Upcoming Events
The Factory: Techniques of Revision
The Factory: Techniques of Revision with Steff Sirois will take place on Tuesday, October 14th from 7 to 8:30 pm in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts.
Do you have a piece of writing you've been neglecting? In this multi-genre workshop, we'll discuss strategies to determine what a piece needs from a writer in order to achieve its purpose. We'll practice being keen readers of our own work, and we'll execute a range of revision techniques to help you transform and elevate your story, essay, poem, or manuscript. Bring a physical copy of something you've been working on, and get ready to revise!
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
$30 gets you 90 minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts from 7 to 8:30 pm. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team by emailing info@ballandsocket.org to discuss accommodations.
About the Instructor:
Steff Sirois got her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Idaho, where she studied the Gothic and wrote short fiction about insanity, hauntedness, and loss. You can find some of her recent work in Ninth Letter, Harpur Palate, Reed Magazine, Landlocked, Prism Review, Fugue Journal, and the Washington Post.
The Factory: Writing Beyond the Veil: Exploring Poetry about Death
Join us in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts. Tuesday, October 21st from 7 to 8:30 pm will take place on with Carly Message Writing Beyond the Veil: Exploring Poetry About Death.
Death is a part of life; that notion is underscored by the multitude of poetry dedicated to that subject. Let’s explore how our culture, our personal experience and the universality of death shapes the poetry we create.
In this season of transition featuring Samhain, Pitru Paksha, All Souls Day and Dia de los Muertos, we are reminded that death is a part of life, which is reflected in the ubiquitous theme of death in poetry. In this workshop we will explore categories of poetry dealing with death (e.g. grief/loss, mortality, the macabre, socio-political, the natural world, celebratory/afterlife, war) while discussing techniques such as form, metaphor, personification, etc.
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
$30 gets you 90 minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts from 7 to 8:30 pm. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team by emailing info@ballandsocket.org to discuss accommodations.
About the Instructor:
Carly Message received her MFA with a concentration in short fiction from the University of San Francisco. She is an active member of the CT Poetry Society and is excited to support the Ball & Socket’s arts community as both a student and facilitator.
The Factory: From Roots to Readers: Creating Children’s Stories from Family History
Join us for From Roots to Readers: Creating Children's Stories from Family History on Saturday, October 25th from 10 to 11:30 am in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts learn how to turn your family's history into a children's book!
Turn your family stories into engaging narratives for kids! In this hands-on workshop, you’ll draft one scene, learn simple storytelling techniques, and leave with tools to keep writing, ensuring that your family history can be passed on in creative and lasting forms. Guided by genealogists and authors Deb Holman and Tara Rothman.
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
$30 gets you 90 minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts from 7 to 8:30 pm. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team by emailing info@ballandsocket.org to discuss accommodations.
About the Instructor:
Deborah S. Holman has spent over twenty years turning curiosity about her roots into a full-blown passion—and a teaching career. Editor of QUEST and leader of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Connecticut’s Writers Group, she helps fellow researchers transform discoveries into stories. An award-winning author, she’s written family histories, the novel Nothing Really Bad Will Happen, the children’s book Doris’s New Home, and the forthcoming Countess of Cons: The Story of a Gilded Age Grifter, all brimming with real-life secrets and wit.
Tara Blieden Rothman is a retired educator, technology trainer, and longtime genealogy enthusiast who has been digging into family history for over 40 years. Author of Gussie’s Suitcase Packed with Courage, Hope, and Secrets and other children’s books at TinyTalesByTara.com, she brings real history to life for young readers. Her goal is to inspire children—and their grown-ups—to treasure the past, understand the present, and imagine the future.
Partner Programming: Trash Art Workshop @ Artsplace for Adults
Using found objects and non-recyclable trash, the participants will create their own works of art on canvas. Imagery templates will include fish and birds, though any subject may be created. This workshop is about the process and creative recycling. You’ll learn how to make art out of what you have on hand and to interpret an image by layering objects and trash. Bring some of yours! (Teens/Adults) (1 day)
Fee: $35 for Residents or $40 for Non-Residents
Partner Programming: Trash Art Workshop @ Artsplace
Sarah Schneiderman Fish or Bird Collage (Grades 4-8) ~ 1 day : register at Artsplace!
Saturday, October 25th (new date) 1:00-3:00 pm
Using found objects and non-recyclable trash, students will create their own works of art. Imagery templates will include fish and birds, though any subject may be created. This workshop is about experiencing the fun of collage, while learning about how plastic and other trash impact the environment, especially sea life.
