Zoey Martinson

Zoey Martinson (she/her) is a writer, director, and co-Artistic Director of Smoke & Mirrors Collaborative. She works at the crossroads of Arts & Advocacy, starting as a humanitarian aid worker with refugees in West Africa, London, and USA/Mexico border. She has created and directed performances in Ghana, South Africa, Berlin Germany, Washington D.C., New York City, and Los Angeles. Her play Olityelwe (Formally Ndebele Funeral) won the Overall Excellence Award for Best Play at the New York City Fringe Festival and then toured in South Africa and Scotland’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival after an Off-Broadway run at 59E59 Theaters. Her award-winning short film La Oposición played at Casa México in SXSW 2019. Her award-winning short film The Fisherman is acquired by HBO Shorts. She recently directed TV Movie Uthandiwe for South Africa’s DSTV MzansiMagic. She co-created and directed Skype Duet, which won the 100 Grand award at the HAU2 Theater in Berlin and then toured throughout Europe. She produced and directed an Arts Mission for the U.S. Consul General to South Africa’s informal settlements. Martinson holds an MFA from NYU TISCH, was a Directing Fellow at Manhattan Theater Club, Dramatist Guild Playwriting Fellow, and was formerly an Artistic Mentor Fellow at Lincoln Center. Her work has been nominated for the Amnesty International Freedom of Expression Award, featured on BBC World Service, and published in five anthologies. Named the 2017 Robert Rauschenberg Artist Activist Fellow. She is the writer and director of a new musical Dreamer premiering at The Kennedy Center.

Image courtesy oof Zoey Martinsoon