Laia Jufresa » Artist Directory
Out of the Blue currently houses over 200 artists, arts organisations and other creative businesses at The Out of the Blue Drill Hall, Abbeymount Studios, NMR Studios (Niddrie Mains), Meanwhile in Leith and Out of the Blue Music Studios. The list below is a selection illustrating the range and quality.
Artists: To update your directory entry or add content, email marketing@outoftheblue.org.uk
Laia Jufresa
Laia Jufresa grew up in the cloud forest of Veracruz and spent her adolescence in Paris. In 2001, she moved to Mexico City and discovered she didn’t know how to cross a street. She’s been writing fiction ever since. She is the author of the short stories collection El esquinista and the novel Umami, which has been translated to English, French, French pocket book, Italian, Dutch, Turkish and Polish, with the Finnish and Danish versions forthcoming as well. It was chosen as the best first novel in Spanish at the 2016 First Novel Festival in Chambéry, France, it was the recipient of a PEN Translates Award and a finalist of The Best Translated Book Award 2017. Laia’s work has been featured in several anthologies as well as magazines such as Letras Libres, Pen Atlas, Words Without Borders and McSweeney’s. In 2014 Laia was invited to write chronicles for the crossing Border Festival in The Hague, and in 2015 she was invited by the British Council Literature to be the first ever International Writer in Residence at Hay Festival in Wales. For it’s 30th anniversary the festival selected “30 young novelists, scientists, philosophers, performers and activists who are astonishing and inspiring to join us in Hay. These writers and thinkers will help imagine and shape the world in the next 30 years”. Laia is honored to be one of them. She has also been named as one of the most outstanding young writers in Latin America as part of the 2017 project Bogotá39 and from Mexico by México20.