Visiting Writers & Artists – 2022

Caridad Moro-Gronlier

Escribe Aquí / Write Here 2022: Caridad Moro-Gronlier is the author of Tortillera, winner of the TRP Southern Poetry Breakthrough Prize published by Texas Review Press (2021) and the chapbook Visionware published by Finishing Line Press (2009). She is a Contributing Editor for Grabbed: Poets and Writers Respond to Sexual Assault (Beacon Press, 2020) and Associate Editor for \\\"SWWIM Every Day\\\", an online daily poetry journal for women identified poets. Recent work can be found in The Best American Poetry Blog, Verse Daily, Home in Florida: Latinx Writers and the Literature of Uprootedness (UF Press, 2021), and Limp Wrist Poetry Magazine. She resides in Miami, Florida with her family.

Julie Morrissy

Julie Morrissy is an Irish poet, academic, critic, and activist. From 2021-2022 she was the first Poet-in-Residence at the National Library of Ireland in the Decade of Centenaries program. Morrissy was also the 2021-22 National Endowment of the Humanities Fellow at the Keough-Naughton Institute for Irish Studies at the University of Notre Dame, where she worked on a poetry-play. From 2019-2021 she was the inaugural John Pollard Newman Fellow in Creativity at University College Dublin. She is currently based at Maynooth University.  Her collaborative, mixed-media poetry practice includes film, animation, moving image, experimental publishing, gallery installation, and live performance. She earned her PhD in Creative Writing at Ulster University, where she was Vice-Chancellor Research Scholar. She holds graduate degrees in Creative Writing (University College Dublin 2013) and Literature (Toronto Metropolitan University 2014), and a Bachelor of Civil Law degree (University College Dublin 2006).

Brian Murphy

Brian Murphy is an internationally acclaimed pianist, composer and arranger who has recorded and performed extensively in Canada, the United Kingdom, Europe, Japan and the U.S.A. with artists as diverse as Wynton Marsalis, Mark Murphy, Diana Krall, Arturo Sandoval, Paquito D'Rivera, Tom Scott, Woody Shaw, Mark O'Connor, and so many others.

Chris Notoarnicola

Christopher Notarnicola is a US Marine Corps veteran and an MFA graduate of Florida Atlantic University. His work has been published with American Short Fiction, Bellevue Literary Review, Best American Essays, Chicago Quarterly Review, Epiphany, Image, The Southampton Review, and elsewhere.

January Gill O’Neil

January Gill O’Neil was born in Norfolk, Virginia, and received a BA from Old Dominion University and an MFA from New York University. O’Neil is the author of Glitter Road (forthcoming CavanKerry Press, 2024); Rewilding (CavanKerry Press, 2018), recognized by Mass Center for the Book as a notable poetry collection for 2018; Misery Islands (CavanKerry Press, 2014), winner of a 2015 Paterson Award for Literary Excellence; and Underlife (CavanKerry Press, 2009).The recipient of fellowships from Cave Canem and the Barbara Deming Memorial Fund, O’Neil was awarded a Massachusetts Cultural Council grant and was named the John and Renée Grisham Writer in Residence for 2019–20 at the University of Mississippi, Oxford. O’Neil is an associate professor of English at Salem State University.

Edgar Pantoja

Escribe Aquí / Write Here 2022: Edgar PANTOJA is a Pianist, composer, arranger, and music educator who specializes in modern and traditional Cuban genres, Latin jazz, and world music. His engaging music combines Cuban roots sources of rumba, son, and timba with international rhythms of samba, Moroccan Gnawa, jazz and funk. Born in Santiago de Cuba, Pantoja has spent decades touring and collaborating with a myriad of stars including Rubén Blades, David Murray, and Angelique Kidjo. He was also pianist/keyboardist and arranger for Cuban conga maestro Pedrito Martinez. Pantoja graduated from the Conservatorio Esteban Salas and the Conservatorio Jose Maria Ochoa, in Cuba.

Konrad Paszkudzki

Although raised in Western Australia by Polish parents, Konrad’s musical affinity and passion for swingin' American jazz revealed itself early on. He was accepted into university at the West Australian Academy of Performing Arts in Perth at the tender age of 15, studying jazz piano and finishing his undergraduate degree a few weeks after turning 19. The precocious instrumentalist swiftly established a reputation as a leading jazzman in Australia, touring for the next two years and playing with his mentor, jazz trumpeter James Morrison.

David Patterson

David Patterson is a historian and professor at the Ackerman Center for Holocaust Studies, University of Texas at Dallas. Patterson's areas of expertise are Holocaust, Jewish Thought, Anti-Semitism and Israel. He is the Hillel A. Feinberg Distinguished Chair in Holocaust Studies. Patterson is author of a study of Holocaust memoir literature and said that reading of first person testimonials has a function, the reader "must become not an interpreter of texts but a mender of the world, a part of the recovery that this memory demands".

