Creative Future hosted a free event,  ‘Meet the Writer: Akila Richards.’ Our ‘Meet the Artist/Writer’ series showcases writers and artists from under-represented backgrounds and how they got their work ‘out there’.

Akila is a writer, poet and passionate spoken word artist. Some of her writing gives voice to the Black German experience and the multiple identities we occupy, when trying to fit in, front or simply wanting to disappear. Then comes another set of selfhoods, when setting up life abroad discovering new parts never reached, refitting culturally and setting new norms that used in different settings, depending on what’s acceptable or not, camouflaging, starting to leave bits of self out, forgetting some but not losing, adding and morphing. Writing provided a route for Akila to relive herself differently on the page through the varied characters and watch herself – sometimes in amazement – from the outside … in.

You can view our highlights video from the event below.