February Events For Myth Lovers
Sandro Boticelli’s The Birth of Venus is in the public domain.
Virtual Events
On Monday February 1, the artist Flora Bradwell will give an online lecture exploring the mythologies, legends and histories surrounding the concept of a toothed vagina. 1:30-3:30 pm EST.
On February 2, 9, and 16, listen to Jon Mason retell Welsh myths online about magicians, princes, warring kingdoms, and more. Tickets · £3 - £15.
On February 2, Brandon Hobson will give a virtual talk at 7:00 CST about his new book The Removed, which draws on Cherokee mythology to explore the reverberations of trauma on a family.
On February 2 at noon ET, listen to an online lecture about Herculaneum, a popular seaside retreat for the Roman elite destroyed by Vesuvius alongside Pompeii. $25.
On February 2 at 7 pm EST, the scholar Kurt (Anthanasios) Sherry will present a program focusing on Greek mythology, their Roman counterparts and the role that the enchantress Circe plays within them.
On February 2 at 2 pm EST, take a class on Celtic Myth in celebration of the Gaelic festival of Imbolc, which marks the arrival of the lighter half of the year when we give birth to the dreams we incubated in the dark months. £24 for non-members.
On February 3, The Archeological Institute of America will hold a presentation on “Who’s Your Mummy? Mummification As A Business In Late And Roman Period Egypt.”
On February 6, the Manchester Art Gallery will give an online tour at 11 a.m. EST of pictures and sculptures in the gallery that took inspiration from Greek mythology.
On February 6 at 1 pm EST, The Salome Institute of Jungian Studies, Alchemy Inc. and Kwame Scruggs will offer men and male-identified participants the opportunity to gather together to explore their personal and collective experiences through myth.
February 4-7 the Chicago based science fiction convention Capricon will be virtual this year. Pay as you wish registration fee between $0 and $50.
On February 7, watch an online presentation on “When Gods And Heroes Retreat: The Death Of Myth On Roman Sarcophagi” at 3 pm central time.
February 11 at 7 pm EST, the NY Mythology Group will hold a presentation and discussion on “What Cupid & Psyche Tells Us About Love, Women, and Marriage.” The interactive discussion will include prompts to free associate about relationships and personal growth.
Benjamin West’s Cupid and Psyche is in the public domain.
On Thursday February 11, listen to a lecture about Gobekli Tepe, a temple from 9600-7300 BC which contains statues carved with animals, abstract symbols, and stylized human beings.
On Thursday February 11, Adrienne Mayor, of Stanford University will discuss her latest book, Gods and Robots: Myths, Machines, and Ancient Dreams of Technology. This book investigates how the Greeks imagined automatons, replicants, and Artificial Intelligence in myths and later designed self-moving devices and robots.
On February 13 from 2-4 pm EST, watch lion dancers, dragon dancers, and other celebrations drawing on Chinese mythology to celebrate the New Year of the Ox.
February 12-14, the Boston based science fiction convention Boskone will be virtual. $25.
February 12-14, the Seattle based science fiction convention Foolscap will take a different approach. “Instead of looking for experts and planning the event around them, we welcome everyone to share what they know,” they say. $30 for a day or $75 for the weekend.
On February 14 at 2 pm EST, the astronomy author Ian Ridpath will give a talk online about constellations in myth, art and reality.
On February 17 at 2 pm EST, discover the creation of the world according to the Mayan's Popol-Vuh. The story will be accompanied by live music and sound effects in the style of Mayan ceremonies, and is hosted from Mexico.
On February 20 at 8 pm EST, Sarah J. Maas will discuss her new novel, A Court of Silver Flames.
On February 24 at 2:30 EST, Rosalind and Jason Buck Storyteller will perform on the theme of Atlantis. £2.50 - £10
Nameless donkey in the hills of Crete, Greece is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. Edward Mason Eggleston’s Alter Dancer in the Temple of Isis is in the public domain. Athina Seitani’s Beach in Greece Summer is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.
On February 25, the scholar Dr. James Rietveld will present on the platonist philosopher Lucius Apuleius, author of the Golden Ass, the only surviving ancient Roman novel.
On February 26, the New York Metropolitan Museum will begin holding classes on Fridays about “stories, mythology, and folklore from around the globe during this interactive program just for kids” aged 5 to 8 years old.
Recurring Virtual Events
If you would rather be in France right now, view a selection of thematically-themed works from the Louvre online, including (in my opinion) the best ones in the Sully Wing, which includes major works of Greek and Egyptian art such as the Venus de Milo.
Moulage d'Aphrodite, dite Vénus de Milo is in the public domain.
Take an online course with Stanford research scholar Adrienne Mayor in which you will “uncover the natural origins of stories about dragons. . .; ponder whether the Amazon horsewomen-archers of myth existed; consider the dilemmas of using poison weapons in myth and ancient historical times; and marvel at robots and other science fiction tales from the time of Homer.” $120.
