2020 NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellows in Poetry Announced

The NYSCA/NYFA Artist Fellowship includes the Poetry category this year, meaning that 15 poets in the New York area are about to receive unrestricted cash grants of $7,000. Panelists Grisel Y. Acosta, Gbenga Adesina, Jacqueline Jones LaMon, Alison Meyers, and Kendra Sullivan chose the following 2020 fellows:

Poetry Fellows

Albert Abonado (Monroe)
Shayok Misha Chowdhury (Kings)
Ama Codjoe (Bronx)**
t’ai freedom ford (Kings)
Ellen Hagan (New York)
Marwa Helal (Kings)
Omotara James (Queens)
Joseph O. Legaspi (Queens)
Ricardo Alberto Maldonado (Kings)
Shane McCrae (New York)
Yesenia Montilla (New York)
Nicole Sealey (Kings)
John Murillo (Kings)
Cindy Tran (Queens)
Jenny Mengyu Xie (New York)

NYFA talked to Yesenia Montilla, who said the fellowship "will provide me with a freedom that I didn’t think possible, it will allow for the type of slow down and deliberate attention that is hard to do when juggling so many financial responsibilities alongside all the uncertainty that 2020 has cemented." 

Congratulations to everyone! For more about 2020's NYFA Fellows, including those who work in Craft/Sculpture, Digital/Electronic Arts, Nonfiction Literature, and Printmaking/Drawing/Book Arts, head here.