Gary Shteyngart
Critically acclaimed author Gary Shtyngart has gained international recognition for his satirical and humorous works of fiction. Born in 1972 in Leningrad, USSR (now Saint Petersburg, Russia), Shtyngart immigrated to the United States with his family in 1979.
Jeannette Bayardelle
Singer and actress Jeannete Bayardelle was nominated for a Tony award for Best Performance by an Actress in 2022 for her role as Mrs. Neilsen in the Conor McPherson-Bob Dylan musical Girl from North Country. Bayardelle, who is a playwright, composer, and lyricist, has many credits to her name both on and Off Broadway. Yet she had planned to be a laboratory scientist after earning a Bachelor of Science degree at Hunter College in 2002.
Edward Burns
Award winning actor, writer, and director Edward Burns is known for his nostalgic and sometimes elegiac coming of age films set in Long Island and Queens. A native New Yorker, Burns grew up in Valley Stream, Long Island. After starting his undergraduate studies at SUNY Albany, Burns moved back to the New York City area and enrolled at Hunter College to study writing and filmmaking.
Sarah Crowner
Brooklyn-based artist Sarah Crowner is recognized for her innovative large scale paintings that test the boundaries of geometric abstraction while engaging in its art historical legacy. She has been making art since the 1990s, and her paintings using a craft-oriented process of cutting and sewing the canvas to create abstract forms—along with the bodies of work that followed—have garnered her much attention.
Janice Y. K. Lee
Janice Y. K. Lee is the author of two novels, The Piano Teacher and The Expatriates. Both set in Hong Kong, the books examine love, loss, and the formation of identity in a foreign land. Born in Hong Kong to parents who were Korean immigrants, Lee moved to the United State to attend Harvard College, where she graduated with a degree in English and American Literature and Language.