The Midwest Arts Writers Fellowship is a 6-month opportunity for writers to develop, refine, and publish writings on topics that are relevant to Indigenous, trans, queer, diasporic, and/or disabled artists and arts workers in our region. The participating Fellows will reflect on the complexities of Midwest life and the artists who help define and articulate its culture. They will explore how the politics and culture of our region intersect within their chosen topics.
We were thrilled by the breadth and depth (almost one hundred!) of proposals we received from writers, artists, and cultural workers across the Midwest. This immense level of interest made it clear to us that opportunities like the Fellowship are both vital to our regional arts writing ecosystem and much desired by Midwestern arts writers.
Due to the large amount of high quality proposals, we have reshaped the Fellowship so that more folks can participate. We are thrilled to announce that, in addition to our two Fellows, we also have included two Fellowship runner-ups!
The Midwest Arts Writing Fellows are Dr. Treasure Shields Redmond (East St. Louis) and Yonci Jameson (Minneapolis). The Fellowship Runner-Ups are Juleana Enright (Minneapolis) and Nasreen Khan (Indianapolis). We are thrilled to have such an amazing group for the Fellowship’s inaugural cohort!
During the Fellowship, each Fellow will be closely working with a Sixty editor to publish two long-form (and related articles) on their proposed topic, and will participate in a public panel discussion about their writing processes. The Fellowship runner-ups will be publishing one long-form article on their proposed topic with the guidance of their editor.
Learn more about our chosen writers below!
Meet the Midwest Arts Writers Fellows
About: A dual citizen of Meridian, Mississippi and East St. Louis, Illinois, Dr. Treasure Shields Redmond is a published poet, master educator, community arts organizer, and culture keeper. As a teen, she was signed to M.C. Hammer’s label as a hip hop artist and writer. She is the author of chop: a collection of kwansabas for fannie lou hamer (2015). Dr. Redmond is the co-founder of Fannie Lou Hamer House, an artist’s retreat located in Illinois, and is the founder of The Community Archive, a non profit where she teaches communities how to collect their elders’ oral histories. Dr. Redmond can be contacted at https://thecommunityarchive.org/.
Topic: Dr. Redmond will be writing about how East St. Louis, a prime destination during the Black Migration, has retained an artistic community that it embraces and supports despite the city’s abandonment by industry, loss of population and other obstacles.
About: Yonci Jameson (they/she) is a Cultural Curator, DJ, Musician, and Writer born/raised/based in Minneapolis. Yonci’s practice is an intricate exploration, experimentation, and expansion into the past, present and future of Black Queer traditions. With over a decade of experience in traditional West African percussion & jazz instrumentation, radio programming, and arts education & community organizing, Yonci employs performance, the pen & page, bread breaking and a love ethic in solidarity with marginalized communities, and in efforts’ to create a future free of anti-Blackness and queerphobia.
Topic: Yonci will be writing semi-autobiographical musings, critiques, grievances, and journeys through the social landscape and arts ecosystem of pre and post George Floyd Minneapolis.
Meet the Fellowship Runner-Ups
About: Juleana Enright (they/them) is an Indigenous queer writer, curator, DJ and theatre artist living in Minneapolis. They are an enrolled member of the Lower Brulé tribe of the Lakota nation. Juleana is the Gallery and Programs Coordinator at All My Relations Arts. They have contributed to local platforms, MnArtists, Pride Magazine, mplsart, Primer and City Pages. Juleana has curated five art exhibitions as an independent curator and was the recipient of the Emerging Curators Institute 2020-21 Fellowship program. Juleana was part of the Writers Residency program at the Franconia Sculpture Park in 2021 and an MnArtist Writers Fellow in 2023. Through their practice, Juleana strives to examine the act of daily creation in the midst of great chaos.
Topic: Juleana will be writing about Indigenous Futurisms, glitch feminism, digital art, and queer futures. They are interested in the concept of glitch as a refusal and the concept of errors in the system specifically in relation to Native and Indigenous history.
About: Nasreen Khan (she/her) is a writer, visual artist, teacher, and mother. She grew up in West Africa and Indonesia and moved to the American Midwest by way of New York City. She and her young son live in their bungalow on Indianapolis’ Near Westside. Her art is interdisciplinary, draws on her multicultural background for inspiration, and often combines her love of poetry with visual illustration. Her Indianapolis art is all a tribute to the Haughville neighborhood where she lives. Her teaching and artistic practices, rooted in questions of equity and earth-based spirituality, grapple with questions of belonging; celebrate cultural margins; and confront colonization, racism, and misogyny.
Topic: Khan will be writing about the diversity of faiths and artistic practices in the neighborhood of Haughville (in Indianapolis) and how spirituality intersects with the other issues of the Westside–immigration, race, gentrification, poverty, environmental pollution.
This fellowship is made possible with support from Arts Midwest. Arts Midwest supports, informs, and celebrates Midwestern creativity. They build community and opportunity across Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Wisconsin, the Native Nations that share this geography, and beyond. As one of six nonprofit United States Regional Arts Organizations, Arts Midwest works to strengthen local arts and culture efforts in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts, state agencies, private funders, and many others. Learn more at artsmidwest.org.
