"A brilliant, emotive, inclusive,
deep thinker and communicator."
- Tonika Johnson
photographer & activist
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She | Her
"A fierce and inspiring badass."
- Niketa Brar, executive director
Chicago United for Equity
I am an arts and culture administrator, programmer, performance poet and event host.
As director of programming at Chicago Humanities Festival, I support and develop 90 + year-round, cultural programs and special events, manage programming partnerships, lead the Shortlist Committee for audiences in their 20's and 30's, and co-chair the strategic planning committee on diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility.
Like many of us who call ourselves poets, I've been writing for as long as I can remember. Opening up for the poet Shihan at Whitworth University in 2006, I performed my first original spoken word piece, "This is Rap" intertwining hip hop history, political commentary, and personal narrative. After college, I moved from Washington State to Chicago to pursue a career in the arts.
In 2011, I founded Art Is Bonfire, Chicago's only Bonfire Cypher. Nearly a decade later, we still gather at Promontory Point every last Sunday of the month, June thru September. I've performed original poetry in venues all over Chicago and beyond, including in cultural centers, churches, schools, universities, bars, gardens, parks.
I am a Chicago United for Equity Fellow and recipient of the 2019 Field Leader Award.
I am building The People's Church with Po'Chop | Jenn Freeman.