Notes on Contributors
- Notes on Contributors
Carlos Almaraz was born in Mexico City in 1949 and grew up in Chicago and Los Angeles. He studied at the University of California, Los Angeles, and later earned a Master of Fine Arts degree from Otis College of Art and Design in 1974. In 1973, Almaraz and three other artists co-founded Los Four, a local art collective whose collaborations brought Chicano street art to the attention of the Los Angeles mainstream art community. Almaraz also created murals, banners, and other artworks for César Chávez and the United Farmworkers Union. Although Almaraz died in 1989, his pastels, paintings, and murals remain a major influence on younger Latino artists. The Los Angeles County Museum of Art will put on the most comprehensive exhibition of his work in 2017.
Bryce Berkowitz’s poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in Passages North, Oyez Review, Oxford Magazine, Evansville Review, and Tule Review.
Charles “Chaz” Bojórquez is a Mexican-American artist who grew up in Los Angeles in the 1950s and ’60s. There, he was introduced to the cholo writing, particularly in East Los Angeles, where latino gangs would tag buildings in their neighborhoods to claim their territory. Unlike the bright cartoon-style murals of the East Coast graffiti, cholo writing features stark black-and-white lettering that pays homage to traditional typefaces. Bojórquez created his own style of cholo writing, which he began to tag on the streets throughout the 1970s and ’80s. His work is a variation on the classic Gothic, an homage to traditional writing, but with sharp lines and accents. Now 67, Bojórquez continues to work and considers himself one of the oldest living graffiti artists.
María Brito (born María Cristina Brito in 1947 in Havana, Cuba) is a Cuban-American artist specializing in painting, sculpture, and installations. Her inspirations often come from random words that she hears spoken in a certain manner, from objects that she picks up at flea markets, or from common everyday objects. In 1961, Brito entered the United States by way of Operation Peter Pan. She earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts from Florida International University (FIU) in 1978, and in 1979 obtained her Master of Fine Arts from the University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida. She lives in Florida.
Dorothy Howe Brooks’s work has previously appeared in Atlanta Review, Poet Lore, Poem, and many other literary magazines. Her second chapbook, Interstices, was published by Finishing Line Press in 2009, and a full-length poetry collection, A Fine Dusting of Brightness, was published in 2013 by Aldrich Press.
Jack Bushnell is an award-winning children’s author and baseball writer. His personal essays, frequently on science and nature, have appeared in various literary journals, and his third book, Farm Crossing, was published in 2004. He lives in Wisconsin with his wife and daughter, where he teaches writing at the University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire.
Allison Campbell is a writer and teacher currently living in Southern Mississippi. She is the author of an illustrated collection of prose poems, Encyclopédie of the Common & Encompassing (Kore Press, 2016), and her poems and visual art collaborations have appeared in such places as The Cincinnati Review, Witness, Rattle, Court Green, Harpur Palate, and Tammy. See more at allison-campbell.org.
María Magdalena Campos-Pons is a Cuban-born artist based in Boston. Campos-Pons works primarily in photography, performance, audiovisual media, and sculpture. She is considered a “key figure” among Cuban artists who found their voice in a post-revolutionary Cuba. Her art deals with themes of gender and sexuality, multicultural identity (especially Cuban, Chinese, and Nigerian), Cuban culture, and religion/spirituality (in particular, Roman Catholicism and Santeria).
Michael Amos Cody was born in Sumter, South Carolina, raised in Walnut, North Carolina, and spent the early years of his adult life as a songwriter in Nashville. He now teaches English at East Tennessee State University. His essays, fiction and poetry have appeared in The Chaffin Journal, The Southern Poetry Anthology (Vols. VI and VII), The Nathaniel Hawthorne Review, The Howl, Pisgah Review, Short Story, Yemassee, Potpourri and Fury. His first novel, Gabriel’s Songbook, will be published...
