Shiraz Husain is a Delhi-based multidisciplinary visual artist and author. He has founded Khwaab Tanha Collective, which popularised local languages, literature and poetry. At Khwaab Tanha Collective, Shiraz produces paintings, posters and short films, celebrating literature whilst making it accessible across generations and borders.
Shiraz has a particular interest in language at the intersection of visual arts and education. He is the the Art Director for Urdu Academy’s monthly Magazine Umang, where he curates and illustrates stories and articles in Urdu. He also writes for Ektara’s Hindi magazine, Cycle, and has recently authored two children’s books.
His book, Lunar Soil (Ektara India) was the runner up for Creators' Award in the Room to Read Children's Book of the Year Award (2024). He holds specialism in book cover design and has won the Oxford Cover Prize for Brilliance in Book Design (2019).
He also won the Yes Foundation’s Best Film Award (2014) for his animation film “YOU”.
Shiraz has taught as a lecturer in the department of Applied Art for several years at Jamia Millia Islamia University, Delhi.
Kavita Bhanotis a writer, translator, editor, researcher and organiser. She wrote the landmark essay 'Decolonise not Diversify' in 2015. She is the editor of three short-story collections, including Too Asian, not Asian Enough (Tindal Street, 2011) and The Book of Birmingham (Comma, 2018), and co-editor of Violent Phenomena: 21 Essays on Translation (Tilted Axis, 2022) with translator Jeremy Tiang.
Her translation of Anjali Kajal's Hindi stories Ma is Scared and Other Stories, winner of a PEN Translates Award in 2021, was published with Comma Press in 2023 and Penguin India in 2024.
Kavita founded and co-organises Literature Must Fall and Jaag: Panjabi and Pahari-Pothwari Language and Literature Festival in Birmingham.
She is currently writing a book Literature Must Fall: Resisting Literary Supremacy (Pluto Press). She was recently Leverhulme ECR Fellow at Leicester University and has taught at Birmingham University, Leicester University, Fordham University, Ashoka University and Manchester University.
Heba Hayek is a London-based, Gaza-raised Palestinian author, creative and facilitator. She completed an MFA in Creative Writing at Miami University, Ohio, and studied for an MA in Social Anthropology at SOAS University of London.
Heba’s first book, Sambac Beneath Unlikely Skies, won the Creative Award in the 2022 Palestine Book Awards and was chosen as a 2021 Book of the Year by The White Review, Middle East Eye and The New Arab.