montauk summer kid in her youth, she has been a full-time resident of the South Fork for 11 years now and serves as Director of Community Engagement at LTV Studios. After covering the rebuilding and rebirth of The Church as a journalist for the Sag Harbor Express between 2017-2019, she is thrilled to be presenting her work here today.
LORA TUCKER
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Brooklyn born and educated, Lora is a poet, activist, and essayist. With over 40 years advocating for racial and social justice, she has taught graduate-level classes in diversity, racism, oppression, and privilege. Known as the “Therapeutic Poet,” she creates workshops in poetry therapy, and conducts professional mental health seminars and racial justice workshops. She has been featured in venues such as The White America Podcast the East Hampton Star, Canio’s Bookstore, the Knitting Factory, The Southampton Revue, and Brooklyn Poets, and has blogged for POZ online magazine and Harlem World. Currently earning an MFA in Creative Writing at Stony Brook University/Southampton, Lora’s thesis is on her search for her father’s patriotic contributions as a Tuskegee Airman. Currently she is the poetry editor for African Voices literary magazine, is conducting workshops for Stony Brook/Southampton Hospital’s Wellness Center, and is performing in “The Vagina Monologues” for Hope & Resilience Long Island on the East End, including a show at Southampton Cultural Center on February 21st.
TOM HOUSE
Curator
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Tom House, a writer and English teacher living in Springs, is president and founding director of the local nonprofit Hamptons Pride. His fiction and nonfiction stories and essays have appeared in numerous publications, including Harper’s, North American Review, and the East Hampton Star.