Kevin Young has been selected as the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) 2018 Katie Jacobson Writer-in-Residence. Young will conduct workshops with CalArts students in the MFA Creative Writing Program and present public readings, which will be held at CalArts on Feb. 15 at 7:00 p.m. and at REDCAT in Downtown Los Angeles on Feb. 16 at 8:30 p.m.

Young is the poetry editor at The New Yorker and the director of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem. Harper’s Magazine has described the tireless poet, who has published ten collections of poetry, as “a relaxed lyricist, precise without being precious, and he expresses enormous feeling with great economy. He’s a natural storyteller.” His new book, Bunk: The Rise of Hoaxes, Humbug, Plagiarists, Phonies, Post-Facts and Fake News, is Young’s second work of nonfiction.

“We’re thrilled to have Kevin Young come to CalArts and REDCAT as our 2018 Katie Jacobson Writer in Residence,” said Tisa Bryant, director of CalArts’s MFA Creative Writing Program. “An award-winning poet, essayist, collector, New Yorker editor, and now director of the New York Public Library’s Schomburg Center, the moves Kevin has made in the arts exemplify the kind of creative life we celebrate in our program, explored not on a single track, but through interrelated fields of inquiry, experimentation and play. ““His work is inventive, incisive, and crucial to the conversation we’re always having about life, art, and how we make the culture we live in.” In writing his latest book, Bunk, Young set out to explore the connection of hoax to legitimacy, power, and race. In fact, during his research he found racism to be a central player in the history of false information. Bryant continued, “Kevin’s visit, and arrival of his new book, Bunk, is right on time, as we puzzle through the spectacular events of this particular moment.”

A vital feature of the CalArts MFA Creative Writing Program, the Katie Jacobson Writer-in-Residence Program is designed to bring a prestigious writer to campus for a public reading, a classroom visit, and to meet with students in one-to-one sessions. The Writer-in-Residence Program offers a unique opportunity for students to gain hitherto unprecedented access to leaders in their field, to discuss professional working methods, and to receive feedback on their own work.

Established in 2013, the Katie Jacobson Writer-in-Residence Program was named in memory of Creative Writing Program MFA student Katie Jacobson, and was created by the generous support of her parents Leslie Jacobson and Jeanine Caltagirone. The program launched with the residency of short fiction writer and translator Lydia Davis. The Pulitzer Prize winning novelist Junot Díaz was CalArts’s 2017 Writer-in-Residence. Click here to learn more about the residency program.

What:
Kevin Young, CalArts’ 2018 Katie Jacobson Writer-in-Residence, will read from his work at CalArts and REDCAT

At California Institute of the Arts (CalArts)

When:
Thursday, February 15 at 7pm

Where:
Langley Hall on the CalArts campus, 24700 McBean Parkway, Valencia, CA 91355-2340
Click here for directions

Admission:
Free

At REDCAT
When:
Friday, February 16 at 8:30 pm

Where:
631 West 2nd Street, Los Angeles, CA 90012
Click here for directions

Admission:
General: $10, Members: $5
Reserve tickets at REDCAT.org or call 213 237-2800