Stephanie Elizondo Griest, Author
When Stephanie Elizondo Griest, writer and professor of creative nonfiction at UNC-Chapel Hill, wondered if the sacrifices she made to pursue a life in art were worth it, she set about to gather answers from other women around the world. “This was a 10-year, 12-nation search for women I call ‘art monks’,” Elizondo Griest says. “I conducted sit-down, formal interviews with about 70 women, but talked for hours with dozens more. Of foremost importance to me was including the widest possible range of voices, both in terms of regions of the world and also in terms of artistic genre.”
She interviewed painters, writers, dancers and musicians, and they showed her how art often confronts catastrophes. “The Rwandan playwright Hope Azeda shows us how she used theater to bring about national reconciliation in the aftermath of genocide, while the Romanian painter Florica Prevenda reveals how art became dissent during the long dictatorship,” Elizondo Griest says. “In this turbulent historical moment, my hope is that Art Above Everything can serve as a guide for powering through it.”
Art Above Everything, June 2025, memoir, hardcover, $30, by Stephanie Elizondo Griest, and published by Beacon Press, Boston, MA. Learn more at StephanieElizondoGriest.com.
