Biography

Carl Hancock Rux's work crosses the disciplines of poetry, theater, music, and literary fiction in order to achieve what one critic describes as a "dizzying oral artistry...unleashing a torrent of paper bag poetry and post modern Hip-Bop music; the ritualistic blues of self awakening."

Carl Hancock Rux is an American poet, playwright, novelist, essayist, recording artist, actor, theater director, radio journalist, as well as a frequent collaborator in the fields of film, modern dance, and contemporary art. He is the author of several books including the Village Voice Literary Prize-winning collection of poetry, Pagan Operetta, the novel, Asphalt, and the Obie Award-winning play, Talk. His music has been released internationally on several labels including Sony/550, Thirsty Ear, and Giant Step. Mr. Rux is also co-Artistic Director of Mabou Mines and Associate Artistic Director/Curator In Residence at Harlem Stage. He is the recipient of numerous awards including the Doris Duke Award for New Works, the Doris Duke Charitable Fund, the New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) Prize, the Bessie Award and the Alpert Award in the Arts, and a 2019 Global Change Maker award by WeMakeChange.Org. Mr. Rux's archives are housed at the Billy Rose Theater Division of the New York Public Library, the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution as well as the Film and Video/Theater and Dance Library of the California Institute of the Arts.

Recent works include Rux’s three-part poem The Baptism (2020), a tribute to the legacies of civil rights leaders John Lewis and C.T. Vivian, commissioned by Lincoln Center, was made into a short abstract film directed by Carrie Mae Weems; I Dream a Dream that Dreams Back at Me, a site-specific Juneteenth celebration as part of Lincoln Center Restart Stages program; Archer Aymes Lost and Found Retrospective: A Juneteenth Exhibition at the Park Avenue Armory and San Juan Hill: A New York Story(2022) at Geffen Hall with Etienne Charles .

Writer/Poet

Working as a Social Work Trainer while moonlighting as a freelance art and music critic, Rux became a founding member of Hezekiah Walker's Love Fellowship gospel choir and later found himself influenced by the Lower East Side poetry and experimental theater scene, collaborating with poets Miguel Algarin, Bob Holman, Jayne Cortez, Sekou Sundiata, Ntozake Shange; experimental musicians David Murray, Mal Waldron, Butch Morris, Craig Harris, Jeanne Lee, Leroy Jenkins, Odetta, Steve Earle, Jim Carroll as well as experimental theater artists Laurie Carlos, Robbie McCauley, Ruth Maleczech, Lee Breuer, Reza Abdoh and others.

He is one of several poets (including Paul Beatty, Tracie Morris, Dael Orlandersmith, Willie Perdomo, Kevin Powell, Maggie Estep, Reg E. Gaines, Edwin Torres and Saul Williams) to emerge from the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, most of whom were included in the poetry anthology Aloud, Voices From the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, winner of the 1994 American Book Award.  His first book of poetry, Pagan Operetta, received the Village Voice Literary prize and was featured on the weekly's cover story: "Eight Writers on the Verge of (Impacting) the Literary Landscape". Rux is the author of the novel Asphalt and the author of several plays. His first play, Song of Sad Young Men[ (written in response to his older brother's death from AIDS), was directed by Trazana Beverly and starred actor Isaiah Washington. The play received eleven AUDELCO nominations. His most notable play is the OBIE Award-winning Talk, first produced at the Joseph Papp Public Theater in 2002. Directed by Marion McClinton and starring actor Anthony Mackie, the play won seven OBIE awards.

Recording Artist/Performing Artist

Rux is also a recording artist, first featured on Reg E. Gaines CD Sweeper Don't Clean My Streets (Polygram). As a musician, his work is known to encompass an eclectic mixture of blues, rock, vintage R&B, classical music, futuristic pop, soul, poetry, folk, psychedelic music and jazz. His debut CD, Cornbread, Cognac & Collard Green Revolution (unreleased) was produced by Nona Hendryx and Mark Batson, featuring musicians Craig Harris, Ronnie Drayton and Lonnie Plaxico. His CD Rux Revue was recorded and produced in Los Angeles by the Dust Brothers, Tom Rothrock, and Rob Schnapf and voted one of the top ten alternative music CDs of 1998 (New York Times). Rux recorded a follow up album, Apothecary Rx, (selected by French writer Phillippe Robert for his 2008 publication "Great Black Music": an exhaustive tribute of 110 albums including 1954's "Lady Sings The Blues" by Billie Holiday, the work of Jazz artists Oliver Nelson, Max Roach, John Coltrane, rhythm and blues artists Otis Redding, Ike & Tina Turner, Curtis Mayfield, George Clinton; as well as individual impressions of Fela Kuti, Jimi Hendrix, and Mos Def.) His fourth studio CD, Good Bread Alley, was released by Thirsty Ear Records, and his fifth Homeostasis (CD Baby) was released in May 2013. Rux has written and performed (or contributed music) to a proportionate number of dance companies including the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater; Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company; Jane Comfort & Co. and Ronald K. Brown's "Evidence" among others.

