"There was a movement of spoken word and queers this millenium
and at the center of that explosion was Kay Barrett."
-- Scott Free, Stonewall Society's GLBT Hall Of Fame in 2005

[Short Artist Bio]

A CAMPUS PRIDE 2009 Hot List artist, Kay Ulanday Barrett is a poet, performer, educator, and martial artist navigating life as a pin@y-amerikan trans/queer in the U.S. with struggle, resistance, and laughter. Currently based in NY/NJ, with roots in Chicago, K’s work is the perfect mix of gritty city flex and Midwest open sky grounded in homeland soil. In Mango Tribe and in solo work, K. has featured in colleges and stages nationally and internationally; from the NJ Performing Arts Center to Chicago’s Hot House, The Brooklyn Museum to The Loft in Minneapolis, to touring the U.S. with the 1st Mangos with Chili Tour, K’s bold work continues to excite and challenge audiences. Honors include: Chicago’s LGBTQ 30 under 30 awards, Finalist for The Gwendolyn Brooks Open-Mic Award, Windy City Times Pride Literary Poetry Prize 2009, and recently, a contribution in the anthology “Kicked Out” released by Homofactus Press in 2009. K. turns art into action, as a dedicated activist who works with LGBTQ youth, and a core member of Shelter From the Downpour, an organization devoted to the support of LGBT and youth Pilipin@ typhoon survivors in the Philippines.

[Artist Bio]

kay ulanday barrett, one of the most involved people in the midwest spoken word & activist community has now landed in NYC/NJ! A spoken word performer, poet, speaker, and martial artist, kay connects life as a filipina/pinay-amerikan queer navigating struggle, resistance, and laughter in the U.S.   

kay was recently published in We Got Issues! a Young Woman's Guide to Living a Bold, Courageous, & Empowered Life edited by Rha Goddess & JLove Calderon, Mother Tongues edited by C.C. Carter, and Kicked Out brought by HomoFactus Press. kay has also contributed to LOUDmouth Zine, Venus Zine, and Brother Outsider.org. more honors include: finalist in the gwendolyn brooks open-mic awards 2005 and windy city times "30 under 30 awards." branching love from dublin, ireland's lesbian arts festival to chicago's hothouse, protests & benefits, universities freckled about the u.s. empire and back again, kay has lit  stages at brooklyn museum, new world theatre, and NJ performing arts center to name a few.

kay founded Gabriela Network's National LGBTQ Caucus. kay is currently membership director of APIA womyn's interdisciplinary theater ensemble Mango Tribe, and had the blessing to feature in the Mangos With Chili's 1st Tour!

read kay's chapter in the Book of Voices at voices.e-poets.net/BarrettK/ On the daily, kay diligently works on cooking ma's recipes, learning about the struggles of homeland, bicycle repair, & taking damn good care of the self.

[Performances & Recognition]

[Awards]

Crossroads Foundation Individual Activist Award 2005
Gwendolyn Brooks Open-Mic Award, Finalist 2005
The Windy City Times '30 Under 30' Award 2005
The Windy City Times PRIDE Poetry 1st Prize 2009

[Venues]

Acme Arts, Chicago IL
Bluestockings Books, NYC
Bowery Poetry Club, NYC
Brownstone Books, Brooklyn NY
Che Voondun, New Orleans, LA
Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago IL
Galapagos Art Space, Brooklyn, NY
The Guild Complex, Chicago IL
The Green Mill, Chicago IL
The HotHouse, Chicago IL
The Leather Museum, Chicago IL
The Loft Literary Center, MInneapolis, MN.
Mental Graffiti, Chicago IL
Middlesex Lounge, Boston MA
The Note, Chicago IL
Old Town School of Folk Music, Chicago IL
The Outpost, Brooklyn, NY
Red Lion Pub, Chicago IL
The Subterranean, Chicago IL
Spontaneous Celebrations, Boston MA
Woman Made Gallery, Chicago, IL
Women in the Director's Chair, Chicago IL
WOW Cafe, NYC.

[Community/ Organizations]                                

Affinity
Amigas Latinas
Asian Arts Initiative
The Asian American Film Festival
The Autonomous Zone
Beyondmedia
The Asian American Arts Collective
The Cafe Batey Urbano
Cafe Intifada
Center for Immigrant Resources & Community Arts (CIRCA)
The Chicago Dyke March
The Chicago Cultural Center,
The Chicago Historical Society
Dyke-Mic
Dr. Pedro Albizu- Campos Puerto Rican High School
Estrojam 2008
Five Points Variety Hour
Gabriela Network
GLSEN's National Day of Silence/Night of Noise
Homolatte, Queer Words & Music
Howard Brown Health Services
International Workers' Day/ People's March May 1st
Incite! Women of Color Against Violence
Insight Arts
Unlocked: International Women's Day
Jane Addams's Hull House
Ladyfest Midwest
Lane Technical High School
The Latina Reproductive Rights Institute
The Leftist Lounge, Chicago
The Lesbian Community Cancer Project
The Lesbian Theater Initiative
Louder Than A Bomb Youth Poetry Slam
Kriti Festival
The Mexican Fine Arts Museum
Middlesex Lounge
Mujeres Latinas en Acc�on
NoThanks!giving
Not in Our Name
PAC/Edge Festival
PINTIG Cultural Group
POW WOW Inc
Rape Victim Advocates
QWOC+Boston
Queer Asian & Pacific Alliance, Boston
Senn High School
The Southern Riot Grrrl's Convention
Ugnayan NY/NJ
Video Machete
Women & Children's First
Women in the Director's Chair
Young Women's Empowerment Project

