Today we’d like to introduce you to Dana Ruff.
Dana, we’d love to hear your story and how you got to where you are today both personally and as an artist.
As I write this, I don’t know what about me is unique. Born and raised in Roxbury, most of my environment inside reflected outside, at some points, to a fault. Mom worked magic to put food on the table, keep bills paid, and clothes on my brother and I. Father was around about as often as his decisions allowed, which looked like my mother raising us alone, with his family stepping up when they could in his absences. That type of situation was the majority of my friends too.
Neighborhood wasn’t bad though inside Madison Park Village. We were actually really a village in a few ways. Parents knew neighbors, neighbors knew someone in your family, every kid hung together, fought together, fought each other, made up and so on. First grade was when I started to write poems. I saw on a show, how writing sweet poems, and jewelry could win over a cute girl’s heart, so I thought why not try. Got a ring from the $.25 gumball machine and write a ‘roses are red’ poem. It didn’t work, in fact, I was turned down cold. First lesson, if I’m writing, write for self.
Fast forward to middle school, and writing saved my life. I was a kid, who was bullied about last name and appearance, who had suicidal thoughts and when I believed that time was approaching, I wrote my “last” poem. A classmate read it, cried, and asked me to continue writing. From that point on, I didn’t stop, and high school was my first time on stage. Freshman year, I was more “rapper” than I was a poet. Very few people knew and I kept it that way, but not for long. By the time, senior year rolled around, it was known I had the ability to write both poems and raps. Found out that time, my mother’s brother, Robert Ruff, was a Jazz poet but I had a little glimmer though, just hobbies and activities used to pass the time. After my first son, spoken word poetry took over.
After a breakup and needing to vent turned into me, writing poems and going to an open mic. After going to a few open mics, Jha D Williams pulled me aside after one of my performances and told me about her open mic, the ‘if you can Feel it, you can Speak it’. After a few months of being a resident poet, she asked if I would co-host the open mic, while she was getting her Masters’. Once I accepted, that’s when the “poet” label wasn’t a hobby, it became my life. Soon, I would co-host for nine years, performing in front of one of my poet inspiration, Black Ice, auditioning at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, author a book, become the feature at different open mic venues that have come and go within the city of Boston, with radio interviews and TV interviews on BNN, becoming a headliner to the first BAMSfest, an art, music, soul festival head in Franklin Park as well as so many other blessings and personal achievements. Currently, I’m Creative Program Coordinator of Boston Pulse Poetry, working to bring self-identifying art to 13-19-year-old students, mostly inner-city, low-income schools, and communities.
We’d love to hear more about your art. What do you do you do and why and what do you hope others will take away from your work?
I’m a spoken word artist. I write and perform poetry. I write how I feel when I’m inspired by current events, from my past, from my environment. Most time, I’m writing to make sense of things, and for therapy. The words that are memorized and performed are the ones that are used to communicate a feeling message. The message is about racism, inequality, love, heartbreak, being black, and being me.
I hope everyone who is listening has an open mind, and after listen have a new perspective on the message, a respect for the art or both. They should know everything about my work is genuine, and it wasn’t something I saw happening in high school.
Have things improved for artists? What should cities do to empower artists?
It all depends on who you ask. In some cases, politics still plays a role in who is and isn’t allowed in certain spaces. Some art is more supported than others. As a whole, art in the city has grown immensely since when I first started. Now, it’s about scheduling things to empower everyone’s through cross-promotion and actually paying/compensating their artists, within reason.
Do you have any events or exhibitions coming up? Where would one go to see more of your work? How can people support you and your artwork?
People can see my art on my social media or coming to see me in person for right now. Until my website and YouTube are more established, those are the most consistent ways people can see what’s going on and what’s happening next.
Contact Info:
- Email: stayinon94@gmail.com
- Instagram: @d_ruff3
- Facebook: facebook.com/stayinon94
- Twitter: @d_ruff3
Image Credit:
Bryan ‘Avi’ Trench, Maya Rafie, Jourdan Christopher
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