Introducing: Maya

Maya views libraries, and bookshops as meeting points for events, conversation, and community building. She is passionate about emphasising independent publishing, art-writing, and knowledge sharing as artistic practice.

Maya is an artist and writer based in Newcastle upon Tyne. Working across text, radio, film and print Maya explores feelings of joy, desire and pleasure through a process of ‘fictional archiving’. She has been part of the artistic community in the Newcastle for 7 years, was a member of NewBridge’s Collective Studio in 2020-21, and most recently she is working on artist studio project, Albion Row Studios, alongside artists Hannah Christy and Sabina Sallis.

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NewBridge Books is a shop that is unique to the North-East region in providing diverse, original and hard-to-find books, magazines, zines and art writing from independent and radical publishers and artists who self-publish, alongside artworks made by local artists and communities. This new role comes at an exciting time following the recent move of NewBridge Books to Shieldfield, at a time when we are keen to expand and diversify what we stock.

The Reading Room is library and free resource where people can read, learn, listen and share ideas. It is a national project created in partnership with Pluto Press and Left Book Club, and new library spaces are opening up with other partners across the country. These organisations involved share a common goal – to support and empower people within their communities and each local hub will develop to reflect and serve the community within which it sits, making each space responsive and unique.