Traci Kato-Kiriyama

Traci Kato-Kiriyama is an award-winning artist, community arts builder, and cultural producer.  She is an educator and springtime Teaching Artist-in-Residence for Grand Park; Arts & Culture Consultant for NeighborWorks America;  Director/Co-Founder of Tuesday Night Project (presenter of art+community series, Tuesday Night Cafe, now in its 19th year and the longest-running Asian American mic series in the country).  She is the writer/actor for PULLproject Ensemble, and has received recognition from several institutions and juries including two consecutive national grant awards from the Network of Ensemble Theaters.  Throughout each year for over the last two decades, she has toured to hundreds of venues throughout the country as a performer/actor, writer, theatre deviser, educator, speech coach, facilitator, speaker, cultural producer and artist-in-residence [Presenters include The Getty Foundation (L.A.), Skirball Cultural Center (L.A.), The Smithsonian (D.C.), The Ford Amphitheater Inside The Ford (L.A.), LaMaMa Cabaret (NYC), Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (San Francisco), Asian Arts Initiative (Philadelphia), EnWave Theatre (Toronto)]. Her writing and commentary have been featured by numerous print and online publications including Tia Chucha Press; Elle.com for Melissa Harris-Perry; The Hollywood Reporter; The Rafu Shimpo; Regent Press; Chapparal Canyon Press. Her newest book is Navigating Without Instruments, about which Naomi Hirahara has written "Traci Kato-Kiriyama is our time's flame bearer, warning us of past wrong turns and shining light immediately in front of us. She belongs to the circle of poets who release words to restore, galvanize, and goad."



© 2022 Traci Kato-Kiriyama
Traci Kato-Kiriyama was a Featured Poet at the October 2022 Second Sunday Poetry Series