Instructor: Sarah Schneiderman
Fee: $35 for Residents or $40 for Non-Residents
The Factory: The Poem as Therapy: Channeling Grief and Joy, Love and Anger
The Poem as Therapy: Channeling Grief and Joy, Love and Anger With Pat Mottola on Tuesday, Oct. 28th from 7 to 8:30 pm
From the ancient wisdom of philosophers and mystics to modern psychotherapy practices, poetry has long been recognized as a powerful tool for gaining self-awareness, processing emotions, and promoting psychological healing. By engaging both mind and heart, the creative process tapped by poetry can be a transformative force. Learn how poets infuse controlled emotion to create power and passion in writing.
About the Instructor:
Award-winning poet and Pushcart Prize nominee, Pat Mottola teaches Creative Writing at Southern Connecticut State University, where she earned both an M.S. in Art Education and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing. In addition to working with students at SCSU, she is thrilled to teach both art and poetry to Senior Citizens in person and online throughout Connecticut. Her work is published in journals across the country, including War, Literature & the Arts, Connecticut Review, Main Street Rag, San Pedro River Review, VietNow Magazine, and Paterson Literary Review. She has served as Keynote Speaker for the MPAC-Young Writers Awards as well as judged Connecticut High School Poetry Out Loud competitions. Pat is President of the Connecticut Poetry Society and served as editor of Connecticut River Review from 2012–2017. On a global scale, she mentors Afghan women writers living in Afghanistan and beyond, resulting in a collection of poems in English, Maybe I Should Fly, by two Afghan sisters who lived under the Taliban regime. She is the author of three collections of poetry: Under the Red Dress, After Hours, and A Town Like That. Pat was the recipient of the prestigious CSCU system-wide Board of Regents Outstanding Teacher Award in 2019, as well as the J. Philip Smith Outstanding Teacher Award in 2021. Pat is the Poet Laureate of Cheshire, CT.
Author Talk and Book Signing with Lara Ehrlich and Kristina Ten
Author Talk and Book Signing with Lara Ehrlich and Kristina Ten on Sunday, November 2nd from 3-5 pm at the ReReads Booksellers
Come meet two fiction authors to celebrate their new books being published this fall. Hear them read excerpts in conversation and stay after for a book signing.
On November 2nd from 3-5 pm, in partnership with ReReads, we will host an Author Talk and Book Signing featuring Lara Ehrlich and Kristina Ten in conversation about their recent works of fiction: Bind Me Tighter Still and Tell Me Yours, I’ll Tell You Mine.
Bind Me Tighter Still by Lara Ehrlich (full media kit available here: https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/12djB3hs0TD49l3T9gSA3jPJkr9r2j12t)
The youngest of three siren sisters, Ceto is weary of an existence driven by hunger, no better than a fish. She trades her tail for life on land, marries the first man she meets, and bears a daughter, only to discover that domesticity is just as mundane as sirenhood. In search of something more, she flees with her daughter Naia to the ocean, where she establishes a mermaid burlesque and recreates herself, performing as a siren in a tank built into the limestone cliffs overlooking the sea. She trains more sirens, expanding Sirenland from a roadside attraction to a national sensation she rules without opposition—until Naia, at 15, begins to push back against the world Ceto has created and the role she performs in her mother’s shows. A death at Sirenland threatens Ceto’s authority and leads Naia to question whether this women-ruled kingdom is truly as empowering as her mother would have her believe. Bind Me Tighter Still explores power and hunger, sacrifice and motherhood, and celebrates the fierceness of female strength in a male-dominated world.
Lara Ehrlich is an award-winning CT author, founder of Thought Fox Writers Den, a community-based writers space for all levels, and hosts the podcast Writer, Mother, Monster. She has taught and participated in panels at Bread Loaf Writers Workshop, Yale Writers Workshop, AWP, and the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing. She is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor of English and Writer in Residence at Connecticut College.
Tell Me Yours, I’ll Tell You Mine by Kristina Ten
The new kid in school discovers a diabolical presence in the depths of an English-language-learning CD-ROM. A declining empire, in its last desperate gasp, designs an elaborate matchmaking system around cootie catchers and soda-can tabs. A former varsity volleyball player reopens the grisly wounds of her youth, haunted by a lost friend. In each story, the game has been twisted. In each game, players must make their own rules. Through a bloody, shattered lens, the artifacts of growing up take on a new and disquieting power—riddles remain unsolved, pranks have perilous stakes, and superstitions won’t save you.
Populated by living paper dolls, summer camp legends, and trivia nights gone terribly wrong, the twelve genre-crossing tales in Tell Me Yours, I’ll Tell You Mine wrestle with themes of memory, disobedience, alienation, belonging, and the horrors of inhabiting a body others seek to control.
