‘sometimes one meets a woman who is beast turning human…’ — djuna barnes.
Audrey di Mola traverses the wilds of the deep heart.
She is an earth-centered artist, storyteller, writer/poet, and experiential (re)educator. She also holds 15 years of experience exploring inner and outer landscapes as sacred space-holder, creative facilitator, and interdisciplinary event curator.
Throughout 2022 Audrey was an active member of the international Roundhouse Storytelling School, featured storyteller on Dr. Sharon Blackie’s Mythic Imagination Network, and proud assistant of the Mythsinger Legacy Project, carrying the fire of one of her heroes, mythteller and musician Daniel Deardorff (1952-2019).
Past offerings include: Nature of the Muse, Church of the Sacred Body, How We Create & How We Cope: Intersections of Art & Mental Illness, the Institute for the Development of Human Arts-hosted “How to Convert Your Life Into Legend: Inside the Hero’s Journey,” A Prayer To See & Be Seen: Creative Reframing for Mental Health, and countless happenings at Long Island City’s Socrates Sculpture Park, where she served as Director of Public Programs from 2016-2021. She was also part of the core ensemble of spirit-inspired international experimental theatre company, Dzieci, from 2019-2021.
She has performed in venues both massive and intimate in NYC and beyond: The Cathedral of Saint John The Divine, Bowery Poetry Club, Brooklyn Museum, The Historic House Trust (Lewis Latimer Museum), Queens Council on the Arts, The School of Myth in Devon UK, on the shore of the East River, in schools and colleges, and an addiction treatment center close to her heart. <3 She has been published in Mad in America and Dark Mountain Project, and her poetry graffiti and immersive art installations have been exhibited at LIC Arts Open and the Southeast Queens Biennial, among others.
Audrey is a lifelong writer and 4-time author (latest titles: WILDLIGHT and THE BOOK OF LEGEND) with a background in arts journalism who owes her life to the loving and regenerative life-forces of Earth and Story. She is passionate about paradox, bridging worlds, experimental creativity, “folkloric futurism,” eco-somatics, and fostering (re)connection to our more-than-human kin.
Most recently: 2020 Certificate in Ecotherapy from The Earthbody Institute; 2021 immersive courses with Dr. Martin Shaw (School of Myth – UK), Francis Weller, MFT (The Alchemy of Initiation – Soul Work and the Art of Ripening), The Sacred Way Mystery School (November intensive).
Her Deep Soul has always been walking this path, but in this current form her unmistakable call back into Remembrance of the healing arts, earth-work, ceremony/ritual, and sacred mystery came most acutely through lived experience of spiritual awakening/emergence and what is known as mental health crisis and suicidality from 2015-2019– she will always honor this underworld ground because Everything has (re)Grown from that place.
Audrey is first generation Southern Italian (Polignano a Mare) on her paternal side, and descended from an active healing lineage on her maternal side. She is New York City born and raised– having grown up walking the edges and in-betweens of her native Long Island City/Astoria, Queens and the Catskill Mountains. She wishes to honor and uplift the Canarsie, Munsee Lenape, Wappinger, and Matinecock peoples, and the precious lands and waters that raised her.
Thank You for This Life, and the opportunity to Help and Heal.
And yes- Audrey Dimola and Audrey di Mola are the same but different ;) My dad changed the spelling of his surname when he received American citizenship, but I am more recently exploring reclaiming the Italian spelling. <3
EXPERIENCES + TRAININGS:
My primary teachers are the Earth, Story, and Spirit. Please keep in mind that there is much that goes unsaid in ‘lists of formal qualifications.’ We learn so much On The Ground…
Multidisciplinary artist: poetry, singing, dancing, acting, installation & mixed media
Certificate in Ecotherapy – The Earthbody Institute, 2020
Bachelor of Arts in Media Studies (Journalism, Writing/Editing), Minor in English (Cum Laude) – CUNY Hunter College, 2009
Nearly 15 years of event curation, hosting/emceeing, community organizing (including ‘the Masters degree I never got’ that was running the diverse array of free, large-scale, outdoor cultural events for hundreds of thousands of attendees/participants each year at Socrates Sculpture Park, 2016-2021)
Selected Courses + Retreats:
Grief Pilgrim – 6-week online grief pilgrimage with ritual, story, movement, poetry, May-June 2022
The Sacred Way Mystery School – November 2021 intensive in Colorado
School of Myth (Summer School) with Dr. Martin Shaw in Devon, UK – July 2021
The Alchemy of Initiation: Soul Work and the Art of Ripening with Francis Weller, MFT – Oct 2021
Storyteller course by Dr. Martin Shaw presented by Mystery School, online – completed 2021
Trauma, Growth & Resilience: Redefining Trauma-informed Practice – Institute for the Development of Human Arts, 2020
Dangerous Gifts: Beyond Symptom & Cure Mentality – Institute for the Development of Human Arts, 2020
Our Struggles are Intertwined: Intersections of Mental Health & Oppression – Institute for the Development of Human Arts, 2020
No Goddess Left Behind – Women’s Retreat (yoga, ceremony, dance, sound healing/journeying, primal scream & drumming, sacred singing & story-sharing) at Growing Heart Farm – June 2018
