Youmna Chlala

Youmna Chlala is a Lebanese-American artist and writer.

Biography She was born in Beirut and grew up there and in Los Angeles. Chlala received a MFA in creative writing from the California College of the Arts. She is a visiting member of the faculty at LaGuardia Community College and the Pratt Institute.

She has been artist in residence at the Henie Onstad Kunstsenter in Norway, at the Triangle Arts and Makkan in Shatana, Jordan and at the Headlands Center for the Arts in California. Chlala received a fellowship from the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts.

Awards and honours She has been nominated for the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize. In 2009, Chlala received a Joseph Henry Jackson Literary Award for her poetry manuscript The Paper Camera. Chlala's short story "Nayla" was included in the 2018 O. Henry Award collection.