Visiting Writer: John Yau

Thursday, October 29, 2026 7:30 PM to 9:00 PM EDT
Fenwick Library, #2001

The Fall 2026 Visiting Writers Series continues with John Yau; a poet, fiction writer, essayist, art critic, and publisher of Black Square Editions who has written across genres and worked in different mediums.

Starting in the mid-1980s, Yau began collaborating with American and European artists, from the widely celebrated to the young and emerging. The collaborations took the form of paintings, drawings, artist books, prints, postcards, objects, clothing, and jazz compositions. Starting in the late 1970s, he began writing reviews and essays for art magazines, galleries, and museums, as well as publishing his poems and fiction. He taught contemporary art history in the art department of the Mason Gross School of the Arts (Rutgers University) from 2001 to 2025, when he retired. He has written monographs on many artists, most recently, Liu Xiaodong (2021) and Joe Brainard: The Art of the Personal (2022). His most recent book of essays is Please Wait by the Coatroom: Reconsidering Race and Identity in American Art (2024) which received an American book Award (2025), and his most recent book of poetry is Diary of Small Discontents: New & Selected Poems 1974-2024. The recipient of awards and grants for his poetry, fiction, and criticism, he has published more than 20 books of poetry.