Jasmine Williams
Jasmine is an artist and producer from South Central Los Angeles. She holds 16 years of residencies that provide equitable creative art programming and is a current CA Creative Corps Fellow. She has worked with Youth Speaks, Say Word LA, B.R.I.D.G.E. Theatre Co., ArtworxLA, & Angels Gate Cultural Center. She has created work featured on FOX, HBO, PBS, & Facebook just to name a few.
Jasmine serves the community to amplify the voices of those brave enough to be heard. She loves mint chocolate chip ice cream, and on her time off she is a UNO champion, a VIP member of Twilight #TeamEdward, before falling asleep to episodes of Hey Arnold or The Office.
Lauren Boone
Lauren is a producer/director for stage and screen from the Bay Area. Previously she worked in Media & Development for Renaissance Literary & Talent with a focus on media and development and adaptations, and as the co-founder / resident director and head of marketing for Third Culture Theatre company in Los Angeles.
Courtnie Everidge
Courtnie Everidge is a daughter, sister, hard worker, an avid traveler, and has an affinity for changing her hairstyles often. She graduated from San Francisco State University with a B.A. degree in Business Management.
Over the years she has enjoyed and become enamored by the creativity and vulnerability artists display weekly at Da Poetry Lounge.
Stephanie Castellano
With a decade of experience in administration and management, Stephanie possesses a sharp eye for detail and excellent problem-solving skills, allowing her to tackle challenges with creativity and efficiency.
When not working, Stephanie enjoys traveling and being active outdoors. She firmly believes in the importance of self-care and pursuing one's passions both in and outside of the professional realm.
Isla Martinez
Edwin Bodney
Edwin Bodney is a Black, Queer, non-binary artist, award-winning educator, and nationally recognized poet from Los Angeles. As someone living with M.S. and the rest of the world’s chaos, they strive to remind all vulnerable communities of their joy and laughter.
Edwin and their work have been featured in platforms and publications like Button Poetry, Platypus Press, The Exposition Review, The Advocate, Lexus, TvOne, Amazon Prime, UW-Madison, and many others. Their full-length book of poetry, A Study of Hands (2017) is available for purchase through Not A Cult Media.
Alyesha M Wise
Alyesha Wise is an award-winning, published poet, educator & speaker from Camden, N.J. Currently residing in LA, she is the co-founder of Spoken Literature Art Movement and the Director of Programming for Street Poets, Inc., an organization mostly serving juvenile injustice-involved youth with mentorship and arts programming.
Alyesha has been featured on platforms and in publications such as OWN TV, BET, LA Times, Bustle, Afropunk, PBS, Buzzfeed and more. Other collabs include the ACLU, The Shabazz Center, The Nantucket Project, Brave New Films and the Google Interstellar Project. Ron Howard once wrote about Alyesha's work, "Very Powerful.”
Matthew Cuban
Matthew ‘Cuban’ Hernandez is a poet, emcee, speaker, actor, and performance coach from Jacksonville, Florida. He has toured as far as Abu Dhabi and nearly every major city in the United States and Europe, performing, teaching and coaching poetry. A teaching artist for over 15 years, Matthew has spent the last ten years working in youth detention centers across Los Angeles County, currently serving as the Director of Camp Programming for Street Poets, Inc. In addition, he is a current Lead Teacher and Co-Founder of Spoken Literature Art Movement.
Cuban has opened for artists such as Wu-Tang, performed for platforms such as BuzzFeed and NPR and even appeared on the award-winning television show, Better Things. Matthew is also a three time Southern Fried poetry slam champion and an award-winning poetry coach. Cuban’s favorite activity is making people feel great; sometimes he does this through hip hop and poetry.
