Dr. Sophia Kidd is an Asia-focused scholar in the humanities, an Associate Research Fellow at Sichuan University, and an Affiliated Researcher at Southwest University. She is the Founder of Nuance Art & Culture and the Publisher of Igneus Press, both of which are Bellingham-based organizations. Read on to learn more about Dr. Kidd and her academic and artistic works.
Photo courtesy of Sophia Kidd
Would you please introduce yourself to our Bellingham Alive readers?
Hi! I’ve been a Bellingham resident for about 15 years now. I’m a publisher and curator with skin in the game, meaning I’m also a writer and artist.
My favorite thing in the world is to bring people together from different cultural backgrounds. I decided to make my long-term dream come true by building Nuance Art and Culture as a platform for these activities.
Could you tell us a little bit about your life as an Asia-focused humanities scholar, lecturer, or faculty member at universities around the world?
Being a full-time faculty member at Sichuan University deserves a book or two. I appreciate the perspective working as an academic abroad gives me. I think these personal experiences make me a stronger and more patient person.
My focus now is on ecological aspects of art and literature [in] China, but is quickly expanding to include important American activists and artists, such as Betsy Damon. I think ecology is an important thing to create awareness about, no matter where I’m teaching in the world, be it the U.S., China, or Germany.
Photo courtesy of Sophia Kidd
In addition to (or hand-in-hand with) all of your academic work, you are an arts professional who heads several organizations. We’d love to talk about Nuance Art & Culture and Igneus Press. To start, what is Nuance Art & Culture?
Nuance is a dream I have of connecting creative regions. I started it in 2018, curating “Bad Exhibition: Value in Art” at Art City Gallery in Ventura, CA. That exhibition researched early avant-garde modes of artistic practice, selecting 12 Ventura and Santa Barbara County artists, as well as four artists from Chengdu and Chongqing, China. Nuance arose as a way to archive [cultural exchanges], from artworks, academic discussion, salons, and arts criticism, to publishing.
Now I’m focused on Bellingham, and finding troves of artists and writers. After COVID, there’s been a re-emergence of open-mics. Tere Harrison’s PROMPT: An Evening for Poets (January 2023) at The FireHouse was a world-class event.
I’ve been hanging out at the Whatcom Museum, too, attending openings and curator walkthroughs … and am presently writing about “Katazome Today: Migrations of a Japanese Art,” which I’ve seen three times. I also go to Historical Society meetings, and Parks and Recs Travelogue meetings. All of this will eventually make its way onto our website, helping creatives and scholars throughout the world learn more about Pacific Northwest arts and literature.
Photo courtesy of Sophia Kidd
Moving on to Igneus Press—it was founded by your father in New Hampshire as a small poetry publishing house. Why did your father found Igneus Press, and how did you come to be a publisher based out of Bellingham?
Small and independent press dismantles cultural power structures, so that new and emerging voices can be heard. My father, Peter Kidd, formed Igneus Press in 1989 as part of the first desktop publishing wave. He worked with a group of New England and West Coast writers to publish nearly 50 titles in three decades.
When my father passed away in 2020, I inherited [Igneus]. I registered the business in Bellingham in 2021. The literary scene here is rich and diverse, with so much going on. I think this is the perfect home for Igneus.
Photo courtesy of Sophia Kidd
What is the future of Igneus Press?
[In addition to publishing poetry], we have started publishing an academic journal for Sichuan University, Literature and Modern China… our upcoming issue is on Chinese science-fiction. It’s going to be totally wild. Nuance is facilitating a poetry exchange between Igneus and China. [There are two new poetry titles,] “Creative Death” by Jack Foley and “The Forest Lawns” by Gerard Crinnin.
These are perfect post-COVID era books, showing the struggles artists go through and the wild destructive creation that makes great poetry. Readers can find them at igneus press. com/bookstore. I’m also hoping Village Books will carry the books.
Are you open to locals looking to publish with Igneus Press? How can they get in contact with you?
Absolutely. We are scheduled out through mid-2024, but good poets who are willing to wait should submit to info@igneuspress.com. Scholars can submit online to Literature and Modern China at literatureandmodernchina.org, to be published in the online and in-print journal. Bellingham, nuanceartandculture.com