NY author Kristin Ten’s short fiction has appeared in such publications as McSweeney's, Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, We're Here: The Best Queer Speculative Fiction, and Lightspeed. She is a graduate of Clarion West Writers Workshop and the MFA program in fiction at the University of Colorado Boulder. Her work has received McSweeney's Stephen Dixon Award, the Subjective Chaos Kind of Award for Short Fiction, and the F(r)iction Writing Contest, and has been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award, the Locus Award, and the WSFA Small Press Award.
Pushing Buttons: Collecting Oral Histories About Ball & Socket Manufacturing
A Free Public Program the evening of November 13th featuring oral history videos, along with time for discussion with our team and Cheshire Historical Society from 6:30 to 8 pm
in the Mary Baldwin Room at Cheshire Public Library
This program is funded by CT Humanities.
Sustainability Fair
Sat, Oct 04 from 10 am to 2 pm:
Join Ball & Socket Arts with our friends from the Coalition for a Sustainable Cheshire for this year’s fair at Boulder Knoll Community Farm.
We will be presenting a Reclaimed Fashion Runway with our current Workshop Gallery featured artist, Kathryn Frund.
Learn to make your own sustainable fashion with us at a hands-on workshop on 10/2 (details).
A whole new venue, a whole new look. This year's 4th Annual Cheshire Sustainability Fair is October 4th at Boulder Knoll Community Farm. Save the Date! Birds of Prey Presentation - EV vehicles on site - Live music - Soulfully Vegan Food Truck and more!
Making Your Own Reclaimed Fashion Runway Look with Kathryn Frund!
We all have it. That perfect dress that doesn't fit anymore. The cool scarf we got at a garage sale and never know what to do with. Join us over at Artsplace with Ball & Socket Arts' Workshop Gallery artist, Kathryn Frund on the evening on Thursday Oct. 2nd from 6 to 8pm.
Intriguing materials and textiles will be provided, but please also feel free to bring your own to work with. Sewing machines will be available.
Finished looks are welcome to 'walk the runway' at our Reclaimed/Upcycled Fashion Show over at the Sustainability Fair on 10/4 at Boulder Knoll Farm. Fashion show will run 11 to 11:30 am. You can also recruit a 'model' for your look.
Workshop is limited to 14 participants, so be sure to register now!
*** please note this Workshop will take place next door at Artsplace in Building 2!
The Factory: Focus on Fear with Emily Costa on September 30th
The Factory: Focus on Fear with Emily Costa will take place on Tuesday, September 30th from 7 to 8:30 pm in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts.
As we creep towards Halloween, let’s look at all the ways fear presents itself in our writing. How might we tap into our own fears for material? How can we use fear to develop characters? To create tension? In this generative workshop, we will explore fear through exercises and prompts, learning how to embrace what frightens us the most.
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
$30 gets you 90 minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts from 7 to 8:30 pm. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team by emailing info@ballandsocket.org to discuss accommodations.
About the Instructor:
Emily Costa is the author of two books: Girl on Girl (Rejection Letters) and Until It Feels Right (Autofocus). She received her MFA in fiction from Southern Connecticut State University where she teaches English. She is the Creative Nonfiction Editor for Farewell Transmission and an Assistant Flash Editor for Split Lip Magazine. You can find her online at emilylauracosta.com.
Author Talk and Book Signing with Roohi Choudhry and Serkan Gorkemli
On September 28th from 2-4 pm, in partnership with ReReads, we will host an Author Talk and Book Signing featuring Roohi Choudhry and Serkan Görkemli in conversation about their debut works of fiction: Outside Women and Sweet Tooth.
This event will take place off-site at the ReRead Ballroom at the Watch Factory.
Stories in Place, Stories of Me: A Scavenger Hunt and Writing Workshop
Stories in Place, Stories of Me: A Scavenger Hunt and Writing Workshop on Saturday, September 27th from 4-6 pm
Our personal narratives are a patchwork map of memories, inherited experience, and our sensing bodies in the everyday. In this workshop, collect your sensory observations and stitch them with memory to tell stories that honor the neighborhoods we move through. We’ll spend some time wandering West Main region (weather permitting) and scavenging for stories. Then, we’ll write and map-make to help turn our found scraps into story treasure
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
$40 gets you 2 hours minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts from 4 to 6 pm. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team by emailing info@ballandsocket.org to discuss accommodations.