Geoffrey Philp

Born in Kingston, Jamaica, Geoffrey Philp's poems and short stories are widely published, appearing in Small Axe, World Literature Today, The Caribbean Writer, Gulf Stream, Florida in Poetry: A History of the Imagination, Wheel and Come Again: An Anthology of Reggae Poetry,Whispers from the Cotton Tree Root, The Oxford Book of Caribbean Short Stories, and The Oxford Book of Caribbean Verse.

Alexandra Regalado

Escribe Aquí / Write Here 2022: Alexandra Lytton Regalado is author of Relinquenda, winner of the National Poetry Series (Beacon Press, 2022) and Matria (Black Lawrence Press, 2017). www.alexandralyttonregalado.com

Ira Rosen

IRA ROSEN has produced some of the most memorable, important, and groundbreaking stories for 60 Minutes. A former Nieman Fellow at Harvard University, Rosen was a senior producer of Primetime Live with Diane Sawyer. Rosen has won 24 National Emmys, four duPont Awards, two RFK Awards, and two Peabodys for his work. He is the coauthor of The Warning: Accident at Three Mile Island.

Helen Schulman

Helen Schulman is an American novelist, short story, non-fiction, and screenwriter. Her fifth novel, This Beautiful Life, was an international bestseller, and was chosen in the 100 Notable Books of 2011 by the New York Times Book Review.

Heidi Seaborn

An awarding-winning poet, essayist, and editor, Heidi Seaborn's the author of An Insomniac's Slumber Party with Marilyn Monroe (winner, [PANK] Poetry Prize, 2021) the acclaimed Give a Girl Chaos (C&R Press, 2019), Bite Marks (Comstock Review Chapbook Award, 2021), Once a Diva (dancing girl press, 2021) and Finding My Way Home (Finishing Line Press, 2018). Heidi is Executive Editor of The Adroit Journal and holds an MFA in Poetry from New York University and a BA from Stanford University. She lives on the edge of Puget Sound.

Nicole Sealey

Nicole Sealey was born in St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands, and raised in Apopka, Florida. She earned an MLA in Africana studies from the University of South Florida and an MFA in creative writing from New York University. Sealey is the author of the collections Ordinary Beast (2017), a finalist for the PEN Open Book and Hurston/Wright Legacy Awards, and The Animal After Whom Other Animals Are Named (2016), winner of the Drinking Gourd Chapbook Poetry Prize. Her other honors and awards include a 2019 Rome Prize, an Elizabeth George Foundation Grant, a Stanley Kunitz Memorial Prize, a Daniel Varoujan Award, and a Poetry International Prize. She has been a fellow at Cave Canem, the Poetry Project, the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, CantoMundo, and the MacDowell Colony. She is currently the executive director at Cave Canem, the 2018-2019 Doris Lippman Visiting Poet at The City College of New York, a visiting professor at Boston University, and a 2019-2020 Hodder Fellow at Princeton University.

Chet’la Sebree

Chet'la Sebree is the author of Mistress (New Issues Poetry and Prose, 2019) selected by Cathy Park Hong as the winner of the 2018 New Issues Poetry Prize and nominated for an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work-Poetry. Her second book of poems Field Study (FSG Originals, 2021) was selected by Rick Barot, Gabrielle Calvocoressi, and Honorée Fanonne Jeffers to receive the James Laughlin Award. She is the Director of the Stadler Center for Poetry and Literary Arts and an assistant professor at Bucknell University.

Douglas Sills

Douglas Howard Sills is an American actor and singer. He made his professional stage acting debut with principal roles in the national tours of Into the Woods and The Secret Garden.

Margo Singer

Margot Singer is the author of a novel, Underground Fugue (Melville House, 2017), winner of the Edward Lewis Wallant Award for American Jewish fiction and finalist for the Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature; a collection of short stories, The Pale of Settlement (University of Georgia Press, 2007), winner of the Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction; and co-editor, with Nicole Walker, of Bending Genre (Bloomsbury Academic, 2013), a collection of essays on creative nonfiction. Her short stories and essays have appeared in The Kenyon Review, The Gettysburg Review, Conjunctions, Shenandoah, Prairie Schooner, Agni, Ninth Letter, The Sun, and many others. Winner of the 2013 James Jones First Novel Fellowship, she has also received a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, the Reform Judaism Prize for Jewish Fiction, the Glasgow Prize for Emerging Writers, the Carter Prize for the essay, and an honorable mention from the judges of the PEN/Hemingway Award.