Theater

Rux studied acting at the Hagen Institute (under Uta Hagen); the Luleå National Theatre School (Luleå, Sweden) and at the National Theater of Ghana (Accra). Rux has appeared in several theater projects, most notably originating the title role in the folk opera production of The Temptation of St. Anthony, based on the Gustave Flaubert novel, directed by Robert Wilson with book, libretto and music by Bernice Johnson Reagon and costumes by Geoffrey Holder. The production debuted as part of the Ruhr Triennale festival in Duisburg Germany with subsequent performances at the Greek Theater in Siracusa, Italy; the Festival di Peralada in Peralada, Spain; the Palacio de Festivales de Cantabria in Santander, Spain; Sadler's Wells in London, Great Britain; the Teatro Piccinni in Bari, Italy; the Het Muziektheater in Amsterdam, Netherlands; the Teatro Arriaga in Bilbao and the Teatro Espanol in Madrid, Spain. The opera made its American premiere at the Brooklyn Academy of Music / BAM Next Wave Festival in October 2004 and official "world premiere" at the Paris Opera, becoming the first all-African-American opera to perform on its stage since the inauguration of the Académie Nationale de Musique - Théâtre de l'Opéra. Combining both his dramatic training and dance movement into his performance, Rux's performance was described by the American press as having "phenomenal charisma and supreme physical expressiveness...(achieving) a near-iconic power, equally evoking El Greco's saints in extremis and images of civil rights protesters besieged by fire hoses." Rux has also appeared in several plays and performance works for theater, as well as in his own work.

Journalism

Rux has been published as a contributing writer in numerous journals, catalogs, anthologies, and magazines including Interview magazine, Essence magazine, The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, aRude Magazine, Nka: Journal of Contemporary African Art (founded by fellow art critics Okwui Enwezor, Chika Okeke-Agulu and Salah Hassan) and American Theater Magazine.

Bibliography

Published Works

Pagan Operetta (poetry & fiction)
Autonomedia, 1998
(Village Voice Literary prize)

Talk (drama)
TCG, 2003

Asphalt (novel)
Atria/Simon & Schuster, 2003

Aloud; Voices From the Nuyorican Poets Cafe (poetry)
Henry Holt, 1994

Selected Anthologies

Soul's Survival; Black Power, Politics and Pleasure (essays) NYU Press. 1998

Korper Lust Sprache (poetry)
Literatur zur Zeit Konzepte Press/ Berlin, Germany, 1995

Action! Nuyorican Theater Festival Anthology (play)
Touchstone/Simon & Schuster, 1995

Listen Up! Spoken Word Poetry (poetry)
One World/ Ballantine, 1998

Go The Way Your Blood Beats, (fiction)
Henry Holt, 1996

Open City Literary Journal (play)
2001

NKA Literary Journal (poetry)
1996

Poetry On Stage (poetry)
Poho Press, 1995

Fire & Spirit (African American Poetry )
Syracuse University Press, 1997

Beyond The Frontier (poetry)
Black Classic Press, 1998

Heights Of The Marvelous (poetry)
St. Martin's Press, 2000

Def Jam Poetry (poetry)
St. Martin's Press, 2001

Bum Rush The Page (poetry)
Three River Press, 2001

Everything But The Burden (essay)
Broadway Books/Random House, 2003

Articles Published IN...

Essence Magazine
Interview Magazine
aRude Magazine
Honey Magazine
New Word Magazine
Freedom Rag Magazine
Nka Journal of Contemporary African Art
Manhattan File Magazine

Selected Discography

Rux Revue Carl Hancock Rux/ Sony, 1999
(New York Times Critics List Top Ten Alternative Music, 1999)

Apothecary; Rx
Carl Hancock Rux/ Giant Step, 2003

Sweeper Don‚t Clean My Streets
Reg E. Gaines/ Mercury, 1995

Cornbread, Cognac, Collard Green Revolution Carl Hancock Rux/ Free Records, 1996

Bow Down to the Exit Sign
David Holmes/ Go Beat, 2000

Jon Brown; Thirty Years Coming
Jon Brown/ Bongload, 2000

Fukatomi
Yoshiro Fukotomi/Sony Japan, 2001

Optometry
DJ Spooky, Mathew Shipp/ BMG/2002

Lamentations (You, Son)
Carl Hancock Rux/Giant Step, 2001 (12 inch vinyl)