About the Instructor:
Roohi Choudhry is a writer, teaching artist, and researcher who lives in Brooklyn, New York. Born in Pakistan and raised in southern Africa, she holds an MFA in creative writing from the University of Michigan and is the recipient of a New York Foundation for the Arts fellowship and residencies at Hedgebrook and Djerassi. She worked as a researcher in criminal justice reform and public health, wrote for the United Nations, and facilitates creative writing workshops for interfaith groups, schools, libraries, and community organizations. Her stories and essays have appeared in Ploughshares, Callaloo, Longreads, and the Kenyon Review. Her debut novel, Outside Women (University Press of Kentucky, March 2025), was named one of the "most anticipated feminist books of 2025" by Ms. Magazine and described as “riveting… an incisive story of how change happens” by Publishers’ Weekly. Find out more at roohichoudhry.com.
Outside Women (University Press of Kentucky) is set in South Africa, Pakistan, and New York City over the span of a century. The book intertwines the narratives of two migrant South Asian women each faced with the choice to risk her own life to pursue justice for a stranger. Ms. Magazine recently included the book on their list of Most Anticipated Feminist Books of 2025 and Publishers’ Weekly described it as “riveting… an incisive story of how change happens.” Pub date — March 25, 2025.
Artist Talk with Kathryn Frund
Meet the artist behind WATERSHEDS in the Workshop Gallery and hear more about her process, inspirations, and methods of crafting these large-scale works.
No need to RSVP, just pop into the Workshop Gallery at 1 pm on Saturday, September 27th and learn something new!
Hidden Powers of Setting: Moving Beyond Backdrop with Kristin Dringoli
The Factory: Hidden Powers of Setting: Moving Beyond Backdrop with Kristin Dringoli will take place on Tuesday, September 23rd from 7 to 8:30 pm in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts.
Learn how to wield the power of setting in your fiction, moving beyond backdrop and into the creative ways this vital craft element can enrich storytelling. Writers will learn specific uses of setting to strengthen their stories, read examples from modern works, and practice what they've learned through in-class writing exercises.
$30 gets you 90 minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts from 7 to 8:30 pm. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team by emailing info@ballandsocket.org to discuss accommodations.
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
About the Instructor: Kristin Dringoli is a fiction writer from Cheshire and currently serves as Ball & Socket's 2025 Writer-in-Residence. She is pursuing her MFA in Creative Writing at Southern Connecticut State University and was a summer 2025 author fellow at the Martha's Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing. Her work has been published in Essays & Fictions, Potluck Mag, Spellbinder, and is forthcoming in Flash Fiction Magazine.
Live @ the Factory: Dan Pugach Big Band at Bartlem Park
Ball & Socket Arts is thrilled to announce a very special edition of Live @ the Factory now on September 19th with Dan Pugach Big Band.
Bring your lawn chairs and a picnic dinner for an evening of original live music from the 18-piece, Grammy-winning Dan Pugach Big Band at Bartlem Park's new bandshell!
Grab your spot and start your picnic at 5:30.
Music from 6-8 pm.
This event is produced by Ball & Socket Arts in partnership with Cheshire Public Library. This night of music is sponsored by HB Live.
Intro to Flash Fiction with Chelsea Dodds
The Factory: Intro to Flash Fiction with Chelsea Dodds will take place on Tuesday, September 16th from 7 to 8:30 pm in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts.
This workshop will provide participants with an introduction to the shortest of short stories (1000 words or less). We will read examples of flash stories, work with prompts to write your own flash stories, and discuss avenues for publishing.
Chelsea Dodds's short fiction has appeared in Maudlin House, Rejection Letters, and Sixfold Journal. A graduate of SCSU's MFA program, her writing has recently been supported with a residency at Craigardan in upstate New York. Her poetry chapbook Nothing Good Will Get Away will be published by Finishing Line Press in February 2026.
$30 gets you 90 minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts from 7 to 8:30 pm. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team by emailing info@ballandsocket.org to discuss accommodations.
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
Opening Reception for Kathryn Frund’s WATERSHEDS
Watersheds, composed of fiber installations, sculptures, and mixed media works on panel, addresses the exponentially expanding amounts of synthetic materials entering the world's landfills and oceans. Animated and graphic in nature, the work employs synthetic fast fashion, diverted from the consumer waste stream.
Small Worlds: The Art of Haiku with Amy Graver
Small Worlds: The Art of Haiku with Amy Graver
Small Worlds: The Art of Haiku with Amy Graver on Tuesday, September 9th from 7 to 8:30 pm.
Explore the power and precision of haiku in this 90-minute, hands-on workshop featuring traditional, modern, haibun, and linked forms. Through joyful discussion and creative exploration, participants will learn essential elements – seasonal imagery, line breaks, rhythm, and juxtaposition – while engaging in fun, generative writing exercises.
