KYLYN AAPI Arts and Culture Festival

KYLYN returns! Hot dog! The KYLYN AAPI Arts and Culture Festival is a multi-day inaugural arts festival that aims to enrich the cultural life of Ann Arbor and establish the city as a central hub for presenting the cutting edge of Midwest AAPI Arts and Culture. The festival features a diverse lineup of artistic, cultural, and educational programming that engages the public and encourages dialogue around important social issues. The festival provides a platform for AAPI/BIPOC artists to showcase their creativity and talent, integrating local arts resources and highlighting the rich and diverse interdisciplinary arts community in Ann Arbor, Metro Detroit, and beyond. KYLYN also features a variety of educational and community-building activities, such as workshops, panel discussions, and performances, that engage the public and foster a greater understanding of AAPI culture and experiences. The KYLYN Arts and Culture Festival is a unique and important event that celebrates the vibrancy and diversity of the AAPI community and promotes cross-cultural understanding and collaboration. It is a testament to the power of the arts to bring people together and create positive social change. Check out the full schedule at: /schedule Featuring All Things Shining, Kim Debord, @the_zozizzle @islandperformance @otodojo @ahkim.writer Bill Kubota, Na Forest Lim, @joowonmusic Kristine Patnugot @tokoshiiki @steadyflightcircle Linh My Truong, @michelleyangwriter @zooliejoo Special thanks to the Ann Arbor District Library, Cluster Musuem, Detroit PBS, Washtenaw Community College, and Rising Voices for their incredible support. KYLYN AAPI ARTS & CULTURE FESTIVAL 2026 is dedicated to the memory of my father Der-Tung Yuan. — CHIEN-AN YUAN

It's KYLYN Week 2 at the Ann Arbor District Library! 5/11 | MONDAY |6:30pm In Love & Struggle: Michigan-Made AAPI Film Shorts Ann Arbor Downtown Library: Lower Level Program Room Join us as we screen three new films by Michigan AAPI filmmakers: Na Forest Lim’s In Love and Struggle (special workprint preview), Toko Shiiki’s and Paloma Núñez-Regueiro’s Dynamic List of Indelible Marks, and Kristine Patnugot’s A Union of Two: A Pre-martial Law Manila Love Story. 

The screening is followed by a Q+A with the filmmakers. --- 5/13 | WEDNESDAY | 6:30pm An Author's Journey: A Conversation on Publishing, Passion, and What Comes Next Ann Arbor Downtown Library: Lower Level Program Room Join a thoughtful conversation with AAPI authors A.H. Kim (A Good Family and Relative Strangers) and Michelle Yang (Phoenix Girl) as they discuss their journeys to get their books published, the positive reception of their work, and what comes next. Kim and Yang will offer reflections and insights on strategies for maintaining a sustained creative practice and provide valuable insight for aspiring writers and readers alike. --- 5/15 | FRIDAY | 6:30pm Dance Performance A Floating World Ann Arbor Downtown Library: 4th Floor Program Room A Floating World is a movement-based performance from AAPI Performance Collaborative IS/LAND grounded in the belief that there exists an ephemeral “floating world” of ancestral consciousness and connectivity. We brush against this floating world in moments of sudden, yet inexplicable, familiarity - lucid dreaming, tasting something new that instantly feels known. These indecipherable encounters are surprising and confusing, yet they stir a profound, unconscious realization of a deeper reality that we cannot consciously understand. Intense emotional experiences, particularly grief, also evoke this connection to the 'floating world,' leaving us raw and destabilized.

Ann Arbor! Tonight! 6:30PM! KYLYN AAPI Arts + Culture Festival presents STEADY FLIGHT CIRCLE @steadyflightcircle Ann Arbor Downtown Library: Lower Level Program Room Thomas Xu is a producer and DJ who creates music that dissolves boundaries between genres and strangers. He debuted with Roots That Talk, a split EP with Julion De’Angelo, released on Theo Parrish’s label Sound Signature. His own label, Steady Flight Circle, champions weird and honest music. Xu recently released his new album, The Heart of the Matter, which contains transpositions from leaving Detroit in 2020 to Thomas Xu’s return from Chicago in 2024. In its intention, Xu’s music is in gratitude for the village and ancestry that supported and enabled Thomas’s existence. Visuals provided by Maro Kariya AKA OTODOJO @otodojo This concert is presented in partnership with the KYLYN exhibit I Use Technology In Order To Hate It Properly at Cluster Museum

KYLYN AAPI Arts & Culture Festival and Cluster Museum present the art exhibit "I use technology in order to hate it properly" Cluster Museum | 307 N. Main St. Ann Arbor, MI 48104 Taken from a famous quote by visionary artist Nam June Paik, "I use technology in order to hate it properly" explores the complex relationships and intersections between art, humanity, and technology by means of the ideas and legacy of the visionary digital video artist, as seen through the artwork of Ann Arbor and Metro Detroit-based interdisciplinary AAPI artists Maro Kariya, Kim Jackson DeBord and Zach DeBord, Joo Won Park, Linh My Truong, and Julie Zhu. This exhibition is presented as part of the 3rd annual KYLYN AAPI Arts and Culture Festival held in May 2026 to celebrate Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month in Ann Arbor. The Opening Reception is Friday, May 8 from 6-9pm

Tonight! 5/4 - 6:30pm Building Media Literacy in Older AAPI Communities Ann Arbor Downtown Library: Lower Level Program Room Join us for a panel discussion exploring the socio-cultural issues affecting the elder AAPI populations today. More than ever, this vulnerable demographic is facing a surge in being targets for scams, disinformation, and soft propaganda. These threats, often amplified through social media, exploit cultural, linguistic, and generational gaps, leading to severe financial, emotional, and social consequences. This panel discussion will focus on strategies being developed in solutions journalism to increase information literacy among AAPI elders and push back against these predatory tactics with evidence-based responses. Featured panelists include: Zosette Guir and Bill Kubota of Detroit PBS. This event is sponsored by the Asian American Journalists Association of Michigan. Special thanks to Frances Kai-Hwa Wang

Ann Arbor! Tonight! 6:30pm! KYLYN AAPI Arts & Culture Festival presents All Things Shining at the Ann Arbor District Library - Downtown Branch! All Things Shining is an experimental improvisation-based ambient/poetry/jazz quartet exploring the communal connections that bind people across all communities in times of conflict. Featuring Marcus Elliot, Jon Monteverde, Chace Morris, and Chien-An Yuan.

