Commissions
Discover some of the projects that Otis Mensah has been involved in including poetry commissions, creative workshops, guest lectures and event curation.
Commissioned by Settle Stories for Yorkshire Festival of Story (supported by Arts Council England) to write The Yorkshire Poem in the seams again.
Commissioned by Alumno to write two poems currently on permanent public display at Park Hill Sheffield We Were Never Derelict & The Great Ephemeral
Commissioned by Visual Verse to create poem Contrary to the Intangible Grapevine
Commissioned by BBC Radio Sheffield to write a poem on community-aid in support of the global pandemic Gather what you have
Commissioned by University of the Underground to run a creative workshop & give a guest lecture for their education programme New Politics and Afrofuturism
Commissioned to curate and write a series of interviews with emerging artists for Pink Wafer
Commissioned by Now Then Magazine to perform poem & give short talk for Black History Month Ode To Black Thought
Organised & curated the first poetry stage at Tramlines Festival called Speakers Corner
Organised & curated an original virtual event for Migration Matters Festival called Live From The Incubator
The University of Sheffield named Otis Mensah their Artist in Residence for 2020. Through Arts & Humanities Knowledge Exchange Otis was funded to facilitate a series of interactive events called Rhyme & Reason which creatively explored personal identity and pressing social issues through the lens of Hip-Hop, poetry and other culture media. For more details, check out Rhyme and Reason or the talks in full via YouTube
Other university funded work includes curating events for Sheffield Makes Music Festival and Off the Shelf, and writing commissioned poetry for Being Human Festival’s ‘Dreaming in the Renaissance’ event. Otis also ran a creative workshop for FirstGenSheffield, presented a sold-out public lecture on Hip Hop, Race and Philosophy, and taught on the School of English’s Black British module with Dr Alex Mason.
If you would like to book Otis Mensah for a poetry commission, creative workshop, guest lecture or event curation contact here.