We’ll try a collaborative “haiku pass,” spark inspiration with a haiku prompt deck filled with sensory cues, and write ekphrastic haiku inspired by gallery artwork or a chosen image. The session will close with a surprise take-home prompt and a small project to carry your haiku into the world.
You’ll leave with several original haiku, new generative techniques, and a deeper appreciation for the small worlds that live in a single moment. Whether you’re a beginner or seasoned writer, come ready to observe, imagine, and surprise yourself.
$30 gets you 90 minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts from 7 to 8:30 pm. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team by emailing info@ballandsocket.org to discuss accommodations.
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
Live @ the Factory: Goodnight Blue Moon on 9/6/25 (MOVED to St. Peter’s due to RAIN!)
On September 6th from 6-8 pm, enjoy a free concert featuring local bluegrass legends, Goodnight Blue Moon. Due to rain in the forecast, we will be MOVING this concert indoors up the road to St. Peter’s Church at 59 Main Street. Same time. Same great music.
Music from 6-8 pm.
Goondight Blue Moon
Blending rich vocal harmonies with lush orchestrations, Goodnight Blue Moon has created a sound that is steeped in tradition, yet entirely current. GNBM is known for their energetic, honest, and dynamic live performances, offering a refreshing take on Americana roots music.
Awarded Best Roots Act in the 2016 New England Music Awards, and Best Folk/Traditional Act in the 2018 and 2013 Connecticut Music Awards, Goodnight Blue Moon has cemented their place as one of New England's premier groups. They have shared the stage with indie-folk heavyweights Hurray for the Riff Raff, Spirit Family Reunion, Wild Child, Joe Fletcher and the Wrong Reasons, and Mother Falcon among others, in addition to creating a diverse and devoted following of their own. Goodnight Blue Moon has been regularly featured on WNPR's Where We Live and NEXT with John Dankosky. Their festival credits include CT Folk Festival, LAUNCH Music Festival, MUSIKFEST, Podunk Bluegrass Festival, I AM Festival and Block Island Music Festival. Goodnight Blue Moon's third studio album Dawning Dream was released April 2018.
New Artcade Mural Unveiling and Celebration!
Be the first to see our brand new mural, meet the artists, and enjoy a custom ice cream cake.
Hear a few words for how our new Artcade mural came to be from the artists. Then celebrate with a snack and stick around for a free bluegrass concert.
Our next Artcade mural has been devised by Daniel Bernier and Dan Gries, two artists who explore and invite viewers into the making process.
What's the Artcade?
The Artcade is a public space for exceptional visual art on view 24/7 at Ball & Socket Arts outside of Building 2 along the ramp as you enter the building.
To date, the Artcade has featured large-scale murals by four visual artists. Our 2025 to 2026 Artcade season is funded by the Ion Bank Foundation.
Daniel Bernier Bio:
Daniel Bernier is drawn to art that invites the viewer into the process of its making. They have long wanted to make musical instruments that don’t require formal training and reward experimentation. They reach most for legible tools and techniques. Each of these is an outgrowth of their understanding that people should be supported in their love for making interesting things, that people love to play.
Their partnership with Dan Gries has produced physical-pixel works that invite the viewer to notice how our eyes resolve an image from discrete points of color. To attend to how we see our screens, instead of what’s on them.
Based in Cumberland, Rhode Island, they are a musician, a poet, a sometimes-generative artist. They are learning to tune and repair pianos. They are a step-parent, and nonbinary.
Dan Gries Bio:
Dan Gries crafts algorithms using computer code to generate images that take physical form as inkjet prints, pen plotter drawings, or installations. His work is not made with artificial intelligence; instead, each piece emerges from systems he builds himself, shaped by decisions about form, motion, and texture.
He is drawn to imperfection and unpredictability: rough edges, wandering curves, and shifts in color or flow. His visual language ranges from minimalist, meditative geometries that seek stability to more intricate expressions of grace or turmoil in motion.
Dan Gries lives and works in New Haven, CT, teaching mathematics and computer science at Hopkins School while maintaining an active practice in visual art.
Artist Talk with Deborah Hesse for Other Asterisms
Other Asterisms by Deborah Hesse
August 1 - September 7, 2025
Located in The Workshop Gallery, Building 3.
Opening Reception on Friday, August 1st from 3-6PM
Artist Talk on Friday, September 5th at 6PM
Regular Gallery Hours from 12-4 pm on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays.
