Line Breaks Showcase

Teja Davis, originally from Aurora, Illinois, is a dynamic performance artist with a passion for creative storytelling through theater, poetry and music. She’s a UW-Madison senior, double majoring in environmental studies and human geography while pursuing five certificates. Davis is a member of the 15th Cohort of First Wave, a Davis and Putter Fund Scholar, and a passionate social justice advocate. She hopes to do ethnographic environmental work exploring the relationship between people, their culture and the planet after finishing her education. She also plans to have a research foundation of her own alongside a successful acting career and life on a happy family farm in the country—after meeting Snoop Dogg and Ice Cube.  

Erika Dickerson-Despenza is a writer, cultural memory worker and historic preservation scholar. She is the creator and inaugural resident of the Ntozake Shange Social Justice Playwriting Residency at the Public Theater in partnership with Barnard College and the Shange Trust. Dickerson-Despenza is also the independent steward of the Daughters Table, a 14-acre regenerative organic farm and herbiary in South Central Louisiana. She is the artistic producer of the forthcoming Alice Dunbar-Nelson & Shirley Graham Du Bois Going to the River Festival, a development residency and annual theater festival showcasing new works of Black women, femmes and gender expansive feminine- of-center transdisciplinary dramatic writers. Awards: Jane Chambers Playwriting Award (2024), PEN/Laura Pels International Foundation for Theater Award (2023), Antonyo’s Lorraine Hansberry Kinfolk Award (2023), Edgerton Foundation New Play Award (2022, 2019), Susan Smith Blackburn Prize (2021), Laurents/Hatcher Foundation Award (2020), Thom Thomas Award (2020), Lilly Award (2020), Barrie and Bernice Stavis Award (2020), Grist 50 Fixer (2020), Princess Grace Playwriting Award (2019). Residencies & Fellowships: MacDowell (2024), Tow Playwright-in-Residence at The Public Theater (2019-2020), U.S. Water Alliance National Arts & Culture Delegate (2019), New York Stage and Film Fellow-in- Residence (2019), New Harmony Project Writer-in Residence (2019, 2021, 2023), Dramatists Guild Foundation Fellow (2018-2019), The Lark Van Lier New Voices Fellow (2018). Productions: SHADOW/LAND (The Public Theater, 2023), CULLUD WATTAH (The Public Theater, 2021), [HIEROGLYPH] (San Francisco Playhouse/Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, 2021). Dickerson-Despenza is crafting a Katrina Cycle decalogy underscoring (neo)colonialism, environmental racism and the erasure of Black land legacies through the distress of disaster, evacuation, displacement, urban renewal and the racial capitalism of heritage tourism. A graduate student in Tulane University’s Master of Science in Historic Preservation (MSHP) program, Dickerson-Despenza is chiefly interested in the visual and material culture of 18th and 19th century dispossessed Black built environments and deathscapes of the American South, with a vested interest in Louisiana, where her family has resided for eight generations. 

The 18th Cohort are a dynamic and globally rooted community of scholar-artists who hail from cities across the United States and carry the cultural heritage of Mexico, Nigeria, India, Peru, Taiwan, Greece, Ethiopia and Jamaica. They possess a wide range of cultural perspectives and lived experiences and embody the collaborative and socially engaged spirit of First Wave. Their academic pursuits span the arts, humanities, social sciences, health, and professional fields—from Spanish, English, education, psychology, and global health to business, communication arts, kinesiology, violin performance and art rehabilitation—reflecting a shared commitment to interdisciplinary learning and creative innovation. Across mediums including poetry, spoken word, dance, music, visual art, acting and film, production and metal arts, they use their practices to tell urgent stories, build connection and move audiences. United by a desire to create meaningful change, this cohort is dedicated to inspiring younger generations, cultivating spaces for marginalized communities, challenging inequitable social structures, and expanding access, awareness and opportunity through their art.