In the Spotlight: Literary Arts Festival

Poster with rainbow heart and LGBTQIA+ flag 
LAF
City Tech's 42nd annual
Literary Arts Festival
Free & Open To The Public
Featuring Akwaeke Emezi [includes photo]
and City Tech Students
For more info: Megan Behrent
MBehrent@CItyTech.cuny.edu
Thursday April 27
4pm-6pm
The Theater at City Tech
285 Jay Street
Sponsored by: Coordinated Undergraduate Education (CUE), New York City College of Technology
This event is made possible through the generous support of LaGuardia Community College and the New York City Council LGBT and Queer Caucus
LAF 2023 poster

We’re shining the spotlight on this week’s Literary Arts Festival. This Thursday, April 27th, come listen to and celebrate City Tech students whose writing won awards in the LAF writing competition. And don’t miss this year’s featured speaker!

This year’s event features acclaimed multidisciplinary artist, writer, and a National Book Foundation “5 Under 35” honoree Akwaeke Emezi, author of Freshwater and the bestsellers You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty and The Death of Vivek Oji.

Not yet familiar with Emezi’s work? The Literary Arts Festival site on the OpenLab includes some great resources for getting to know Emezi and their work. Check out the LAF 2023 Featured Writer: Akwaeke Emezi page, and scroll through the posts highlighting their work. These posts include links to Emezi’s website and featured content, as well as embedded videos of interviews and readings with Emezi.

You can see in the featured post on the LAF site that there is a link to register for the event, along with all the information you need to attend the 2023 City Tech Literary Arts Festival: on Thursday, April 27, from 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m., at the Academic Complex Theater, 285 Jay Street.

In the Spotlight: Literary Arts Festival

This year’s Literary Arts Festival–the 40th annual installation of this City Tech institution–will no doubt be different than the previous 39, but certainly exciting and enriching as always.

We’re spotlighting both the festival itself–now virtual via Zoom–and the revamped call for student submissions. The organizers of the Literary Arts Festival emphasize that “Your Voice Matters. Your Story Matters. You Matter and We Care.” Instead of a writing competition, the call asks students to share stories with the City Tech community. The focus is on “quarantine, hardship, loss, resilience, social activism, remote education, mental health, essential workers, health care workers, caregivers” and can include “personal essay, poem, song, photography, illustration, video/animation, dance, spoken word performance”–so any format of creative work. Submit your work by March 17th.

Details on the call for submissions are available on the Literary Arts Festival’s OpenLab site.

Then check out–and share!–this awesome poster for the event, designed by Or Szyflingier in COMD! It has information for you to save the date for the event: on Tuesday, April 13, at 5:00pm, the City Tech community will gather for a Literary Arts Festival featuring spoken word artist Staceyann Chin and City Tech students from among those submitting their work for the call for submissions.

Before the festival, get to know Staceyann Chin’s spoken-word work. Here are some samples of her work from the Poetry Foundation, and some videos and further reading.

Thanks to the Student Government Association President Ngozi Okonkwo and the SGA Team for hosting, and for their work with English Department faculty, led by Dr. Caroline Hellman, in organizing and supporting this year’s festival.