(Photo Credit: Steven Fullwood)

CONTACT ME

Sharon Bridgforth
PO Box 817
Austin, TX 78767

sharon AT sharonbridgforth dot com

You might also find me hangn at my favorite Austin (Texas)
coffee shop/cafe/performance venue/free wireless spot Cafe Mundi

I Received The 2008 Alpert/Hedgebrook Award!

Short BIO

Sharon Bridgforth, two time Alpert Award Nominee, is recipient of the 2008 Alpert/Hedgebrook Residency Prize. Her piece , delta dandi, is a NPN Creation Fund Project co-commissioned by Women & Their Work in partnership with The Center on Halsted and the National Performance Network. Bridgforth is the Lambda Award winning author of the bull-jean stories and love conjure/blues a performance/novel (RedBone Press). Anchor Artist for The Austin Project (Produced by The Center For African and African American Studies, UT Austin), Bridgforth is co-editor of The Austin Project Archive: Experiments in a Jazz Aesthetic (2009 by University of Texas Press). sharonbridgforth.com

(Photo Credit: Karla Legaspy)

Long BIO

Sharon Bridgforth is the Lambda Award winning author of the bull-jean stories (RedBone Press), and love conjure/blues. Both books are published by RedBone Press. Bridgforth has broken ground in ground in the creation and presentation of the performance/novel and in doing so has advanced the articulation of the Jazz aesthetic as it lives in theatre. She is one of three artists featured in Dr. Joni Jones’ forthcoming book titled, Jazz Ase and The Power Of The Present Moment. In this book Dr. Jones examines the jazz and Yoruba structures and philosophies that shape the work being done by Bridgforth, Laurie Carlos and Daniel Alexander Jones.

Bridgforth’s work has fostered the study of Black lesbian performance literature in academic settings. Some of the professors who have taught her work are: Cherrie Moraga at Stanford University; E. Patrick Johnson at Northwestern University; Lisa Anderson at Arizona State, Phoenix; Elmo Terry-Morgan at Brown University; Laura Harris at Pitzer College; Daniel Banks at New York University, Tisch School For The Arts; Joyce Ann Joyce, Temple University; Lisa L. Moore, Daniel Alexander Jones, Jafari Allen, Mattie Richardson , Dr. Joni Jones at University of Texas, Austin.

Bridgforth has developed a method of facilitating creative writing that she calls, Finding Voice. With the Finding Voice method Bridgforth mentors/and or facilitates writers through a creative process, encouraging them to use the page as a canvas; to use identity-culture-memory-family histories-dreams to articulate and examine the socio-political realities of their lives in a form that is part poetry, part oral history, part performance art; to examine their creative process; to work in community as they use art as a vehicle for social justice.

Bridgforth uses the Finding Voice method in her work as Anchor Artist for The Austin Project (sponsored by The Center for African and African American Studies, U. T. Austin) for past five years. Bridgforth’s Finding Voice Facilitation Manuel will be published in 2009 by University of Texas Press in a book, The Austin Project Archive: Experiments in a Jazz Aesthetic, edited by Dr. Joni Jones, Acting Director, Center for African and African-American Studies, Associate Professor, Department of Theater and Dance U.T. Austin; Dr. Lisa L. Moore, Associate Professor, English and Women’s and Gender Studies, U.T. Austin; and Bridgforth..

A two time Alpert Award Nominee in the Arts in Theatre, Bridgforth is the recipient of the 2008 Alpert/Hedgebrook Residency Prize. Bridgforth’s work has been anthologized and produced widely and has received support from the National Endowment For The Arts Commissioning Program; The National Endowment For The Arts/Theatre Communications Group Playwright in Residence Program; National Performance Network; and the Rockefeller Foundation Multi-Arts Production Fund Award. Bridgforth’s work has presented nationally at venues including:the Walker Arts Center in Minneapolis, MN., The Theatre Offensive Out on The Edge Festival in Boston, MA., LaPena in Berkeley, CA., The Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival, Penumbra Theatre Company in St. Paul, MN

Bridgforth is currently touring delta dandi, a National Performance Network Creation Fund Project co-commissioned by Women & Their Work, in partnership with Center On Halsted and the National Performance Network.

CV available upon request

(Photo Credit: Cheryl Coward)