In a return visit to Macon, American writer and musician Joy Harjo, a member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation and the 23^rd U.S. poet laureate, will be among the headliners of the 2023 Arts Festival hosted by Middle Georgia State University’s School of Arts & Letters. The free festival takes place March 27-April 14.

Built around the theme “Reclaiming the Native South,” this year’s Arts Festival also features a reading and book talk with author Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle (Eastern Band of Cherokee); a discussion panel featuring Tracie Revis, (Muscogee (Creek) and Euchee), director of advocacy for the Macon Ocmulgee National Park and Preserve Initiative; a film screening with Dr. Malinda Maynor Lowery (Lumbee), historian and documentary film producer; and a musical performance and storytelling presentation with Randy Kemp (Muscogee (Creek), Choctaw, and Euchee), an interdisciplinary artist and storyteller.

The festival will explore the richness and deep roots of Native American arts and culture in the South, particularly in the Middle Georgia region, home to Ocmulgee Mounds National Historical Park. Most festival events will take place on the University’s Macon Campus and are free and open to the public.

The headline events are sponsored by the Middle Georgia State (MGA) School of Arts & Letters, with generous support from Georgia Humanities Council, and from the Georgia Council for the Arts. Additional support comes from the MGA Foundation, the Office of Student Affairs, and the Honors Program.

“We are grateful for the generous financial support that allowed us to take the annual festival to a whole new level,” said Dr. Mary Wearn, dean of the School of Arts & Letters. “The Ocmulgee Mounds are such a treasure to our local community. We hope the festival will support the growing awareness and appreciation of indigenous history, art, and culture.”

Harjo, who served three terms as the 23^rd U.S poet laureate, is making her second appearance at MGA in three years. The Oklahoma-born writer and musician is a member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, which has ancestral ties to what is now Ocmulgee Mounds National Historical Park. The nation lived across the Southeastern U.S. until its forced removal to the Indian Territory west of the Mississippi in the late 1820s, according to the Ocmulgee park’s website.

The sovereign Muscogee (Creek) Nation continues to play a vital role in the protection of Ocmulgee. On January 20, Macon-Bibb raised the nation’s flag in front of City Hall, where it will permanently fly alongside the state and American flags. David Hill, Muscogee principal chief, attended and spoke at the event.

The author of ten books of poetry, including the highly acclaimed An American Sunrise, several plays and children's books, and two memoirs, Crazy Brave and Poet Warrior, Harjo’s many honors include the National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award, the Ruth Lily Prize for Lifetime Achievement from the Poetry Foundation, the Academy of American Poets Wallace Stevens Award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. As a musician and performer, the Tulsa, Okla., resident has produced seven award-winning music albums. She is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, Board of Directors chair of the Native Arts & Cultures Foundation, and is the first artist-in-residence for Tulsa's Bob Dylan Center.

In February, Harjo was named the winner of Yale’s 2023 Bollingen Prize for American Poetry, awarded biennially to an American poet for the best book published during the previous two years or for lifetime achievement in poetry. Harjo received the award for her book, Weaving Sundown in a Scarlet Light: Fifty Poems for Fifty Years, and for her lifetime achievement in and contributions to American poetry.

At MGA, Harjo will give a reading performance at 11 a.m. Tuesday, April 11, at the Recreation & Wellness Center on the Macon Campus.