Naomi Sokoloff

Naomi Sokoloff has published widely on Israeli and American literature, commenting on work by, among others, Diane Ackerman, S.Y. Agnon, Yehuda Amichai, Aharon Appelfeld, Louis Begley, Ch.N. Bialik, Alona Frankel, David Grossman, Primo Levi, Etgar Keret, Jerzy Kosinski, Primo Levi, Savyon Liebrecht, Rutu Modan, Yehoshua November, Cynthia Ozick, Hava Pinhas-Cohen, Gabriel Preil, Haim Plutzik, Henry Roth, Philip Roth, Avraham Shlonsky, and Myra Sklarew. Among the topics discussed in her books and articles: responses to the Holocaust, gender and women’s voices in literature, modern poetry in relation to traditional prayer, representations of childhood in fiction, and children’s literature.

Melissa Studdard

Born in Alabama, Melissa Studdard is a professor at Lone Star College–Tomball. She hosts and produces VIDA Voices & Views for Vida: Women in Literary Arts.  In her podcast work she has interviewed such figures as Jane Hirshfield, Rita Dove, Julia Cameron, Robert Pinsky, Patricia Smith, Cheryl Strayed, Joy Harjo, and Krista Tippett. Studdard is also a past president of the Women's Caucus and moderated their annual meeting at the Association of Writers & Writing Programs conference. She is also an honorary Professor at the International Art Academy in Volos, Greece.

Charu Suri

Charu Suri is an award-winning pianist, composer and journalist who became the first Indian born jazz composer at Carnegie Hall. She has been praised with creating a new sound in jazz, blending a trio with Sufi vocals and Indian ragas. She is also an award-winning journalist who has contributed hundreds of articles to publications including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, National Geographic, Condé Nast Traveler, Architectural Digest and The Washington Post. Recently, her jazz original, Bluesy, won a silver at the International Singer Songwriters Association (ISSA) Awards. She also was awarded a gold record for "Jazz Artist of the Month" by ISSA. Her latest release, “The Book of Ragas vol. 2" scored for piano, vibraphone and a Sufi singer has garnered critical acclaim and was selected by Jazz at Lincoln Center as an August release pick. Her work has been performed by cellist Yo-Yo Ma and double bassist, Edgar Meyer. She is a voting member of the Recording Academy (GRAMMYs). As a journalist, she has won several gold medals from the North American Travel Journalists Association (NATJA) and also a Lowell Thomas Gold for a collaborative story for The New York Times.

Qian Julie Wang

QIAN JULIE WANG (pronounced “Chien Joolee Wong”) is a New York Times bestselling author and civil rights litigator. A graduate of Yale Law School and Swarthmore College, Qian Julie is managing partner of Gottlieb & Wang LLP, a firm dedicated to advancing education, disability, and civil rights on behalf of marginalized communities. Her writing has been published in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Elle, Harper’s Bazaar, and The Cut, and she has appeared on the TODAY Show, MSNBC, and NPR. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and their two rescue dogs, Salty and Peppers.

Stephanie Wich-Herriein

Stephanie Wich-Herriein is a passionate traveller. She creates travel-focused visual content and compelling stories on a bilingual blog. ‘My goal is not only to inspire but also to empower people to pursue their wanderlust and travel dreams. My comprehensive travel guides and self-tested itineraries are written for fellow wanderers who like to travel independently.’

Bill K. Wurtzel

Bill Wurtzel was guitarist for many years with the Count Basie Countsmen, Harlem Blues & Jazz Band, Jazz organists Bill Doggett, Jimmy McGriff and Reuben Wilson. He has accompanied singers Gloria Lynn, Ruth Brown, Terri Thornton and Jimmy Witherspoon. Bill’s groups have played for countless private affairs with music that’s perfect for the event. Repeat clients include the Riverside Symphony and Paul Simon. Bill is also a director of the Jazz Foundation of America.

Claire Wurtzel

Claire Wurtzel has been an educator for over 40 years, helping teachers work effectively with students who struggle with learning and/or behavior challenges. Claire was on the faculty of the American Museum of Natural History as well as Bank Street Graduate School, where she taught and chaired the Department of Special Education. Claire has co-authored 6 books with her husband Bill, an award-winning visual artist and jazz musician.
their latest book, a children's book, was chosen by PJ Library for 2023. The book tells the story of a family who want to hold a seder in their tiny house. It is called," In Our Teeny Tiny Matzah House".

Tony Siqi Yun

The Canadian born pianist Tony Siqi Yun is currently based in New York. This season, Tony will make his subscription debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra performing Robert Schumann’s Piano Concerto under the baton of Yannick Nézet-Séguin. He first met Maestro Nézet-Séguin in the final round of the inaugural China International Music Competition in 2019, where he went on to win First Prize and a Gold Medal. Recent concerto performances include the Philadelphia Orchestra (Robert Schumann), Toronto Symphony Orchestra (Clara Schumann) and the Orchestre de Chambre de Paris (Beethoven). As a solo recitalist, recent and future highlights include his debuts at the Vancouver Recital Society, Gilmore Rising Stars Series, Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, Gewandhaus in Leipzig, and Rheingau Music Festival.