Authors and Artists
Authors
Click on the link on the right of the name to find their tour dates and magic!
DOB: 2/7/1973
Brown, former paratrooper for the 82nd Airborne, gondolier, magician, and fired weatherman, now travels the world and performs his written work. As a poet, he has toured or performed with indie rock act, Cold War Kids, The Flaming Lips and Comedian David Cross. About.com called his latest collection, Scandalabra, one of the best books of 2009. To date, Brown has performed at over 1500 venues and universities internationally including The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, All Tomorrow’s Parties, Glastonbury and La Sorbonne in Paris. He is the founder and Captain of Write Bloody publishing.
Wakefield is the two-time Individual World Poetry Slam Champion featured on NPR, the BBC, HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, and most recently signed to Ani DiFranco’s Righteous Babe Records.
Nettifee is a Grand Slam Champion of the Long Beach/Orange County Poetry Slam and competes on and coaches teams at 5 National Poetry Slam Competitions. She served for five years on the Five Penny Poets advisory board of literary nonprofit Tebot Bach. She currently directs the poetry nonprofit Write Now Poetry Society.
Beau Sia
Beau Sia is the son of chinese immigrants from the Philippines. Beau’s first collection of work was A Night Without Armor II: The Revenge. Since then, he’s shared his work all over the world at festivals, universities and conferences. He has also acted in Slam and Rachel Getting Married, Norman Lear’s Declare Yourself project; wrote the hip hop musical Krunk Fu Battle Battle.
Benjamin Clark Benjamin Clark spent his formative years in rural Nebraska, and now lives in Chicago, Illinois with Apple Juice (cat) and Debra (girlfriend). Among other occupations, he has worked as a teacher, librarian, organic food salesman, tile maker, and in a microwaveable popcorn factory. He will be attending the School of the Art Institute this fall (2010) as a Creative Writing MFA student. He also regularly attends the Vox Ferus writing workshops, acts as an assistant editor for Muzzle Magazine.
C.R. Avery is a unique, raw and dynamic performer. His genius lies in many genres – blues, hip-hop, spoken word and rock & roll. From musical beginnings in his late teens, he has recorded over fifteen albums as well as writing & directing six hip-hop operas, which were mounted and performed from New York’s Bowery to L.A.’s South Central. He has toured throughout Canada, the US and Europe.
David Perez has toured in over 25 cities throughout the US and Canada both solo and as half of the eclectic poetry duo The Pincushion Orchestra. He represented San Jose at IWPS 2008 and NPS 2009 and coached the 2010 Santa Cruz Slam Team.He holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Goddard College.
Elaina M. Ellis writes poetry in an urban tree house in Seattle, teaching writing to students of all ages. She founded TumbleMe Productions, a vehicle for multi-media artistic collaboration which, in its first year, sold out four taboo-smashing productions. Ellis will earn her MFA in Creative Writing from Antioch University Los Angeles in 2011.
After decades of writing poetry and five years in the world of slam and spoken word, Laura has blossomed, earning a coveted Cave Canem fellowship and fourth place at PSI’s Women of the World Poetry Slam. Laura also performs with Chicago’s Speak’Easy Ensemble, the brainchild of slam founder Marc Smith.
DOB: 6/15/1983
Jon Sands has been a professional teaching and performing artist since 2007. He’s a recipient of the 2009 NYC-LouderARTS fellowship grant, and has represented New York City multiple times at the National Poetry Slam. He is the Director of Poetry and Arts Education Programming at the Positive Health Project, as well as a Youth Mentor with Urban Word-NYC.
Idris Goodwin is an NEA award-winning playwright, break beat poet, recording artist, and educator. Idris’ theater works have enjoyed world premieres across the nation. He has been featured on HBO Def Poetry, The Discovery Channel and National Public Radio.
Paul Suntup has edited three books of poetry and his work has appeared in numerous publications including Rattle, Spillway, Artlife, Cider Press Review, ISM and the anthology 180 More: Extraordinary Poems
Tim Stafford is a poet and public school teacher from Chicago.
Tara Hardy is a working class queer femme poet who writes and teaches in Seattle, Washington. She is the Founder and Art and Education Director of Bent, a writing institute for LGBTIQ people based in Seattle. In 2002, she was elected by the people and named by the city council Seattle’s Poet Populist and she won the Seattle Grand Slam Champion title the same year. In 2008, she was selected to represent Seattle in the Women of the World Poetry Slam in Detroit. She holds an MFA from Vermont College in fiction writing and an MSW from the University of Michigan in Community Organizing.
