As part of the California Institute of the Arts 50-year anniversary celebrations, the forthcoming 2023 graduate cohort for the MFA Creative Writing program will run a series of free events across Los Angeles to share their writing and performances to the public.

The Next Words events will showcase a diverse range of emerging writers across fiction, non-fiction, poetry and prose, including writing that blends multi-media, visual and audio elements.

The purpose of the event is to celebrate the outstanding talent of the 2023 cohort, while preparing them for the real world of the creative industry by gaining experience through public readings and performance. It is also a fantastic opportunity to support emerging talent within the LA creative community and enables the public to connect with the students and experience their writing first-hand.

There are four events running across April and May as follows:

-April  22: The bats have left the tower – Beyond Baroque, Venice Beach – 4 p.m., involving: Madelaine Auble, Brandon Cooper, Andrew Hubbell, Collin Jonkman, and William Lockwood;

-May  2: The spaces between us – The Ripped Bodice Bookstore, Culver City – 7 p.m., involving: Lemiaye Miyazaki-Taylor, Michelle Cushing, Paola Parreno-Merino, Michael Diskint and Charlie Fry

-May 3: At the edge of the labyrinth – The Poetic Research Bureau, Silver Lake – 7 p.m., involving: Ayla Combes, Yaz Archer, Nick Barner, Charlie Bohem, Farah Abouzeid, Jamiah Lincoln and Brian French

– May 7: The Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater (REDCAT), Downtown Los Angeles, involving the entire cohort (details to follow closer to the date).

At each event, the students will read and perform 5-10 minute extracts of their written work.

Anthony McCann, MFA Creative Writing Program Director says; “The faculty of the CalArts MFA Program in Creative Writing are bursting with pride over the creative achievements of the class of ‘23. With their wild and wide-ranging talents they have put forward in their work a range of genre diversity and commitment to experiment that really embodies the core values of our unique, non-tracking graduate program. These events are sure to be a blast!”

In addition to the readings, the cohort will be publishing an anthology booklet that showcases samples of their writing. Printed copies will be available to purchase at the events.