KEYNOTES

KENYA

Ray Mwihaki is a multidisciplinary artist living and working in Kenya. Writing, to her, is more than just a form of expression, it’s catharsis. She writes copy for advertising when she isn’t writing fiction and poetry. She has authored five books: Breaking the Epitaph, Life Goes Round, Who Dropped the Cake?, Candles Along Ngunyiri St. and Not All Birds  Her work has been featured on Omenana, Down River Road, Manure Fresh, Us in Flux by ASU’s Centre for Science and the Imagination and Femmolution. When she isn’t writing, she’s painting or farming or daydreaming. Of all these, it’s the daydreaming she enjoys the most.

 

Photo Credit: Kevin Ragui

BRAZIL

Israel Neto is a writer, screenwriter, and editor in São Paulo who co-founded collective Literatura Suburbana (Suburban Literature), through which he also edits Coleção Literária Besouro (Besouro Literary Collection). He has participated in several movements of Black literature from the margins of Brazilian society between 2009 and 2015. He has written the short novels Amor Banto em Terras Brasileiras, Os Planos Secretos do Regime, Ancestral, and Não Podemos Esperar. Israel has been awarded the Jovem Brasileiro prize in 2011, the Funarte Hip Hop Prize in 2014 and the Odisseia Prize of Fantastic Literature in 2021. He was also shortlisted for the Golden Cube prize in the geek literature category in 2022. Since 2018, Israel has also been working to foster the Afrofuturist literary scene in Brazil through his own writing and by publishing other authors.

Israel Neto é escritor, roteirista e editor, cofundador do coletivo Literatura Suburbana, no qual também edita a Coleção Literária Besouro. Participou de diversas antologias literárias dos movimentos de literatura periférica e negra entre 2009 a 2015. Autor dos Livros Amor Banto em Terras Brasileiras, Os Planos Secretos do Regime, Ancestral e Não Podemos Esperar. Recebeu os prêmios Jovem Brasileiro, 2011, Prêmio Funarte Hip Hop em 2014 e Prêmio Odisseia de literatura fantástica, 2021, Finalista do prêmio Cubo de Ouro na categoria literatura geek, 2022. Israel tem desde 2018 fomentado a cena de literatura negra afrofuturista, em sua produção literária e na publicação de outras autoras e autores.