Brendan Constantine is a poet based in LA. His work has appeared in numerous journals, most notably Ploughshares, Ninth Letter, ArtLife, The Cortland Review and Runes. His new work is forthcoming in Field Rattle, Redivider, and Verse Wisconsin. His collection, Letters To Guns, was released in 2009 from Red Hen Press. He is currently poet-in-residence at The Windward School and Loyola Marymount University Extension. In addition, he offers workshops in hospitals, foster and elder care centers, and shelters for the homeless. In 2002 he was nominee for Poet Laureate for California.
Michael Roberts
Roberts is the author of the Pushcart Prize-nominated collection No More Poems About The Moon. He also contributed poems to the Write Bloody anthology The Good Things About America. Roberts is a member of the Lightning Bug Romantics tour collective.
Gibson was the winner of the 2008 Women of the World Poetry Slam, and has placed 3rd in the world for the last 3 years by iWPS. She won a DIY Poetry Book of the Year and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize for her first book, “Pole Dancing to Gospel Hymns.” She has appeared on Free Speech TV, the documentary Slam Planet, NPR, Air America and Independent Radio Stations nationwide.
Anis Mojgani is a two time National Poetry Slam Champion and winner of International World Cup Poetry Slam. A Pushcart Prize Nominee and former resident of the Oregon Literary Arts Writer’s-In-The-Schools program, Anis has performed at numerous universities, festivals, and venues around the globe. His work has appeared on HBO, NPR, and in the pages of Rattle magazine.
A former member of four National Poetry Slam teams and a coach to two more, Deschenes dusts off her BA in Theater to perform. She has received a Jacob Knight Award, been nominated for two Pushcart Prizes and represented Worcester in the 2005 Individual World Poetry Slam.
DOB: 2/5/1972
A 2004 winner of the Jacob Knight award, Infante has read his poetry all over the United States, and in the United Kingdom. His work has appeared in a number of publications, including Poetry Slam: The Competitive Art of Performance Poetry (Manic D. Press), Worcester Magazine, The Orange County Register, ArtLife, Words: Beatnik to Hip-Hop (Out of Tokyo, Japan), So Luminous the Wildflowers anthology of California poetry and Incidental Buildings & Accidental Beauty (Tebot Bach).
Morgan was instrumental in the rebirth of the Philadelphia Poetry Slam Team, which lay dormant for twelve years prior. She now lives in Chicago where she is actively involved with regular poetry events, including the Encyclopedia Show, Vox Ferus and Young Chicago Authors. She was nominated for the Pushcart Prize award.
Jeremy Radin Jeremy Radin is a poet and actor living in LA. He has performed at several poetry venues in the greater Los Angeles area such as Beyond Baroque and co-hosted the Lightbulb Mouth Radio Hour. As an actor, he’s spent the last six years studying at the Beverly Hills Playhouse, has been on several television shows: ER, CSI, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. He is currently running poetry workshops for patients under treatment for eating disorders.
Sierra DeMulder Sierra DeMulder is a Pushcart-nominated touring performance poet. In 2009 she won the National Poetry Slam, was awarded Best Female Poet at College Union Poetry Slam Invitational, and ranked 9th at the Individual World Poetry Slam. She lives in St. Paul, MN.
Shanny Jean Maney is a performance poet and teacher. With Robbie Q. Telfer, she co-founded internationally popular The Encyclopedia Show, which won the Orgie Theatre Award in 2009. She lives in Chicago.
Lauren Zuniga is a nationally touring poet and teaching artist. She is the founder of Oklahoma Young Writers. In 2010, she was nominated for Oklahoma Poet Laureate. She serves on the board of the IAO Gallery, tours for the Oklahoma Arts Council. She has competed in 9 national level poetry competitions.
Bucky Sinister Bucky entered the world of poetry in 1987 and continues today as a well-regarded poet, comedian, and self-help author. He counts nine chapbooks and three books of poetry. His poetry has been in numerous anthologies, most notably The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry. Bucky keeps a street theme throughout his work, which makes him accessible to a wide range of people. He performs regularly in SF’s The Business.
DOB: 8/6/1988
Megan Falley is one of a mere handful of poets to be published both on Penmanship Books and Write Bloody Press. After representing SUNY New Paltz for four years on the college slam team, Megan later earned her degree in English Literature and Creative Writing and returned to New Paltz to coach the team. In 2009 she helped found the second largest collegiate spoken word tournament in the country, The Wade-Lewis Poetry Slam Invitational. In 2010 she represented New York City on a competing team at the National Poetry Slam and her work began appearing in several literary magazines and anthologies including The Nervous Breakdown, PANK, Muzzle, Kill Author, The Legendary, Danse Macabre, and The Literary Bohemian. When she is not writing poems, Megan occupies herself by turning her ex-lovers into pies.
