Susi Owusu

Susi Owusu brings over twenty years of experience connecting people, organisations, and ideas across the creative, arts and culture sectors. Her career has been shaped by a natural curiosity about how communities form and how stories travel — a thread that runs from her student days collecting the full Heinemann African Writers Series, to her current work building the future of one of Africa’s most celebrated literary prizes. Susi began her career in Ghana’s creative industries developing marketing and partnerships for the National Dance Company of Ghana and then in research at a radio station and stakeholder engagement for the first carnival in Accra. Following time in the international development sector, she then co-founded Smoke Creatives UK, a content marketing agency that delivered award-winning campaigns for clients including Voluntary Services Overseas focussing on changing the way Africa is perceived, represented and engaged with by international development agencies and their audiences. A skilled stakeholder manager, facilitator and negotiator, she recently coordinated a multi-disciplinary team on a public art campaign in Brighton, which drew over 150,000 visitors to the city and is currently Chair of the Board of Trustees at Fabrica, a contemporary visual arts gallery in the same city. Susi joined the Caine Prize for African Writing as a fundraising consultant and strategic advisor, contributing to the Prize’s vision as it marked its 25th anniversary. She now leads the organisation as Director, focusing on what the Prize can and should deliver in the next 25 years. At the heart of this work is  the question on how to build literary bridges across writing, publishing and translation.