Meet the YNME Creatives

Alan Pelaez Lopez

CULTURAL CRITIC, EDUCATOR, INTERDISCIPLINARY ARTIST, POET, WRITER

Alan Pelaez Lopez is an AfroZapotec artist from Oaxaca, México. They are the author of Intergalactic Travels: poems from a fugitive alien (The Operating System, 2020), a finalist for the international latino book award and to love and mourn in the age of displacement (Nomadic Press, 2020). Much of their writing honors the messiness of grief, love, social movements, & reconciliation. They have been organizing with undocumented LGBTQIA+ migrants for ten years.

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Image Credit: Jess Alvarenga

Ariana Brown

POET, WORKSHOP FACILITATOR, PERFORMER

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NOW BOOKING FOR:

Poetry performances, writing workshops, artist talks, and panel discussions

Ariana Brown is a queer Black Mexican American poet from San Antonio, TX. She is the author of We Are Owed. (Grieveland, 2021) and Sana Sana (Game Over Books, 2020) and a 2014 national collegiate poetry slam champion. Ariana’s work investigates queer Black personhood in Mexican American spaces, Black relationality and girlhood, loneliness, and care. She has been writing, performing, and teaching poetry for over ten years.

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Image Credit: Adam Hamze

gripp

FILM, POETRY, THEATER, MUSIC

gripp is a writer / programmer / educator based primarily on the internet. gripp has a B.S. and an M.S. in Computer Science. Eir work is multimedia and interdisciplinary, ranging from written word to performance art to electronic installation. Ey have appeared onstage as an actor and a poet, self-published and been printed in literary magazines, built digital chapbooks and chatbots, taught college courses and workshops, and have written, produced, and appeared in short films.

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Image Credit: gripp

Janae Johnson

WRITER, PERFORMER, EDUCATOR, CURATOR, DJ

Janae Johnson is a multi-disciplinary artist: writer, performer, educator, storyteller, DJ & vibe curator. She is a national + international poetry slam champion and her work has appeared in outlets such as: PBS Newshour, ESPN & Button Poetry. Her full-length book Lessons on Being Tender Headed is forthcoming with Write Bloody Press in March 2022.

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Image Credit: Zorn B Taylor

Jonathan Mendoza

POET, ORGANIZER, EDUCATOR

Jonathan Mendoza is a Jewish and Mexican-American activist, spoken word poet, social justice educator, and musician. He is a National Poetry Slam Champion, winner of the Sonia Sanchez – Langston Hughes Poetry Prize, and a community organizer for housing justice and youth power in Chicago's lower west side.

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Image Credit: James O'Connell

Porsha Olayiwola

BLACK: WRITER, PERFORMER, FUTURIST

Black, poet, queer-dyke, hip-hop feminist, womanist: Porsha is a native of Chicago who now resides in Boston. Olayiwola is a writer, performer, educator and curator who uses afro-futurism and surrealism to examine historical and current issues in the Black, woman, and queer diasporas. She is an Individual World Poetry Slam Champion and the former artistic director at MassLEAP, a literary youth organization. Olayiwola is an MFA Candidate at Emerson College. Porsha Olayiwola is the author of i shimmer sometimes, too published by Button Poetry and is the current poet laureate for the city of Boston.

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Image Credit: Carlie Febo