[Theater]

Bailiwick Theatre, Chicago IL.
Black Repertory Theater, Providence, RI.
Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn NYC.
Chopin Theater, Chicago, IL.
Congress Theater, Chicago IL.
Loop Theater, Chicago, IL.
New World Theater, Amherst, MA.
The Theatre Building, Chicago IL.
Vittum Theater, Chicago, IL.
Wow Cafe, New York City, NY

[Universities & Schools]

University of California at Los Angeles
Columbia College
University of Chicago
DePaul University
U of I at Chicago
U of I at Champaign-Urbana
Loyola University
Malcolm X College
University of Michigan
The School of the Art Institute
Oakton Community College
Oberlin College
Northeastern University
Northwestern University
University of Alabama
Swarthmore College
University of Massachusetts
UCLA
University of Tennessee
University of Wisconsin (Milwaukee)

[Publications]

Ahora (2004)
Brother Outsider.net (2008)
Communities Engaged in Resisting Violence (2008)
The DePaulia (2003)
Lantern Magazine (2001)
LOUDmouth Zine(2008)
Kicked Out (2009)
maganda magazine (2003)
make/shift magazine (2009)
Mother Tongues (2002)
Sable Magazine (2007)
Venus Zine: Reader of the Week (2008)
We Got Issues! a Young Woman's Guide to
Living a Bold, Courageous, & Empowered life (2006)

[Panels/Workshops/Speaking]

The Chicago Dyke March- Keynote Speaker (2004)
Defining Ourselves, Shaping Our Reality | GabNet- Workshop LGBTQQI Activism & Caucus (2005)
International Women's Day Rally/March - Keynote Speaker (2006)
New World Theater's Intersections- Workshop: Future Aesthetics of Hip-Hop Theater (2006)
The National Women's Studies Association Conference- LGBTQ Human Rights in Women's Solidarity Work (2004)
PAC/EDGE Festival, Panel (2005)
Tuloy Ang Pakikibaka, Gabriela Network Conference (2003)
University of IL Office of GLBT Concerns- Race, Class, Gender, and Sexual Orientation, Panel (2004)
University of IL Asian Pacific American Coalition-Unseen/Unheard Conference (2002)

[Film]

Bakla/Tomboy: A documentary on Gay & Lesbian Filipinos (2003)
Can LGBTQ + School = Safe? (2006)
Little Boy Panties Project (2003)

[International]
University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh Scotland (2001)
The Lesbian Arts Festival (LAF), Dublin, Ireland (2003)

[Praise & Props]

"There was a movement of spoken word and queers this millenium and at the
center of that explosion was Kay Barrett. "
-- Scott Free, Stonewall Society's GLBT Hall Of Fame in 2005

"Kay Barrett sweeps Chicago with striking, subtle poetry ...Spoken word artist and political activist Kay Barrett has been taking Chicago's poetry world by storm. Her poetry is brutally honest and sincere."
--The Columbia Chronicle

"Anyone dedicated to performance art that speaks truth to power should be dedicated to participating in Kay's art. She doesn't allow for easy answers and requires us to think of the history of events, not just the surface feelings of the immediate....If you have never been where kay has been, she will bring you with her. Let your journey begin."
--Toni Asante-Lightfoot, Poet, Teacher, Co-Founder of Modern Urban Griots, Former President of the African American Writers Guild & Business Manager of the Guild Complex

"amazing, powerful, truth-teller. this work shows an astute interconnectedness of issues, identities, and movements."
--Dr. Ann Russo
Director of Women's & Gender Studies(DePaul University)

" Kay Barrrett goes for the gut in straight ahead language that lays bear what alls the body politic. She fearlessly works without a net and if you're looking for tightly written, no-holds barred poetry that both confronts and excites, look no further. "
--Lisa Alvarado
Poet, Writer, Performance Artist
Literary Criticism

"Kay Barrett is a cultural pioneer on the American landscape, a brave, urgent young writer of conscience charting new fresh dialogue. Kay speaks of family and fundamentals...to the America I have hoped to hear from all along."
-- Kurt Heintz, e-poets.net

"In a world where even art is littered with divide and conquer,
kay barrett strives to re-unite the intersections of
race, class, sexuality, international borders and struggle as one.
With patience and anger, action and love, we become whole again,
and kay's words are salve for where we�ve been torn apart."
-- Allison J. Faelnar, Co-founder of R.E.A.C.Hip-hop
& We Got Issues! National Organizer

"Kay Barrett deftly combines politics with the astute poetics of
everyday living. She is an energetic performer, smart and savvy and
criss-crossing social lines and boundaries that she --brown, queer,
immigrant... She is at once an artist, an activist, and an example
of how to fight the good fight, love the good love. "
-- Coya Paz, Co-founder/Co-Artistic Director of Teatro Luna