photo credit George Roberts 

FY 2014 Grantees of the Minnesota State Arts Board Cultural Community Partnership Grant - Rain Taxi Review of Books, Minneapolis:

Rain Taxi and partner J. Otis Powell‽ will work together to publish a book of new literary work by Powell‽. A reading and discussion will be open to the public. Rain Taxi, a catalyst and cultivator of literary culture on the local as well as national stage, proposes to help advance J. Otis Powell‽’s literary career. Through the publication of a book of new literary work by J. Otis under its imprint OHM Editions, an interview to be featured in the nationally distributed journal Rain Taxi Review of Books, and a public reading and discussion in Minneapolis, Rain Taxi will help to increase exposure to and appreciation of the literary aspect of Powell‽’s identity.

For Powell‽ this project will spur and spotlight his literary work in strategic ways. It builds upon the audience he has created as a performance artist, and moves him toward a trajectory as a literary artist, exposing his writing to Rain Taxi’s national reading audience and the significant writing community in the Twin Cities. The grant will also  strengthen cultural diversity within the state of Minnesota, as Powell‽ is a renowned African American artist straddling various fields of practice, from music and philosophy to writing and Spoken Word.  This diversity of aesthetics, in combination with his cultural background, will help inform what we might mean by “a Minnesota

artist” in the 21st century.