Katie Ka Vang is a

Hmong Hmong may refer to: * Hmong people, an ethnic group living mainly in Southwest China, Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand * Hmong cuisine * Hmong customs and culture ** Hmong music ** Hmong textile art * Hmong language, a continuum of closely related to ...

American performance artist, poet and playwright. She has created and written several performance pieces and plays. These include ''wtf'', ''Hmong Bollywood'', ''Meaning of Freedom''; ''Use of Sharpening'', ''Youth In Session'', and ''Myth of Xee''. Vang was born in

Santa Ana, California Santa Ana () is the second most populous city and the county seat of Orange County, California. Located in the Greater Los Angeles region of Southern California, the city's population was 310,227 at the 2020 census, making Santa Ana the List of ...

, lived in Colorado and moved to

Minneapolis–Saint Paul Minneapolis–Saint Paul is a metropolitan area in the Upper Midwestern United States centered around the confluence of the Mississippi, Minnesota and St. Croix rivers in the U.S. state of Minnesota. It is commonly known as the Twin Cities ...

in 1999. She attended

Concordia University Concordia University ( French: ''Université Concordia'') is a public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1974 following the merger of Loyola College and Sir George Williams University, Concordia is one of the t ...

, where she studied marketing., then attended

Brown University Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...

and graduated with an MFA in Playwriting. As a performer, Vang has appeared at numerous venues, including Theatre Mu, the Center for Hmong Arts and Talent, the

Walker Art Center The Walker Art Center is a multidisciplinary contemporary art center in the Lowry Hill neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. The Walker is one of the most-visited modern and contemporary art museums in the United States and, t ...

, Exposed Brick Theatre, Pillsbury House Theatre,

Ordway Center for the Performing Arts The Ordway Center for the Performing Arts, in downtown Saint Paul, Minnesota, hosts a variety of performing arts, such as touring Broadway musicals, orchestra, opera, and cultural performers, and produces local musicals. It is home to several lo ...

, and as an ensemble member at Pangea World Theater. Vang has published work in the ''St. Paul Almanac'', ''Bakka Mag'', ''Asian American Press'', and ''Voices from the Asian American Experience''. Her self-published book of poetry and prose is ''Never Said''. Vang has received grants from the Jerome Foundation and the Minnesota State Arts Board. She received a NPN Creation Fund grant to complete ''Hmong Bollywood''. In 2012, she was awarded the Woman of the Year award; this recognized her contributions to the lives of Hmong women and the Hmong community. Vang has worked as a program director, volunteer and teaching artist with C.H.A.T. ( Center for Hmong Arts and Talent), one of the world's first Hmong arts organization. In 2012 Vang was diagnosed with stage four

anaplastic large-cell lymphoma Anaplastic large cell lymphoma (ALCL) refers to a group of non-Hodgkin lymphomas in which aberrant T cells proliferate uncontrollably. Considered as a single entity, ALCL is the most common type of peripheral lymphoma and represents ~10% of all per ...

. After going into remission, Vang put on the one-woman show ''Hmong Bollywood'' at Intermedia Arts in 2013.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vang, Katie Ka Living people Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century American women artists American performance artists American writers of Hmong descent Brown University alumni Concordia University (Saint Paul, Minnesota) alumni People from Santa Ana, California Poets from Minnesota