Francesca Ekwuyasi is a writer and multidisciplinary artist born in Lagos, Nigeria. Her work explores themes of faith, family, queerness, consumption, loneliness, and belonging. Her short documentary Black + Belonging screened at the Halifax Black Film Festival, Festival International du Film Black de Montréal, and Toronto Black Film Festival.

You may find some of her writing in Winter Tangerine Review, Brittle Paper, Transition Magazine, the Malahat Review, Visual Art News, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, and GUTS magazine. Her story "Ọrun is Heaven" was longlisted for the 2019 Journey Prize and her debut novel Butter Honey Pig Bread is forthcoming in October 2020 with Arsenal Pulp Press.

*register below to get the zoom link for Thursday May 28, 7pm ADT*

About the workshop

Come Closer is a virtual interactive writing and storytelling workshop exploring inner and outer landscapes in the current realities of the COVID19 pandemic. It is an invitation to archive moments of closeness and re-imagine intimacy when physical distancing is a requirement for safety. During this workshop, participants are encouraged to read/listen/move to stories on themes of closeness, loneliness, isolation, and the future, as well as create and share their own stories. Writing prompts, guides, and exercises will be made available a week before the workshop, as well as an opportunity to contribute to a workshop anthology.

Participants may engage in storytelling/worldbuilding/writing as a practice of (time) travel and touch using the prompts and in-workshop group writing exercises. In keeping with an overarching theme of closeness, the workshop syllabus and exercises are divided into the following four categories:

• Archives

• Eros

• Borders

• Body politic