FRANK X. WALKER

Founder of Affrilachian Poets, educator, author

A multimodal and interdisciplinary artist, Frank X. Walker has built a legacy as a celebrated and frequently anthologized poet and a founding member of the Affrilachian Poets.

Frank X. Walker’s talent in highlighting the experiences of people of color in Appalachia aims to “to render the invisible visible,” to create greater understanding of perspectives that are often ignored in conversations about the region, according to Professor Bianca Spriggs. This drive to bring awareness to otherwise ignored voices makes sense after considering Walker’s upbringing.

Born in Danville, Kentucky, in a family of 11 children, Walker’s mother was a Pentecostal minister, greatly influencing his creativity in a number of ways at a young age. Through organizing different church activities, cooking for churchgoers and directing children’s on-stage performances, Walker’s mother inspired him to express his creativity. In high school,where he excelled in his studies and as an athlete on the football team and was twice elected class president. 

His academic and extracurricular achievements  would result in him winning a competitive scholarship to study engineering at the University of Kentucky. As the first person in his family to go to college, he quickly became enamored by the overwhelming number of courses he could take. After taking a writing course taught by Gurney Norman, Walker decided to redirect his scholarly energy: he dropped his engineering major and began studying English. During this time, he began channeling his creative energy into writing and visual art.

After graduating, he served as the Program Director for the Martin Luther King Cultural Center, where he continued writing poetry. To help distinguish his poetry from the visual art he created at the time, he adopted the middle initial “X.” Still acting as the Program Director, he founded the Bluegrass Black Arts Consortium, which consisted of artists of practically all mediums in Kentucky. 

As a champion of collaboration, Walker discovered a unique opportunity to highlight marginalized voices when he helped to found the Affrilachian Poets. After completing his MFA in 2003, he became the founding editor for pluck! The New Journal of Affrilachian Art & Culture. 

In 2013, he was recognized as the Poet Laureate of Kentucky, becoming the first African American to secure that role. The winner of several literary awards and fellowships, including 2004 Lannan Literary Fellowship for Poetry and the 2013 West Virginia Humanities Council’s Appalachian Heritage Award, he holds honorary doctorates from the University of Kentucky, Spalding University, Centre College, and Transylvania University.