Pizzica Tarantata, Tammurriata, & other Southern Italian healing trance dances & ritual with Alessandra Belloni – March & June 2018
Reclaim the Wild Woman (martial arts, meditation, plant medicine and creative exploration) with Vanessa Chakour/Sacred Warrior – Fall/Winter 2017
More Background:
As of 2022: Assistant for Mythsinger Legacy Project– carrying the fire of mythteller and musician Daniel Deardorff (1952-2019), active member of the international Roundhouse Storytelling School, and featured storyteller for Dr. Sharon Blackie’s Mythic Imagination Network
Company Member in Dzieci, international experimental theatre company, 2019-2021 (including ‘A PASSION’ and ‘Fools Mass’ each year, ensemble for ‘MAKBET’ and street performances in 2019, special residency at Boughton Place in Upstate NY to create ‘A PASSION’ for 2021)
Weekly sharing & storytelling with The Storytelling Circle (online, based in UK) – Dec 2020 to May 2021
Somatic Experiencing work with ThruBody Therapy, weekly – April 2020 to November 2021
The Sacred Body with Maré Hieronimus, Movement Medicine and Yoga & Somatic Alchemy – 2021
Qoya: LORE (A Lifestyle of Reverence Everyday) movement program – 2021
Outdoor educator & guide in training for Discover Outdoors Foundation (youth work), Discover Outdoors (Upstate NY), and Destination Backcountry Adventures (Upstate NY) – Summer and Fall 2015
WWOOFer for Growing Heart Farm (Upstate NY) and Common Ground Farm (PA) – Summer and Fall 2015Aerial training (trapeze, lyra, silks) and natural circus ability! ;)
Yoga practice since 2008/2009; hiking; avid cyclist!
Childcare since 2014 (1 yr old + up); Dog handling & walking since 2012
WHAT THE PEOPLE SAY:
“A masterful facilitator – both solo and in collaboration – and a magnetic storyteller.” -j.roth
“Bewitching, ethereal, badass & real…” -poets settlement
“Soul-stirring, victoriously vulnerable, emotionally charged, fire-breathing…” -b.geraghty
“True artistry in motion with a courage that inspires.” -n.johannes
“A poet with a righteous warrior’s soul.” -j.belitsky
“Proof of the power that story can have in changing the course of our lives.” -b.lucia
“A brave streak of lightning continuing to illuminate the hearts of everyone who knows her […] Thank you for your thunderous existence!” -r.green
“Inspiration incarnate.” -j.horstmeier
“Incredibly moving, validating, healing, cathartic, in your words, alchemical… legend. […] For those of us who cannot find either voice, expression, eloquence, strength, capacity, courage, physicality, or who have not yet come to the place in our journey where we can even begin to articulate our experience… I humbly thank you. Your willingness to be vulnerable, to trust the Universe and the rest of us with your story, your soul, heals not just you, but all of us.” -l.monet bevino
“Queens’ very own supreme creative force…” -s.vazquez
“Relentless in her powerful vulnerability and radical approach to performance…” -s.t.licardi
“A proponent of passion and the positive power of the present moment.” -n.ruhling
“You’re the human form of fire.” -o.koralashvili
“Poetic force of nature…” -m.geffner
“Vulnerable, daring, generous, entertaining…” -m.poels
“One of Queens’ art and literary gems…” – the sisSTAR loop
“Busting down walls with words, flint for heart fire…” -m.pasca
“A wildfire in a world of fluorescent bulbs.” -d.benigno
“An authentic and adventurous gatherer of souls and stories…” -s.toledano
“One of the few original wild spirits…” -s.ahmed
“A walking, talking, fully embodied supernova.” -s.t.licardi
“An absolute force..” – d.gorman
“A delightful storm of light and power!” -e.toney
“The personification of creativity, talent, and light…” -s.hussain
“The quintessential cultural place-setter…” -g.mangusso
“A force of nature, approaching everything with expertise, openness, honesty and joy.” -k.kitchen
“A testament to the human spirit…” -j.anastasio
“Full of joie de vivre and life force!” -t.fink
“After meeting her you get the feeling that at any moment she might sprout wings and fly off into the sunrise…” -t.bell
“The ‘REBEL POET of QUEENS’ who created a Queens literary community with the alchemy of a poetic wild heart!” -j.willette
“YOU ARE CHARISMA. FEARLESS.” -m.pasternack
“Audrey Dimola stands as a beacon for the literary and artistic community in Queens. She’s been hugely successful in uniting the community in her native borough and once you’ve met her, it is easy to see why. Her dynamic energy and passion for life shine through…” -idlewild magazine
“You’re a warrior of light and a beacon of strength for what words can do. Truly you are a force. One candle can fill a dark room. But a star…” -b.perdomo
“You have poetry in you, and it’s BURNING up inside like a VOLCANO! LET IT OUT…!” – one of my heroes, m.disuvero
In wildness is the preservation of the world.
–H.D. Thoreau
If you don’t break your ropes while you’re alive, do you think ghosts will do it after?
–Kabir
But the heart refuses to be imprisoned; in its first and narrowest pulses, it already tends outward with a vast force, and to immense and innumerable expansions.
–R.W. Emerson
Verily the lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul, and then walks grinning in the funeral. But you, children of space, you restless in rest, you shall not be trapped nor tamed.
–Kahlil Gibran
audrey di mola - folkloric futurism 