April Wen
is an interdisciplinary artist and educator based in New York City. Her works have appeared in the American Northeast, Mexico, Taiwan, and Georgia’s Caucasus Mountains.

Her institutional experiences include Film and Media Studies at Yale University (B.A. 2017), a Teaching Artist Fellowship at the Center for Urban Pedagogy (2018), and a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship in Taiwan (2021-2022).

She is currently pursuing an MFA in Film Directing at the Feirstein Graduate School of Cinema, Brooklyn College.


2013 -2021

Tri-State Area, 2013-2015

Digital positives of 35mm film negatives taken in 2013-2015, in New York City; New Haven, Connecticut; and Atlantic City, New Jersey.
  • Created with the support of Magnolia Film Lab in Tbilisi, Georgia, after the AqTushetii photography residency, in Omalo, Georgia. 2021.


2018 -2021


The Center for Urban Pedagogy 


As a Teaching Artist Fellow, I led two projects at the International High School for the Health Sciences in Queens, New York. 

The first project, Care Aware, explores the barriers undocumented immigrants face in accessing healthcare in New York City. It culminated in an informational booklet that incorporates student artwork and interviews with the school community.

The second project, Peel It Back, is a short documentary that investigates the problem of lead paint in New York City public schools. 

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2019 - 2020

The Wisdom Channel


A young insomniac visits a meditation teacher for nonsensical insights about her waking life and identity.









The Wisdom Channel: Take 1. Video, color, sound. 2019.

2015 - 2017











Jenny (Craig)


A PLAY, incorporating FILM
The fictional world of Jenny (Craig), which culminated in a playscript and its theatrical performance, was developed over two years at Yale University for the thesis in Film and Media Studies. The world began with two short stories, then deepened into the single perspective of Jenny, the main character, through the creation of her ”Diary.” A short film, Tactic (TV), explores Jenny’s relationship with her alter ego, Bibbe. These ambient worlds begin to ask: what happens when you think of yourself apart from your race? 

The play, eponymously titled Jenny (Craig), revolves around Jenny and her boyfriend Craig, who are high school students living in New York City. The play takes place over the course of one night, in which they attempt to destress from the college applications process. The TV’s on. Their minds are off. But when Craig falls asleep, Jenny’s alter ego, Bibbe, brings Jenny on a literal trip down memory lane. In the surreal New York of Jenny’s imagination lies both the violence and potential of interracial relationships - in family, friendship, and romance.      



Jenny (Craig). Theatrical production, the Crescent Underground Theater, 2017.
Advised by Claudia Rankine and Donald Margulies.

  • Digital Media Center for the Arts Interdisciplinary Arts Award, 2017
  • St. Anthony Hall Educational Foundation Grant, 2017
  • The Creative and Performing Arts Award, Yale University, 2017

                                                                      

 Tactic (TV). Video, color, sound. 2016. The Creative and Performing Arts Award, Yale University, 2016















Jenny’s Diary [Selections]. 8” x 11”. Concertina sketchbook, ink, watercolor, crayon, pencil, cotton fabric, stamps, pantyhose packaging, stickers, business cards, vellum, found photographs. 2016.
  • The Construction of Whiteness exhibition, curated by Claudia Rankine, 2016.























































“”

 

Deep down, Craig knows that pet ventriloquism is still seen as a notch beneath puppeteering, his first love.


Jenny (Craig). Yale Literary Magazine, 2016.

My limited experience with vulnerability probably stems from observing Jennie and Craig’s honestly scary romance. And of course, my mother and father’s relationship – which isn’t a relationship so much as a pizza party with only calzones.


Cusp. Yale Literary Magazine, 2015.

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2023 © April Wen