A career in fiction writing seemed out of reach for Emery, but she had been writing from a young age. She started writing with silly, sarcastic, and fun end-of-year newsletters that her parents sent out to their friends – in one, she talked about how her brother won the Nobel Prize at 10! So it makes sense that she eventually landed in writing young adult fiction and that she’s still writing today with five books published. Emery and I talked about being passionate about what you’re writing, the core questions at the center of books, and whether writers are our characters.
Read MoreEach day begins with big toothy smiles,
But these tragic events have left us all in denile.
There is no answer or magic potion
No way to quell the brimming sea of emotions.
Read MoreAnne Saker is a firecracker of a woman. In her line of work, you have to be. A self-proclaimed “servant of the people,” Anne has taken her role as a journalist with great pride and even greater dedication. She’s had an expansive career from North Carolina, to Portland, to Cincinnati. It was in Cincinnati that she chose to finish her years as an active journalist at the Enquirer.
Read MoreThe best way to describe Annie Ruth is as a bright ray of sunlight on a foggy, hazy day. When she walks into a room, her spirit is a reminder of hope and positivity. She brings her authentic self forward and hopes to inspire others to do the same. Not only is Annie a talented artist and educator, but she's full of compassion and wisdom, and her enthusiasm for life is truly contagious. Even after many difficult obstacles in her path, she’s living proof that strength and determination can move mountains.
Read MoreDr. Nicole Avant carries titles familiar to many women: mother, sister, daughter, caretaker, provider, business owner, employee, teacher, professor… But, now at age 42, she’s learning to define herself outside these roles. In our recent conversation, Nicole shared how she’s taking the time now to find and love herself. She’s breaking free from the confines of productivity, structural inequality, and capitalism to build a life centered on joy – and she wants more women to do the same.
Read MoreAiesha Little is a professional writer and editor, the founder of the Midwest Black Speculative Fiction Alliance, and, in a whimsical twist, the ‘mechanic’ of the steampunk-focused cosplay group Airship Ashanti. Before I met her, I suspected she was creative and fun – and those suspicions proved wholly accurate in the course of our interview. I walked away thinking how crucial it is to find and make spaces for joy in our lives.
Over a Zoom conversation in January, we talked about her entry to cosplay, her creative interests, and the ways she’s made space for them. Photos were taken at Tillie’s Lounge in Northside.
Read MoreHuddled in Clifton’s Sitwells Coffeehouse, we sat down with author and community leader, Lauren White. The coffee shop is just a short drive from the University of Cincinnati (U.C.), where Lauren received her bachelor’s degree, is working on her master’s, and is a current employee. She’s made the most of the opportunities U.C. provides to create change for students and youth across Cincinnati. A published poet, Lauren wrote a book of poetry sharing the untold stories of Black women that she hopes will help encourage and inspire anyone who reads it.
Read MoreEven before I had the chance to meet her in person, I had a hunch that Kathryne Gardette’s energy was something special. Her texts and emails regularly begin with anything from “magnificent Monday” to “spectacular Saturday” and always ALWAYS sign off with an invitation to “share your joy.”
Read More“Cincinnati Is Beautiful.”—This simple and colorful mural in Camp Washington, just off Martin Luther King Drive near its overpass with Central Parkway, catches my eye every time I drive past it to get to the University of Cincinnati. Heading downtown, as I walk or drive around Over-the-Rhine, I take a closer look at the doors and walls of some boarded buildings and am often surprised to find them painted with cute door knobs, windows, and flower boxes.
Read MoreHow can you sum up a person in just a few sentences with a few lines of text on a page? Raneem Salem is too infinite to be condensed into a few paragraphs, especially when his life is about creating space; space for freedom, for creative self-expression. He creates spaces like Girls Rock Cincinnati, a music and arts camp for girls and gender-variant youth, where he serves as executive director. Raneem co-founded the Cincinnati branch of Girls Rock in 2018; it’s a space he wishes he had as a child to explore his own gender and power. Raneem identifies as transmasculine but chose to interview based on his historical proximity to womanhood.
Read MoreJillian Harrison-Jones grew up in a family of musicians and took lessons from their careers to ultimately find her passion in conducting. She started as a history major, bound for law school, but when asked what she was truly passionate about, she knew it was music. Jillian made a dramatic switch, getting a new undergrad degree and ultimately pursuing her passion to mold voices into one awesome sound.
