E. Amato moves fluidly between words, stages, film, and practical activism. She brings fire, passion, grace, intelligence and wit to audiences hungry for depth of soul and clarity.
A spoken word artist, poet, writer, producer, filmmaker, editor of the Zestyverse, and publisher at Zesty Pubs, she keeps herself busy. She is currently a content writer for The Body Is Not an Apology. She is available for workshops and consulting.
In 2008, E. Amato embraced her inner nomad. Her experience as a script supervisor on over twenty independent feature films, setting up shop on location on a moment’s notice, and WiFi made this possible. People called her brave (which she understands is the polite way of saying crazy). Wending her way through the US and the UK with stints in a squat in Balham, The Poet House in Oklahoma City, several months as a boat-sitter on London’s canals, and a writer’s residency at Playa in central Oregon, she learned many things, like never again take the Greyhound from DC to OKC via Nashville. An unfettered lifestyle allows her to experience people, cultures and microcultures intimately; it inspired her little Kindle book 5: Poems and Images from Morocco (Zesty Pubs, 2012), and reframed her community, worldview, and sense of compassion. Her second full collection of poems, Will Travel (Zesty Pubs. 2013), reflects and processes her experience of place.
For E. Amato, the thread is in creating robust community – she lives with the conviction that life is about people, not stuff, and that people are inherently creative beings. Though a member of the 2011 Los Angeles Slam Team and a competitor at Poetry Slam Nationals and WOWps, she finds slam a necessary evil at best – a way to expand audiences for spoken word and hone skills. She prefers being the poetic hot sauce sprinkled on the music night. Some favorite gigs include Jazzverse Jukebox, Lyrix Organix, W.E. Love Sundays, TEDx London, and Folk-A-Dot. She has worked with youth through Peace4Kids, Youthspeaks’ Brave New Voices, and continues to facilitate workshops whenever and wherever possible.
To offer boutique events to wider audiences and champion emerging artists, E. Amato started Down Home in Santa Monica in 2006, coupling her keen eye for talent and eclectic curatorial sense. In 2007 and 2008 Down Home produced a groundbreaking mix of poetry, music, live and video art, at the Festival Fringe Edinburgh, with performers from LA, and London’s PoeJazzi, garnering 5-star reviews consecutive years – a rare honour. In its 8-year history, Down Home has presented numerous artists including musicians Ed Sheeran, Kal Lavelle, Lánre, John West, Gideon Conn, Tabitha Benjamin, Jonny Taylor, Jonny Berliner, Ben Hall, Sam Golzari, Sandbloom, and poets Aja Monet, Jack McCarthy, Tshaka Campbell, Sabrina Mahfouz, Catherine Brogan, Dean Atta, Joshua Idehen, Inua Ellams. In 2013, Down Home produced Saria Idana’s Homeless in Homeland for Brighton Fringe, receiving 4 stars. In June 2013, she created a new event, Secret Door, at Babel Studios, which was the culmination of years of experience as a performer and promoter, and which has refocused her energies as a curator.
E. Amato holds a BFA in Film from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and a Certificate in Directing from the American Film Institute’s prestigious Center for Film and Television Studies.
