JOEL BARRAQUIEL TAN is the Community Engagement Director of San Francisco's acclaimed arts venue, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Prior to his work with Yerba Buena, he was the Associate Artistic Director for Asian American Theater Company and worked with the National Pilipino Arts Network.

Tan also worked in HIV/AIDS education for communities of color for 16 years and co-founded Los Angeles' Asian Pacific AIDS Intervention Team.

Tan is the author of two volumes of poetry, Monster (Noice Press, 2002) and Type O Negative (Red Hen Press, 2006), and the editor of Inside Him - Gay Erotic Fiction (Carroll & Graf, 2006) and Best Gay Asian Erotica (Cleis, 1998 & 2003).

His award-winning essays, poetry, and short fiction have been published internationally in various commercial and academic venues including: Asian American Sexualities ed. Russell Leong (Routledge), Q&A: Queer & Asian in America, eds. David Eng & Alice Y. Hom (Temple), Fresh Men: New Voices in Gay Fiction, ed. Edmund White (Carroll & Graf), On a Bed of Rice: An Asian American Erotic Feast, ed. G. Kudaka (Doubleday).

Tan is currently working on a collaboration project with award-winning composer Francis Wong and choreographer, Alleluia Panis on an opera entitled Savage, I and an NEA-funded poetry and performance project, Sons with poet Jaime Jacinto and promising young San Francisco Filipino American poets.

Tan received his B.A. from UC Berkeley in Ethnic Studies and his M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Antioch University.

Joel Barraquiel Tan will be reading his work on Thursday, September 20th, 8 - 10pm, at The Lab.

Above: Joel Barraquiel Tan (Photo courtesy of the artist)