Take an online mini-course about Rome, seeing how it exists not only in brick and mortar, but also in the realm of ideas, and through the eyes of locals and visitors. Topics will include Rome’s urban and architectural development, as well as its representation in maps and artworks from across the city’s exceptionally long lifetime. $99.
On Sunday mornings, Krista Lea will present an online meditation class that uses sound, aroma, poetry, and goddess mythology to focus on the archetype of the Divine Feminine. Tickets $11
The NY Mythology Group, which is associated with the Joseph Campbell Foundation, holds presentations and discussions about mythology related topics ranging from the Greek goddess Hecate to Carl Jung. Their events usually take place on Tuesday evenings at 8 pm EDT, and have been online since the pandemic started.
The Center for Fiction will hold a discussion group on Wednesday nights from September 16-January 6 about “ways in which pervasive themes drawn from oral tradition find their way into our collective consciousness, either perpetuated or subverted by current fiction.” Readings from authors including Octavia Butler, Catherynne Valente, Ursula LeGuin, Kelly Link, and Aimee Bender.
BSFW, or Brooklyn Speculative Fiction Writers, meetings take place mostly online currently, but pre-pandemic were in the homes of writers mostly in Brooklyn but also on occasion Manhattan or Queens. Check out their calendar on meetup to attend their numerous writing workshops, social gatherings, meetings with editors/agents/authors, book clubs, and more. The group includes many published writers and has its own audio fiction magazine, Kaleidocast. If you post about your fetish for Olympian gods on their Facebook group feed, they (probably) won’t judge.
EREWHON BOOKS, a publisher focusing on novel-length works of speculative fiction: science fiction, fantasy, and related genres, holds readings usually on the second Thursday each month virtually for now and in a pre-apocalypse world at its high ceilinged office of many windows in Manhattan.
Fantastic Fiction at KGB is a monthly speculative-fiction reading series held on the third Wednesday of every month virtually for now, and in a pre-apocalypse world at KGB Bar in Manhattan. Ellen Datlow and Matthew Kressel host the event. As one might expect from a communism-themed bar, admission is free.
The NYC Greek Myth & Classical Lit Meetup meets every third Thursday of the month at the Cloister Cafe in the East Village to discuss the work of mostly long dead authors (e.g. Aristophanes, Dante.) The group has existed for more than a decade, so the long-term participants have already earned their unofficial classics PhD’s, and we already know that anybody who would do this for fun is as hip as a person can get.
The virtual exhibit Guiding Spirits: The Radical Witches and Women of OPUS presents materials highlighting explorations of mythological witches and the occult and supernatural underpinnings of depth psychology.
World Events
"Myth.Slide1.16" by c.a.francese is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
Finncon Postponed until 2021
The International Association for Comparative Mythology’s 14th conference, “Death and Migration in World Mythology” takes place in Mexico City and has been postponed until June 7-11, 2021.
Worldcon is scheduled to take place in Washington D.C. on August 25-29, 2021. You can buy your ticket for their convention here.
U.S. Events
Readercon, a conference in Boston for readers and writers of science fiction, takes place July 8-11, 2021.
DisCon III, the 79th World Science Fiction Convention, takes place August 25-29, 2021 in Washington D.C.
The conference Anime Los Angeles 17 has been postponed for a year. Instead of this month, it will take place from January 6-9, 2022, in Long Beach California.
New York City Events
In a series of richly-imagined portraits, the artistic duo Sarah Cooper and Nina Gorfer explore the idea of Utopia in the age of the new diaspora. Young women who have been forced to uproot their lives are photographed like goddesses inside lustrous and surrealist-inspired sets. On exhibition in the Church Mission Building near 23rd street at Fotografiska New York until February 7.
On various Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays starting February 2021, you can enjoy a 90-minute psychedelic cocktail menu with the Mad Hatter in an immersive Alice in Wonderland experience. $65. Reserve in advance.
A seven-foot statue of Medusa holding the head of a Greek hero now stands across from the Manhattan courthouse that convicted Harvey Weinstein, the New York Post reported recently. The statue will be on view there until March. (It’s not an event, but you know, COVID. . . if you go to see this one, at least you’ll be outdoors!)
Look at paintings in a Met Museum exhibition that capture the Ramayana, an epic narrative composed by the Sanskrit poet Valmiki around the fifth century B.C. Or check out Arte del mar ("art of/from the sea"), which explores the artistic exchange around the rim of the Caribbean Sea before the sixteenth century, including objects rooted in mythological narratives.
Check out the images of buddhas, bodhisattvas, tantric deities, protectors and more at the Rubin Museum’s Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room, which is open again with timed entry tickets for social distancing.
Marcantonio Raimondi’s “A Bacchanal”. CC01.0 Public domain.
