Poetry Reading: Transat' & Friends

Join us for an evening of poetry and translation with transatlantic poetry journal Transat’.

Transat’ publishes poems, translations, and essays in English and French to facilitate a globalized conversation, on a bridge of linguistic and cultural exchanges.

The program will feature readings from an exciting line-up of artists from both France and the United States:

• Vincent Broqua
• Rachel Galvin
• Camille Bloomfield
• cj nizard
• Léon Pradeau

Guests will enjoy complimentary French wine and light hors d’oeuvres in the Alliance’s jewelbox courtyard.

Doors at 6:00 pm. Program at 6:30. Please enter via 810 N Dearborn St. In the event of inclement weather, the event will be moved indoors to the Eleanor Wood Prince Salon. Non-alcholic options will be available.

About the Artists

Vincent Broqua is a writer, translator and professor at Université Paris 8. He is the co-curator of the Double Change reading series. Photocall: Projet d’attendrissement (Les petits matins, 2021) won the “best gay novel” award in the poetry section. Other publications include Recovery (trans. Cole Swensen, Pamenar Press, 2023) and La langue du garçon (Al Dante, 2023). Excerpts of his latest book Gaiamen (Al Dante, 2025) appeared in Transat’ 3.

Rachel Galvin is a scholar, poet, and translator specializing in twentieth- and twenty-first-century comparative poetics in English, Spanish, and French. She teaches English and Creative Writing at The University of Chicago. Her recent publications include the poetry collection Uterotopia (Persea Books, 2023) Her translations include Raymond Queneau’s Hitting the Streets (Carcanet, 2013), and Argentinian poet Oliverio Girondo’s Decals: Complete Early Poetry (with Harris Feinsod: Open Letter Books, 2018)

Camille Bloomfield explores poetry under many forms: writing, performance, translation, research… Like Rachel, she is a co-founder of the OuTransPo (Ouvroir de translation potencial); she is also an editor of the journal Po&sie. She published two books with Les Venterniers : Les gens qui datent (illustrations Béatrice Bloomfield, 2022) et Poèmes typodermiques (2023). Her latest publication is a translation-recreation of Perec and Helmlé’s La Machine (Le Nouvel Attila, 2025). Transat’ 4 contains a few of her translations from Rachel Galvin’s Uterotopia.

cj nizard is a French scholar, performance-maker, and translator based in the USA. They have published poems in Transat’ and dance reviews in Chicago Review and ASAP/J. Recent performance credits include choreographing summer games for The Lawn (2024, Chicago, IL) and dancing in works by Shir Ende, Erin Kilmurray, and Yuval Sharon. Léon Pradeau is the founding editor of Transat’. He writes books that move between French and English, most recently vaisseau instantané / instant shipping (Les murmurations, 2024). His translation of Anne Portugal’s My Domestic Robots is forthcoming this fall from The Year. cj and Léon are the co-translators of Cécile Mainardi’s Superliquid Water (Prroblem Press, 2026), the first full-length translation of Mainardi’s work.

About the Journal

Transat’ is published semiannually, in late spring and early winer. Each year, two guest editors guide the conversation. Transat’ is about creating community: by sending two small packages a year to their subscribers, organizing events wherever they go, and dropping off issues of the journals as they travel back and forth, in bookstores on both sides of the ocean.

Getting Here

The Alliance Française de Chicago is one block from the CTA Red line stop at Chicago Avenue. Best bus routes are the 22 on Clark and the 66 on Chicago Avenue. A Divvy station is located in front of the Chicago Ave entrance.

Parking Information

$12 for 12 hours at InterPark at 100 W Chestnut St. Validation is available at reception.

Photography Notice

Please be advised that students, members, and attendees at cultural events or programs may be photographed, and these images may be used for marketing purposes.