Other Asterisms is a solo exhibition by Deborah Hesse featuring sculptural, light-responsive wall works made from industrial and everyday materials. Together, the pieces form a constellation—charting imagined links between the material and immaterial, the physical and virtual. Evoking underwater ecosystems, celestial maps, and microscopic life, these luminous, biomorphic forms blur boundaries and invite reflection on unseen systems beyond the known world.
Deborah Hesse is a multimedia artist and independent curator based in New Haven, CT. She holds a B.A. from Smith College and an M.A. in Painting and Printmaking from the University of New Mexico, where she was a Tamarind Institute Fellow in Lithography. Her honors include a Connecticut Office of the Arts Individual Artist Fellowship and a Regional Project Initiative Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
The Archive: Mining the Past to Write Today with Allison Bass-Riccio
This generative writing workshop will focus on using archival material as an entry point into a story: either fiction or nonfiction. Participants will: read excerpts from authors using archival material in their writing, view artifacts from archives (either their own or ones supplied for viewing), and search for an entry point into their next story. Participants will have the chance to share their work at class close. All levels of writers are welcome.
Live @ the Factory: Tim McDonald the Ghost Tones with opener, Ed Corvo
Ball & Socket Arts is thrilled to announce a very special edition of Live @ the Factory on August 23, brought to you by Richard Chevrolet and featuring a night of Rock with Tim McDonald and the Ghost Tones with opener, Ed Corvo.
Bring your lawn chairs and a picnic dinner for an evening of great music.
Grab your spot and start your picnic at 5:30.
Music from 6-8 pm.
This event is produced by Ball & Socket Arts and this night of music is sponsored by Richard Chevrolet.
Make Your Mark: Public Art Making Workshop
Our next Artcade mural has been devised by Daniel Bernier and Dan Gries, two artists who explore and invite viewers into the making process. But we need YOUR help to bring it to life.
Stop by our outdoor creation station and be part of the next piece to hang outside Sweet Claude's!
Live @ the Factory: Poetry Night with Luisa Caycedo-Kimura and Michael “Chief” Peterson plus an Open Mic!
Ball & Socket Arts is thrilled to announce the return of Poetry Night to Live @ the Factory 2025 with headliners: Luisa Caycedo-Kimura and Michael “Chief” Peterson.
We’ll kick things off with readings from these incredible poets, followed by an Open Mic where all are welcome to share a poem.
Bring your lawn chairs and a picnic dinner from one of our local restaurants for an evening of literary delights. A big thank you to Pat Mottola, Cheshire’s own Poet Laureate, for all her help planning this event.
Grab your spot and start your picnic at 5:30.
Readings start at 6 pm, Open Mic to follow.
This event is produced by Ball & Socket Arts with support from our Literary Subcommittee.
Stand Out and Get Published with David LeGere
Join publishing veteran David LeGere for a dynamic session on navigating today’s publishing options—traditional, hybrid, and self-publishing—and how to choose the right path for your book. Learn how to craft a compelling elevator pitch, define your unique selling position, and develop effective marketing strategies. Perfect for authors at any stage, this talk offers practical tools to stand out in a crowded market.
Live @ the Factory: Lys Guillorn & the Void Kittens with opener, the Sawtelles
Ball & Socket Arts is thrilled to announce Lys Guillorn & the Void Kittens, with opening act, the Sawtelles on Saturday, August 16th from 6-8 pm.
Bring your lawn chairs and a picnic dinner from one of our local restaurants for an evening of music.
Grab your spot and start your picnic at 5:30. We will have cold beverages available for sale with all proceeds benefitting future programming on-site.
Music from 6-8 pm.
More on 8/16/25 Headliner: Lys Guillorn & The Void Kitttens
Lys Guillorn is a genre-bending singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist from Connecticut, dipping one boot in twangy indie folk, and the other in psych rock. Live, Guillorn is joined by The Void Kittens--Peter Riccio (drums) from The Sawtelles and NHIC, and Eric Bloomquist (bass) of Chica Non Grata and Bronson Rock.
Guillorn’s self-titled first record, released in 2003, earned some indie press and radio airplay due to its originality as well as guest turns from members of the Feelies, Luna, and Voidoids. Since then, Guillorn has remained a steadfast member of the Connecticut music scene, printing photos by day and playing shows by night with both local and national artists. They have two full-length studio records of originals, and a couple of EPs and singles on their own label, Little Cowgirl Records. Guillorn's most recent release is a newly remastered version of Wayward Children, which features demos and tracks from compilations put out by other labels. They are currently working on their next full-length record.