Syd Butler grew up in DC and attended the RISD (BFA in Film/Video) where he founded the band Les Savy Fav, then launched the Independent label, Frenchkiss Records. He currently lives in NYC where he splits his time between the management of his growing record label, playing in side project bands and illustrating his minds weird workings.
Stevie Edwards lives in central New York, by way of Chicago, by way of Michigan, often exploring the constructs of decaying social in the Rustbelt. She is editor-in-chief/founder of Muzzle and is currently an MFA-poetry candidate at Cornell. Her poetry has appeared in several literary magazines.
G. Murrary Thomas has been an active participant in the Southern California poetry scene for over 20 years. In addition to publishing Next… Magazine, he has two collections of poetry available: Cows on the Freeway, iUniverse (1999), My Kidney Just Arrived, Tebot Bach (2011). He has also edited several anthologies of poetry, including Paper Shredders (2005), a collection of surf writing.
DOB: 9/23/1982
Ellis began performing for audiences in spring 2006. Since then he has been on the the Cantab Lounge Poetry Slam team twice and has represented the Cantab at the individual world poetry slam. He is a local slam champion and has been featured at poetry venues from New England to various regions of the U.S.
As a Poetry Slam competitor in the U.S., Mike has competed at the National Poetry Slam on team San José several times. In 2003, McGee won the coveted National Poetry Slam Individual Grand Championship, besting over 300 nationally ranked poetry slammers.
Mali is the author of two books of poetry, The Last Time As We Are (Write Bloody Books 2009) and What Learning Leaves (Hanover 2002), and four CDs of spoken word. He received a New York Foundation for the Arts Grant in 2001 to develop Teacher! Teacher! a one-man show about poetry, teaching, and math which won the jury prize for best solo performance at the 2001 Comedy Arts Festival. Mali was formerly president of Poetry Slam, Inc.
Founder and host of the three-time National Poetry Slam Championship venue, NYC-Urbana, Cristin is the author of five books of poetry. She is currently a rights agent for the Artists Rights Society.
Karen Finneyfrock is a poet, novelist and teaching artist in Seattle, WA. She is a Writer-in-Residence at Richard Hugo House in Seattle and teaches for Seattle Arts and Lectures’ Writers-in-the-Schools program. A member of four National Poetry Slam Teams, Karen has toured across the US and Canada reading poetry in bars, coffee shops, theatres and the occasional living room. Karen was honored as a “Slam Legend” at the National Poetry Slam in 2006.
Ryler has headlined at venues from the Nuyorican Poets Cafe to Washington State University. A finalist in the Individual World Poetry Slam, Ryler has won the Sue C Boynton award and the Bart Baxter Poetry Contest. He recently received his second Pushcart nomination.
Rob Sturma, performing under the nom de plume Ratpack Slim, has been on three nationally-ranked slam teams and made it to the finals stage in 2005 with Team Hollywood. He is a former poetry editor for GetUnderground.com, the current poetry editor for Kotori Magazine, and produced a series of webstories for kcet.org called “Children Of Slam”.
Telfer lives in Chicago where he curates the Encyclopedia Show, writes the serialized blog-novel The Chronicles of Professor Fliggins, and is the Director of Performing Arts for Young Chicago Authors (YCA). He was a finalist at the National Poetry Slam in 2007.
In 2004, Byloos was included in the UCLA Hammer Museum’s New American Writing Series. His fiction has been published in Fishwrap, Schtick, and Undershorts. His first collection of short stories, Don’t Smell the Floss, comprises work written in the years after he completed graduate school. Byloos is also an accomplished painter.
Josh Boyd is an artist who has been writing and touring for the last decade. Former humanitarian worker in Morocco, Mexico and Spain, Boyd is also a journeyman electrician and small business owner.
She has represented New York City three times at the National Poetry Slam at the Urbana Poetry Slam and The louderARTS Project. Verlee was the highest-scoring individual poet at the 2008 National Poetry Slam Finals, is the 2009 NYC-Urbana iWPS Champion, and represented NYC-louderARTS at the 2010 Women of the World Poetry Slam.
Musician Beck called Steve Abee The love powered bullhorn blasting down from the heavens. Abee is the author of the collection of short stories and poems, King Planet (Incommunicado). His newest book, Great Balls of flowers was named as one of the best books of 2009 by The Nervous Breakdown. He lives and teaches in Los Angeles.
Artists
Joshua Grieve
Maust
Blaine Fontana
Jennifer Davis
Matthew Carver
Brandon Lyon
Matthew Wignall
Jeff Harmon
Shea Gauer
Cole Nuckols
Kevin Staniec
Lea Deschenes
Jenny Lewis
Michael Sarnowski
Amanda Atkins
Jasper Wong
Brooke Lanier
