In Conversation:

Xandria Phillips & Chekwube Danladi

Xandria Phillips

Xandria Phillips is a writer, educator, and abstract artist from rural Ohio. The recipient of the Judith A. Markowitz award for emerging writers, Xandria has received fellowships from Oberlin College, Cave Canem, Callaloo, the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, and the Brown University Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America, where they are currently researching and composing a project book of poems and paintings that explore black feeling and materiality. Xandria is also a dream space residency recipient at the center for African American poetry and poetics. Their poetry has been featured in American Poetry Review, Black Warrior Review, Crazyhorse, poets.org, Virginia Quarterly Review, and Bomb Magazine. Xandria's poem, "For a Burial Free of Sharks" won the Gigant Sequins Poetry Contest judged by Lucas de Lima, and their chapbook, Reasons for Smoking won the 2016 Seattle Review Chapbook Contest judged by Claudia Rankine. Xandria's first book, Hull was published by Nightboat books in 2019 and is a recipient of a Lambda Literary Award. Xandria is currently working on a non-fiction manuscript called Presenting as Blue /Aspiring to Green. This book explores color theory, gender, and modes of making. Xandria also writes for artificial intelligence app, Replika AI.

Chekwube Danladi

Chekwube Danladi is the author of Semiotics, selected by Evie Shockley as the winner of the 2019 Cave Canem Poetry Prize University of Georgia Press, September 2020). She has received support from Callaloo, Kimbilio, Hedgebrook, Jack Jones Literary Arts, The Lambda Literary Foundation, The Vermont Studio Center, & The Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing. Her chapbook, Take me Back, was included as part of the New Generation African Poets: NNE Boxset in 2017. From Lagos by Way of West Baltimore, she is based in Chicago, and teaches in the writing program at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is also a teaching artist with the Youth Empowerment Performance Project (YEPP), a performance healing group for lgbtq street-based youth in Chicago.

Langer Over Dickie stands in solidarity with all efforts for black liberation. Our goal as an artist-run space is to represent artists in parity to the racial, ethnic, and gender demographics of Chicago. As co-directors and individuals we set out to create spaces for artists. We hope to facilitate challenging and timely conversations between artists from a broad range of communities, centering artists whose identities intersect QTNB, LGBTQIA+, and BIPOC experiences. We have benefited greatly from the Black cultural production both personally as as an institution.

We understand that representation is nothing without action and we acknowledge the many privileges we have, which allow us to run this space and be part of a contemporary art community. We hold ourselves accountable for our own growth and education. Participation in this struggle by us all is acutely needed in this moment, as well as a sustained long-term commitment to fundamentally changing our society.

We love y’all. Take care of yourselves.

If you have the capacity please support the work of

Marsha P Johnson Institute

Southeast Community Commission

** this is not an exhaustive list. We will be continually updating.