Creative Writing

Robert Sullivan

Poet, Academic, and Editor
Robert Sullivan gave a Visiting Writer Workshop at the Arts Research Center on September 20, 2023.

Robert Sullivan (Ngāpuhi and Kāi Tahu) has won awards for his poetry, editing, and writing for children, including the 2022 Lauris Edmond Memorial Award for a distinguished contribution to New Zealand poetry, Distinguished Visiting Writer at the University of Hawai’i, the Montana New Zealand Book Award for co-editing Whetu Moana: Contemporary Polynesian Poems in English, the Māori Literature Award for co-editing Puna Wai Kōrero: An Anthology of Māori Poetry in English, and...

Hito Steyerl

Filmmaker, Moving Image Artist, Writer, and Professor of New Media Art at the University of the Arts in Berlin
Hito Steyerl was a Visiting Artist Panel Participant at the Art, Technology, & Culture Colloquium at the Arts Research Center on February 22, 2016.

Hito Steyerl is a filmmaker and writer. She teaches New Media Art at University of the Arts in Berlin. Steyerl studied film at the Academy of Visual Arts in Tokyo, the University of Television and Film in Munich, and holds a Ph.D in philosophy from the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna. The most formative parts of her education, however, include working as a stunt-girl and bouncer. Steyerl’s work focuses on the...

Juliana Spahr

Poet, Critic, Editor, and Professor and Unit Chair of Arts & Humanities at Mills College at Northeastern University
Juliana Spahr gave a Visiting Writer Reading at the Arts Research Center in April 2021, part of the Spring 2021 Flash Reading Series.

Juliana Spahr is a poet & scholar of 20th c. literature. Her poetry moves between lyricism, explanatory prose, and theoretical discussion. In her most recent book, That Winter The Wolf Came, concerns global struggle, especially those located at the intersection of ecological and economic catastrophe. Previous to this, she has published four full-length collections of poems and two books of prose that might be...

Pamela Sneed

Poet, Performance Artist, Actress, Activist, and Professor of Visual Arts at Columbia University
Pamela Sneed gave a Visiting Writer Lecture at the Arts Research Center on November 8, 2023.

Pamela Sneed is a New York–based poet, performer, and visual artist. She is the author of Imagine Being More Afraid of Freedom Than Slavery (Holt, 1998), KONG and Other Works (Vintage Entity Press, 2009), Sweet Dreams (Belladonna*, 2018), and Funeral Diva, published by City Lights in Oct 2020. Funeral Diva was featured in The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, Literary Hub, Artnet, and...

SA Smythe

Writer, Artist, and Assistant Professor of Black European Cultural Studies in the Department of African American Studies at UCLA
SA Smythe gave a Visiting Writer/Scholar Lecture at the Arts Research Center on September 13, 2018.

SA Smythe is a blktrans nonbinary theorist, multi-instrumentalist, transmedia storyteller, and educator currently based in Tkaronto and Rome. Smythe’s antecartographic practice conjures black belonging and is concerned with the thrival of our relations beyond every border. They weave blktrans poetics, performance, light sculptures, sound composition, photography, and found footage/archival ephemera. Smythe’s transmedia work has been featured...

Patricia Smith

ARC Fellow, Poet, Spoken-Word Performer, Playwright, Author, Writing Teacher, and Former Journalist.
Patricia Smith was an ARC Poetry & the Senses Fellow in Spring 2020.

Patricia Smith is the 2021 recipient of the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize for Lifetime Achievement, presented by the Poetry Foundation, and a 2022 inductee of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. She is the author of nine books of poetry, includingUnshuttered (Feb 2023);Incendiary Art, winner of the 2018 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award, the 2017 Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the...

Danez Smith

ARC Fellow, Poet, Writer, and Performer
Danez Smith was an ARC Poetry & the Senses Fellow in 2020.

Danez Smith is the author of three collections including Homie and Don’t Call Us Dead. They have won the Forward Prize for Best Collection, the Minnesota Book Award in Poetry, the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Poetry, the Kate Tufts Discovery Award, and have been a finalist for the NAACP Image Award in Poetry, the National Book Critic Circle Award, and the National Book Award. Danez's poetry and prose has been featured in Vanity Fair, The New York Times, The New...

Jake Skeets

ARC Fellow, Poet, and Professor of Poetry at the University of Oklahoma
Jake Skeets was an ARC Poetry & the Senses Fellow in 2022.

Jake Skeets (he/him) is Tsi’naajínii born for Tábąąhá; his maternal grandparents are the Táchii’nii and his paternal grandparents are the Tódík’ózhí. Skeets is Diné from Vanderwagen, New Mexico. His debut collection of poetry, Eyes Bottle Dark with a Mouthful of Flowers, is a winner of the National Poetry Series, American Book Award, Kate Tufts Discovery Award, and Whiting Award. His honors include a 2020-2021 Mellon Projecting All Voices Fellowship and the 2023-2024 Grisham Writer in Residence at the...

Maya Sisneros

Writer and Undergraduate Advisor in the UC Berkeley School of Education
Maya Sisneros gave a Visiting Writer Reading at the Arts Research Center in April 2022, part of the Spring 2022 Flash Reading Series.

Maya Sisnerosis a Bay Area-based writer whose poetry and fiction explore identity, intimacy, and lines of f/light. She is a recipient of the inaugural 2021 SFF/Nomadic Press Lit Award and AWP's 2021 Kurt Brown Prize for Fiction. She attended a Tin House Summer Workshop in 2021. Maya is currently at work on a novella of speculative fiction.

Kevin Simmonds

Musician and Writer
Kevin Simmonds gave a Visiting Writer Reading at the Arts Research Center in October 2021, part of the Fall 2021 Flash Reading Series.

Kevin Simmonds is a musician and writer originally from New Orleans. He studied music at Vanderbilt University, Middle Tennessee State University and completed the Ph.D. at the University of South Carolina. He founded Tono International Arts Association, an international arts presenter in northern Japan (Iwate Prefecture).

Kevin received a Fulbright fellowship to Singapore where he started the first-ever poetry workshop in Changi...