Porsha Olayiwola

The electric slide is how we leave here, how we ascend. This kinship is how we get to a place named joy, and go home. That's blood, history, man. Ain’t no teaching that.

American performer, writer and teacher Porsha Olayiwola uses Afrofuturism and surrealism to explore historical and contemporary themes. Those themes often relate to the experiences of the black, female, queer diaspora in the United States. Olayiwola has won numerous slam competitions, including the Individual World Poetry Slam and is the current poet laureate of Boston, the city where she lives and works. Poetry has always played a major role in her life; when she applied for a spot on her school's youth board as a teenager, she wrote a poem instead of one. Since then, she has never stopped writing. An activist at heart, Olayiwola advocates for the rights of homeless people in the US. She is also artistic director of MassLEAP, a nonprofit foundation that encourages and supports youth in the state of Massachusetts by providing opportunities for them as writers. Known for her powerful performance, Olayiwola will be performing in the Netherlands for the first time in June!