Timothy Kimo Brien
The Start of an Era in Art
Timothy “Kimo” Brien has started his career in Poetry and Theater in 1990. He learned how to play acoustic guitar and bass guitar from his older brother Pete and tuba from his older brother Mike. Taking this into Thomas Jefferson High School he joined the school orchestra and took a beginning theater class. From there his desires to perform began. He also was stuck in an honors English class so he could take his electives and that is where he found his love of poetry, accidentally. Exposed to T.S. Elliot at that age, specifically, The Hollow Men, led Timothy on a journey of exploration. This was an accident as the class was reading one poem and Timothy was reading the one that would change his life forever.
Combining Art Forms
Due to family circumstances, Timothy decided the best course of action was to join the USAF in 1991 in order to pay for college and continue his journey. Once based in Abilene TX at Dyess AFB, he came upon a coffee shop called Espresso Europa. It was there that he began performing his poetry in front of those gathered and really started to find his voice. He also discovered the Surrealist movement from the ’20s and ’30s. The gathering of artists at Europa was a once in a lifetime event. All forms were pursued and displayed for the community, this was before Starbucks before corporate America decided to invade. Chess matches could be played, poetry readings popped up organically, drag shows were happening many nights. When someone created something in the cafe, they presented it immediately and
Starting Academia
Beginning in 1997, Timothy seriously started his academic journey in Theater at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. It was there that he developed his eye for art and was able to begin to verbalize his approach to art. With over 100 shows under his belt from main stage productions to found space performances, he was able to run the gamut of possibilities to perform. He was also part of the spoken word scene in Carbondale at the local coffee houses, again this was before the major takeover of coffee culture. He moved onto Richmond Virginia to obtain his MFA in Theater Pedagogy where he learned the art of teaching others about theater through performance and the history behind the theater. Again, he acted and directed a number of performances that challenged the status quo.
Adding Podcasting, Publishing, and Painting
After his MFA program, Timothy found himself in the “real” world, and without the security of academia to provide him space, he created spaces in unlikely places. He started a podcast on BlogTalkRadio called Kimo’s Den of Iniquity which began as a poetry reading between friends from across the nation and eventually led to a scripted show of 65 episodes. While starting the podcast, Timothy began self-publishing his own poetry works on Lulu and Create Space. You can find them all listed here plus swag and reprints of original artwork. He ran into a few like-minded individuals such as Heather Moon who is a painter, poet, and alchemist. His new group of friends encouraged him to use this new space and his new talents to further his art exploration while working a full-time job.
Being the true Sagittarius
Once Timothy moved back to Virginia, he began attending a meetup for Podcasters. This led him to discover a better way of podcasting and he embarked on 45 episodes of KDOI Podcasting and then re-branding it to Create Art Podcast. While in this new group, Timothy attended many conferences and spoke at them. He worked on Podwrecked with his good friend Kyle Bondo and they have joined up to further Gagglepod, a network that helps creatives tell their stories through podcasting. To keep Timothy’s artistic juices flowing, he continues to write, paint, produce and podcast with the new podcast through interviews, conversations, commentary, and projects that inspire others who think they do not have what it takes to create art.