IN The Studio: Theresa Davis

Theresa Davis, left, with National Book Award winner Mark Doty at the 2008 Atlanta Queer Literary Festival.

Born into a family of writers and entertainers, Theresa Davis has found her own voice as a poet and in-demand spoken word artist both locally and around the country.

Davis, 44, said for years she was introduced as the daughter of Alice Lovelace, the internationally acclaimed writer and activist. “I had to find my own niche in the niche,” Davis laughed. “My mother and I travel in the same circles since we’re both poets and activists.”

Davis and Lovelace often share the same bill these days, and their individual poetry is very distinct, but laced with a firey delivery that has become a family hallmark. Davis’ humor and politics are on display on a brand new spoken word album, Live at Eddie’s Attic. In February, her third collection of poetry, Poems with the Word Love In Them, will be released just in time for Valentine’s Day. Her work is also featured on Congo’s Angels, an album to benefit and raise awareness about domestic violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo, with Neko Case, Caroline Aiken, Irma Thomas and many more.

Creative Loafing named her Atlanta’s Best Poet last year, and you might have seen her onstage alongside Jane Fonda and Eve Ensler last spring in a benefit production of The Vagina Monologues.  She was a keynote speaker alongside National Book Award-winning poet Mark Doty and gender activist/author Kate Bornstein at the 2008 Atlanta Queer Literary Festival. Her work has been turned into dance performances and she regular gets calls to perform at liberal-leaning political events, including a performance in front of 20,000 at a rally against the School of the Americas in Columbus, Ga. last fall.

Over the last two years, Davis has traveled all over the country competing in slam poetry contests, reading at coffee houses and speaking at universities. She’s been a teacher at the private, alternative Horizon School for 18 years and is the mother of three.

Locally, she’s on the board of Poetry Atlanta and a member of the Art Amok Slam Team, which has gone to the National Poetry Slam three years in a row. She and her mother also member of 50 Artists, a local collective of musicians, artists and poets who raise awareness about social injustice. 

“I’m all about reciprocal energy,” Davis said. “I like working with other artists and I want the audience to come out, listen and take something away from the event and put it to use.”

Later this year, she plans to join with several other local poets and musicians – including Yolo Akili and Ken J. Martin – for the “Rock Star Poets” tour, which plans to hit universities and venues around the southeast.  

For more information and to hear performances, visit www.myspace.com/theresadavis.