Kristiana Rae Colón (born April 16, 1986) is an American poet, playwright, actor, educator,
Cave Canem Fellow, creator of
#BlackSexMatters and co-founder of
the #LetUsBreathe Collective. She was awarded 2017 Best Black Playwright by
The Black Mall. Her plays have premiered in Chicago, New York, London, and other cities.
Colón is the author of several plays and poems. She earned the 2013 Drinking Gourd Poetry Prize. Her play, ''Octagon,'' won Colón the
Arizona Theatre Company
The Arizona Theatre Company is an American nonprofit regional theater company operating in Phoenix, Arizona.
History
The Arizona Theatre Company (ATC) was founded by Sandy Rosenthal in 1966 as the Arizona Civic Theatre. It originally performe ...
2014 National Latino Playwriting Award. Kristiana's writing, producing, and organizing work to radically reimagine power structures, our complicity in them, and visions for liberation.
Early life and education
Colón is the daughter of April and former Alderman Rey Colón, who met during their college years in a writing class. They both encouraged their children to be involved in the arts.
She was born and raised in
Chicago
Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...
, where she attended gifted elementary schools and graduated with honors from Whitney Young High School. Colón earned a Bachelor of Arts from the
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...
, and a
Master of Fine Arts
A Master of Fine Arts (MFA or M.F.A.)
is a terminal degree in fine arts, including visual arts, creative writing, graphic design, photography, filmmaking, dance, theatre, other performing arts and in some cases, theatre management or arts admi ...
in Writing at the
School of the Art Institute of Chicago
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) is a Private university, private art school associated with the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC) in Chicago, Illinois. Tracing its history to an art students' cooperative founded in 1866, which gr ...
.
Activism
Colón is the co-director of the #LetUsBreathe Collective and co-creator o
#BlackSexMattersref name=":5" />
The ''Let Us Breathe Collective'' is an alliance of artists and activists who want to tell the stories of protestors and people involved in
#BlackLivesMatter.
Colón is the executive director of the group.
The collective formed in 2014 as a way to raise funds to bring
tear gas
Tear gas, also known as a lachrymatory agent or lachrymator (), sometimes colloquially known as "mace" after the Mace (spray), early commercial self-defense spray, is a chemical weapon that stimulates the nerves of the lacrimal gland in the ey ...
protection to protesters in
Ferguson.
Let Us Breath Collective protested in July 2016, marching and chaining their bodies together to block the entrance of the
Chicago Police Department's Homan Square facility
The Chicago Police Department's Homan Square facility is a former Sears, Roebuck and Company warehouse on the city's West Side. The facility houses the department's Evidence and Recovered Property Section. In 2015, the facility gained worldwid ...
.
Theatre
''but i cd only whisper'' was premiered at the
Arcola Theater in
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
in 2012.
''Florissant & Canfield'' tells a vivid epic about Ferguson, in the midst of the
Black Lives Matter
Black Lives Matter (BLM) is a Decentralization, decentralized political and social movement that aims to highlight racism, discrimination and Racial inequality in the United States, racial inequality experienced by black people, and to pro ...
movement, a newly formed alliance of protesters are forced to put their nascent ideologies to the test in the quest for new visions of justice. This production was inspired by the
Ferguson protesters along with the ''Let Us Breathe Collective'' and ''Lost Voices,'' and it was featured on the 2016 Hedgebrook Women Playwrights Festival.
''Good Friday (2016)'' is an all-women production that tackles topics like
millennial
Millennials, also known as Generation Y or Gen Y, are the demographic cohort following Generation X and preceding Generation Z. Researchers and popular media use the early 1980s as starting birth years and the mid-1990s to early 2000s as ...
feminism
Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideology, ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social gender equality, equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern soci ...
,
sexual violence
Sexual violence is any harmful or unwanted Human sexual activity, sexual act, an attempt to obtain a sexual act through violence or coercion, or an act directed against a person's sexuality without their consent, by any individual regardless of ...
, and
gun violence
Gun-related violence is violence against a person committed with the use of a firearm to inflict a gunshot wound. Gun violence may or may not be considered criminal. Criminal violence includes homicide (except when and where ruled justifiable ...
.
Her play, ''Octagon'', is full of complicated female characters who are preparing for a
slam poetry
A poetry slam is a competitive art event in which poets perform spoken word poetry before a live audience and a panel of judges.
Poetry slams began in Chicago in the 1980s, with the first slam competition designed to move poetry recitals from a ...
contest.
''Octagon'' won the
Arizona Theatre Company
The Arizona Theatre Company is an American nonprofit regional theater company operating in Phoenix, Arizona.
History
The Arizona Theatre Company (ATC) was founded by Sandy Rosenthal in 1966 as the Arizona Civic Theatre. It originally performe ...
National Latino Playwriting Award in 2014.
The play had its world premier at the Arcola Theater in September 2015.
''
The Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN radio and WGN tel ...
'' wrote that "'Octagon' sometimes feels more like an octopus, with many tentacles reaching in multiple directions. But by the end, it proves exhilarating, exhausting and plain exciting. Just like a great poetry slam should be."
''One Week in Spring,'' laced with hip hop and poetry, bursts with preconceptions about taboos such as women's sexuality, and concepts of consent that have been shaped and re-shaped by millennial
social media
Social media are interactive technologies that facilitate the Content creation, creation, information exchange, sharing and news aggregator, aggregation of Content (media), content (such as ideas, interests, and other forms of expression) amongs ...
. This particular production it was developed in the MFA Writing program at the
School of the Art Institute of Chicago
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) is a Private university, private art school associated with the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC) in Chicago, Illinois. Tracing its history to an art students' cooperative founded in 1866, which gr ...
, where it also received its first staged reading.
Her play, ''Tilikum'', will have its world premiere in June 2018 at the Sideshow Theatre Company in Chicago.
Poetry
Colón earned the
Drinking Gourd Poetry Prize in 2013 for her
chapbook
A chapbook is a type of small printed booklet that was a popular medium for street literature throughout early modern Europe. Chapbooks were usually produced cheaply, illustrated with crude woodcuts and printed on a single sheet folded into 8, 1 ...
, ''promised instruments''.
Her poems have been featured in the
anthology
In book publishing, an anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler; it may be a collection of plays, poems, short stories, songs, or related fiction/non-fiction excerpts by different authors. There are also thematic and g ...
, ''The BreakBeat Poets: New American Poetry in the Age of Hip-Hop'' (2015).
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Colon, Kristiana Rae
1986 births
Living people
African-American poets
American women poets
American women dramatists and playwrights
African-American dramatists and playwrights
Poets from Chicago
University of Chicago alumni
School of the Art Institute of Chicago alumni
Hispanic and Latino American dramatists and playwrights
Activists for African-American civil rights
21st-century American poets
21st-century American women writers
21st-century African-American women writers
21st-century African-American writers
20th-century African-American writers
20th-century African-American women