top of page

Sannii Crespina-flores

Artist
Sannii Crespina-Flores has been a teaching artist, advocate, and activist for youth and women for more than twenty years, but it is the space between pen and paper that she finds sanctuary. A member of the Writers Guild of America(East) Indie Caucus and founder of the Un-Inhibited Muse Film Festival, the global youth initiative Do Remember Me, and the art collaborative Yram Collective, she is committed to building community, sharing the art of storytelling, and bearing witness through archiving. She has received grants and awards to create works for independent television and cultural organizations. She has written two books of poetry, an audiobook that debuted in South Africa and London, and a book of short stories currently on Amazon Books. She has screened work at the 60th Cannes Film Festival and was awarded the grand prize for the short story challenge at the 15th Sundance Film Festivals and her work has been published in 50 in 50: Letters to Our Daughters, Black Female Photographers, midnight & indigo, Root Journal and received the MVICW Author, Barbara Neely Fellowship and the Justice for my Sister Sci-Fi Screenwriting Lab 2021 Cohort. She has also contributed to academic publications and created learning guides for TED-Ed, National Geographic, and the Hip Hop Education Center.

Jade is a thirteen year old African-American girl living in North Philadelphia during the transition from gang wars to drug kingpins. A product of a catholic school education and respectability politics for a “good” black girl, she struggles with her wild and free tomboy nature.

The summer brings changes to her body, her family and the way she views the world.

Her favorite person on the planet, the only person who “sees” her, her great grandmother, is lost to her due to dementia. When Jade is asked to help care for her great grandmother, she is excited to not have to babysit her siblings but has no idea how much this summer will change her.