Marc Bamuthi Joseph
Oakland, CA
A New York City native, Marc Bamuthi Joseph lives and works in Oakland, California. He is a National Poetry Slam champion, and his work has been presented in Tokyo during the 1st International Spoken Word Festival and in Santiago, Cuba where he joined the legendary Katherine Dunham as a part of the CubaNola Collective. His evening-length works include Word Becomes Flesh, presented at On The Boards in Seattle, Houston’s DiverseWorks, Washington, DC’s Dance Place, and New York’s Dance Theater Workshop; as well as De/Cipher and No Man’s Land, which were presented extensively in San Francisco. Joseph has been a featured lecturer and performance artist at many universities and served as an Institute for Diversity in the Arts resident artist in Stanford University’s Drama Department, where he taught spoken word and community action.
Scourge
Marc Bamuthi Joseph is a spoken-word poet, dancer, and playwright who frequently directs stand alone hip-hop theater plays.
Artist BioScourge is a hip-hop theater work about the history of Haiti that blends Afro-Caribbean jazz music, folkloric and contemporary movement, and spoken word. The piece is developed with choreographer Rennie Harris, composer John Santos, director Kamilah Forbes and dramaturge Roberta Uno, as well as young poets from the group Youth Speaks. Scourge is divided into four parts and ties together significant events in Haiti’s past with the myths that surround them, while illuminating cultural and political connections among that country, the United States, Africa and the other nations of the Caribbean.