More on The Sawtelles:
“The Sawtelles strip it down to the absolute bare minimum you need to still be rock ‘n’ roll. They are elegant minimalism and the wonderful thing is that there are no secrets, no cards up their sleeves, because they’re not trying to out-cool you.” - Dan Barry
Event takes place on-site at Ball & Socket Arts in the plaza in front of Building 5.
Extended parking available at the municipal lots along Railroad Avenue. Or if you're local, please consider walking or bicycling to the site!
Advance (free) registration encouraged to receive communications about any changes or rescheduling due to weather events.
Faking It: Fictionalizing Your Story with Emily Costa
What makes a piece of writing creative nonfiction, memoir, autofiction, or just plain fiction? In other words, what makes a story true? And does it matter? In this class, we will explore genre-blurring and the spectrum of truth, discussing ways to fictionalize stories and details from our lived experiences; we will read short pieces and try some writing exercises to get the feel of sharing disguised (or barely disguised!) truths.
The Factory: Ekphrastic Poetry: Does Art Imitate Life, or Does Life Imitate Art? Workshop with Pat Mottola on August 6, 2025
Famous Works of Art: How they speak to you, how you speak back to them. In ekphrastic poetry – poetry that is inspired by a work of art – the writer has a relationship with the work of art.
Poets writing about art create a story beyond what the eye can see. Ekphrastic poetry expresses something unique about the original piece of art. Writers of ekphrastic poetry create the unseen from the seen. Ekphrastic poetry allows us to think outside the box, approach artworks in different lights, and compose ourselves anew. Thoughts and feelings are enhanced by the collaboration of visual works of art and poetic expression.
$30 gets you 90 minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts on August 6th from 7 to 8:30 pm. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team to discuss accommodations.
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
Award-winning poet and Pushcart Prize nominee, Pat Mottola teaches Creative Writing at Southern Connecticut State University, where she earned both an M.S. in Art Education and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing. In addition to working with students at SCSU, she is thrilled to teach both art and poetry to Senior Citizens in person and online throughout Connecticut. Her work is published in journals across the country, including War, Literature & the Arts, Connecticut Review, Main Street Rag, San Pedro River Review, VietNow Magazine, and Paterson Literary Review. She has served as Keynote Speaker for the MPAC-Young Writers Awards as well as judged Connecticut High School Poetry Out Loud competitions. Pat is President of the Connecticut Poetry Society and served as editor of Connecticut River Review from 2012–2017. On a global scale, she mentors Afghan women writers living in Afghanistan and beyond, resulting in a collection of poems in English, Maybe I Should Fly, by two Afghan sisters who lived under the Taliban regime. She is the author of three collections of poetry: Under the Red Dress, After Hours, and A Town Like That. Pat was the recipient of the prestigious CSCU system-wide Board of Regents Outstanding Teacher Award in 2019, as well as the J. Philip Smith Outstanding Teacher Award in 2021. Pat is the Poet Laureate of Cheshire, CT.
Opening Reception for Other Asterisms
Other Asterisms by Deborah Hesse
August 1 - September 7, 2025
Located in The Workshop Gallery, Building 3.
Opening Reception on Friday, August 1st from 3-6PM
Artist Talk on Friday, September 5th at 6PM
Regular Gallery Hours from 12-4 pm on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays.
Other Asterisms is a solo exhibition by Deborah Hesse featuring sculptural, light-responsive wall works made from industrial and everyday materials. Together, the pieces form a constellation—charting imagined links between the material and immaterial, the physical and virtual. Evoking underwater ecosystems, celestial maps, and microscopic life, these luminous, biomorphic forms blur boundaries and invite reflection on unseen systems beyond the known world.
Deborah Hesse is a multimedia artist and independent curator based in New Haven, CT. She holds a B.A. from Smith College and an M.A. in Painting and Printmaking from the University of New Mexico, where she was a Tamarind Institute Fellow in Lithography. Her honors include a Connecticut Office of the Arts Individual Artist Fellowship and a Regional Project Initiative Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.
The Factory: Call and Response with Brian Johnson
In this workshop, you will learn how to respond to poems that move you, writing your own poems that echo, question, or reinvent the original work.
Brian Johnson is the author of Torch Lake and Other Poems and the recipient of two Connecticut Commission on the Arts Fellowships. He directs the first-year writing program at Southern Connecticut State University.
$30 gets you 90 minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team to discuss accommodations.
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
The Key to Adventure: cARTie Bus Visit for families with kiddos under 10!
The cARTie bus is coming to Ball & Socket Arts Cheshire on Saturday, July 26th from 3-5 pm.
Targeted at families with kiddos under 10, cARTie educators will guide young people on an exciting adventure through the world of the Key to Adventure, a children’s book celebrating the Connecticut Museum.