KYLYN AAPI Arts & Culture Festvial kicks off its first week at the Ann Arbor District Library - Downtown Branch this Friday! We got concerts! panel discussions! and more concerts! Come on out! Don't sleep! :D Friday 6:30pm 5/1 Concert All Things Shining All Things Shining is an experimental improvisation-based ambient/poetry/jazz quartet exploring the communal connections that bind people across all communities in times of conflict. Featuring Marcus Elliot, Jon Monteverde, Chace Morris, and Chien-An Yuan. -- MONDAY 6:30pm 5/4 Panel Discussion Building Media Literacy in Older AAPI Communities Join us for a panel discussion exploring the socio-cultural issues affecting the elder AAPI populations today. More than ever, this vulnerable demographic is facing a surge in being targets for scams, disinformation, and soft propaganda. These threats, often amplified through social media, exploit cultural, linguistic, and generational gaps, leading to severe financial, emotional, and social consequences. This panel discussion will focus on strategies being developed in solutions journalism to increase information literacy among AAPI elders and push back against these predatory tactics with evidence-based responses. Featured panelists include: Zosette Guir and Bill Kubota of Detroit PBS. This event is sponsored by the Asian American Journalists Association of Michigan. Special thanks to Frances Kai-Hwa Wang -- WEDNESDAY 6:30pm 5/6 Concert Steady Flight Circle Thomas Xu is a producer and DJ who creates music that dissolves boundaries between genres and strangers. He debuted with Roots That Talk, a split EP with Julion De’Angelo, released on Theo Parrish’s label Sound Signature. His own label, Steady Flight Circle, champions weird and honest music. Xu recently released his new album, The Heart of the Matter, which contains transpositions from leaving Detroit in 2020 to Thomas Xu’s return from Chicago in 2024. In its intention, Xu’s music is in gratitude for the village and ancestry that supported and enabled Thomas’s existence.

That’s a wrap on KYLYN 2025! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼 to @rubini.naidu on a fantastic artist talk! Inspiring and insightful - it was all the things. Thanks all who attended. Special thanks to @aadlgram support staff Hayley and Ethan for their assistance! Photos by @sylviajarrusphoto

Thanks to all who joined the @kylynfest writing workshop Writing For Our Lives presented by @franceskaihwawang Thanks as always to the @aadlgram support staff - Emily and Jackie, you’re superstars! Special thanks to Christina from @wccaccess for co-sponsoring the event and providing the most fantastic pens and journals! Final KYLYN event tomorrow w an artist talk feat @rubini.naidu - see you there!

KYLYN week four continues this FRIDAY 5/23 at 5:30pm w “Writing for our Lives” with journalist, poet, essayist, and educator Frances Kai-Hwa Wang in an empowering writing workshop. “We write to find our voices, to discover our meaning, and to fight for our message - to write for our lives! With short timed writing exercises, we will write and share our stories, discuss ways our stories and struggles may have been discounted by others, and lift up our stories and perspectives to make our mark on today, this moment.” - Frances Kai-Hwa Wang Frances Kai-Hwa Wang is a journalist, essayist, speaker, activist, and poet focused on issues of diversity, race, culture, and the arts. The child of immigrants, she was born in Los Angeles, raised in Silicon Valley, and now divides her time between Michigan and the Big Island of Hawai‘i. Her writing has appeared at NBC News Asian America, PRI Global Nation, New America Media, Pacific Citizen, Angry Asian Man, Cha Asian Literary Journal, Kartika Review, Drunken Boat, and several anthologies, journals, and art exhibitions. She teaches courses on Asian/Pacific Islander American media and civil rights at University of Michigan, and she teaches creative writing at University of Hawaii Hilo and Washtenaw Community College. She co-created a multimedia artwork for the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center Indian American Heritage Project online and travelling art exhibition. Wang is a 2019 Knight Arts Challenge Detroit winner, Marguerite Casey Foundation Equal Voice Journalism Fellow on Poverty, and Keith Center for Civil Rights Detroit Equity Action Lab Race and Justice Reporting Fellow on Arts and Culture. Co-sponsored by the Washtenaw Community College Office of Student Access & Success

Thanks all who came to the Jiraiya the Hero live score and live group improvisation! It was truly a magical event - I really don’t have the words other than thank you thank you thank you to @photoandkioto @sugifoto @haruhi_ @theblackharpist @marcus.elliot for such an electric performance and showcasing exactly what is so thrilling about live group improvisations. 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼 Thank you to Matt, Steve, Ethan, and David of AADL for their tech support Week 4 of KYLYN continues this week w a Writing Workshop by @franceskaihwawang this Friday at 5:30pm!

Exciting news! Catch Kioto Aoki @photoandkioto and Marcus Elliot @marcus.elliot today on Michigan Public’s Stateside @michiganpublic with April Baer @aprilbaerradio as they chat about this Fridays upcoming KYLYN live score / concert at @aadlgram Tune in at 3pm est! /show/stateside