With stacks of art supplies, colorful paintings, and children’s drawings decorating the room, the West End Art Gallery’s bright space is reminiscent of the best kind of art classroom. Tia and Michael Brown started the nonprofit art center as a place for the community to find a positive form of expression. The “WE Gallery,” as Tia calls it, began as pop-up workshops in neighborhood buildings. It’s turned into a labor of love for the Browns, with a dedicated space, mobile mural-painting events, two hyper-local coloring books, and art-supply grab bags as COVID-19 restricted in-person workshops.
Read MoreBlackness should be celebrated year-round, not just in February. However, this month brings the chance for people to intentionally reflect and learn more about the long, and often hidden, history of Black people in our country. High school history classes around the country are profoundly guilty of omitting Black history in their curriculum, and 28 days is certainly not enough time to dismantle a long cycle of educational exclusion. We’ve curated a list of books specifically detailing the history of Black people in Cincinnati by local historians, scholars, and writers as one way to help fill this gap.
Read MoreSusan Austin is a creator, community volunteer, and fiber artworks program founder at the Barn in Mariemont. Susan combines artmaking with group activities and holds a communal space for creative expression through fiber artwork: weaving, knitting, sewing, and quilting. She enjoys the creative process of making something out of nothing, embracing mistakes, and appreciating beauty. She says every piece of art is unique, and although ideas and materials may be similar, they are imagined in brave and bold new ways of self-expression.
Read MoreTo step into Grainwell is to step into a rustic charm interior design wonderland. Nestled within the historic, red-bricked West Pike Street in Covington, Kentucky, Grainwell has established itself as the go-to place for sentimental family gifts and modern design.
The sisters behind the shop and business – Christine, Michele, and Melyssa – never set out to create a multi-faceted business; rather, it snowballed into one. They began by pursuing their interests in design by making items for family and friends while they were in school. Eventually, they teamed up and brought their collective skills together to form Grainwell. Their business now provides custom corporate work, wholesale items, and in-store shopping.
Read MoreI studied art history as an undergraduate at Boston University, and I kind of fell into architecture. They had a fantastic professor, an architecture historian, who became my mentor, and I studied architectural history and art history and then got the design bug. I love learning the history and theory of these things. What if I used my skills differently? I think I always loved watching buildings go up. Thinking about how we build community and society’s fabric – that’s what led me many years later to design school at the University of Cincinnati.
I wanted architecture to be more than it currently is. I wanted it to imprint more on community and society, and how we think about each other and spaces. Since I’ve graduated, I’ve focused my efforts on thinking about that, changing how I think about teaching. With everything that is going on in the world, I’ve been thinking more deeply about how we need to impact future generations and our earth. I would like to leave more of a legacy, getting my students to think about projects more deeply.
Read MoreNazly Mamedova, immigration attorney, world traveler, and linguaphile, has called Cincinnati home since she moved here as a teenager in 2004. We sat down to chat shortly after the June Supreme Court decision restoring the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, an immigration policy that grants recipients who came to the United States as children a renewable, two-year protection from deportation.
At Xavier University’s Brueggeman Center, where she studied as a fellow while earning her undergraduate degree in international affairs, we talked about the best and worst parts of being an immigration attorney, her family history, and her love of travel.
Read MoreErika Nj Allen is a soft, spoken, beautiful soul from Guatemala. She’s been on my mind for the past two days as I ponder what to write for her introduction. Should I describe Erika’s studio, where everything had a purpose and a reason why it was there? Should I describe her beautiful soul? Or maybe I should take a cue from her story and highlight how Erika comes full circle over 30 plus years – all of it starting in Guatemala with a letter of invitation to a U.S. art school she couldn’t, at the time, accept.
Read MoreWe met Tika Adhikari at the University of Cincinnati a few days after World Refugee Day – a day that provides awareness of the experiences and struggles refugees face around the world. In her community liaison work and social work studies, Tika provides these services for refugee, immigrant, and minority populations and advocates for their representation in the decision-making process in our city. She believes in the power of kindness to build communities – which has inspired her to challenge impossibility and overcome significant obstacles to set and achieve personal and community-oriented goals.
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