Face painting and guided art activities will be set-up as well, along with information about registering for Artsplace classes and workshops.
https://www.connecticutmuseum.org/key-to-adventure-childrens-book/
The Factory: Making Meaning Without Conflict: Workshop with Steff Sirois
In this studio-styled workshop, we’ll deviate from the traditional story arc and identify alternative narrative structures for short stories that empower us to write more originally. We’ll identify how a form should fit a story as opposed to a story fitting into a form, and we’ll write to exercises and prompts that deemphasize conflict and plot by instead focusing on world building, image stacking, and characterization.
More About Steff:
Steff Sirois got her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Idaho, where she studied the Gothic and wrote short fiction about insanity, hauntedness, and loss. You can find some of her recent work in Ninth Letter, Harpur Palate, Reed Magazine, Landlocked, Prism Review, Fugue Journal, and the Washington Post.
$30 gets you 90 minutes of instruction in the Workshop Gallery at Ball & Socket Arts. If cost is a barrier to participation, please reach out to our team to discuss accommodations.
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
Live @ the Factory: Community Sing with Brian Ember and friends
Ball & Socket Arts is excited to bring back the Community Sing in summer 2025 on-site.
On Saturday, July 19th from 6-8 pm, we will gather again for our second annual “Sing Out” led by Brian Ember. Join us for a night of belting out classic tunes from the last few decades in our very own community sing.
It will be silly.
It will be delightful.
You’ll find community and find unlikely connections.
No musical experience necessary, but a curious and open mind will help.
New Haven’s Brian Ember (https://brianember.com/about) will be our song leader. Song list will be shared as soon as we have it.
Experience what Brian Eno describes as ‘the key to a long life’ and sing with us!
Need more reasons to try a group sing?
Brian Eno’s Reasons: https://www.npr.org/2008/11/23/97320958/singing-the-key-to-a-long-life
Scientific Reasons: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-020-00549-0
Journalistic Reasons: https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2023/06/25/singing-with-others-mental-physical-health/
Etc…: https://www.artsandmindlab.org/group-singing-provides-a-good-refrain-for-the-brain/
The Factory: Stand-Up Comedy for All
About This Event
Always wanted to try Stand-Up? Never known where to start? Try this intro class open to all. No experience necessary.
Workshop is limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register now!
More about David Iscoe:
David Iscoe is a writer, educator, and ghostwriter. He writes strange, cross-genre fiction on his own, and wide variety of things for hire. He also works as a humor coach and consultant.
The most famous place he worked was The Onion, where he served as a TV staff writer, a web series head writer and director, and a senior writer in the video department.
The Factory: Object as Inspiration: A Generative Short Fiction Session with Kristin Dringoli
Explore writing fiction with Kristin Dringoli.
The Factory: Poetry Workshop With Pat Mottola on 7/2
Explore writing various forms of poetry with Cheshire Poet Laureate and CT Poetry Society president, Pat Mottola!
Please reserve your spot in advance.
Pat Mottola bio:
Award-winning poet and Pushcart Prize nominee, Pat Mottola teaches Creative Writing at Southern Connecticut State University, where she earned both an M.S. in Art Education and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing. In addition to working with students at SCSU, she is thrilled to teach both art and poetry to Senior Citizens in person and online throughout Connecticut. Her work is published in journals across the country, including War, Literature & the Arts, Connecticut Review, Main Street Rag, San Pedro River Review, VietNow Magazine, and Paterson Literary Review. She has served as Keynote Speaker for the IMPAC-Young Writers Awards as well as judged Connecticut High School Poetry Out Loud competitions. Pat is President of the Connecticut Poetry Society and served as editor of Connecticut River Review from 2012–2017. On a global scale, she mentors Afghan women writers living in Afghanistan and beyond, resulting in a collection of poems in English, Maybe I Should Fly, by two Afghan sisters who lived under the Taliban regime. She is the author of three collections of poetry: Under the Red Dress, After Hours, and A Town Like That. Pat was the recipient of the prestigious CSCU system-wide Board of Regents Outstanding Teacher Award in 2019, as well as the J. Philip Smith Outstanding Teacher Award in 2021. Pat is the Poet Laureate of Cheshire, CT. Look for her amazing lineup of guest poets and spoken word presentations and open mics in Cheshire all this summer through fall!ance.
Ball & Socket Arts’ events are regularly photographed and recorded. By attending an on or off-site event, you consent to be photographed, filmed, and/or otherwise recorded. Your presence at an event or on-site grants permission for the use of your image, voice, and likeness in any and all media for any purpose related to Ball & Socket Arts, the event and its promotion.