Bobby LeFebre

Bobby LeFebre is an award-winning writer, performer, and cultural worker fusing a non-traditional multi-hyphenated professional identity to imagine new realities, empower communities, advance arts and culture, and serve as an agent of provocation, transformation, equity, and social change. His work has appeared in The New York Times, Huffington Post, The Guardian, American Theater Magazine, NPR, and Poets.Org.

LeFebre co-founded the award-winning nonprofit organization Café Cultura, dedicated to utilizing poetry as a tool for youth literacy and educational and cultural development. Café Cultura uplifted and amplified marginalized voices, specifically Latinx and indigenous voices, across the Denver Metro area. He is a two-time TEDx speaker and has performed at hundreds of cultural events, social actions, detention centers, conferences, and colleges and universities across the United States and abroad.

Holding a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the Metropolitan University of Denver and a master’s degree in Art, Literature, and Culture from the University of Denver, LeFebre is a Fellow of the National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures Leadership Institute, the National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures Advocacy Institute, and the Intercultural Leadership Institute. He has received numerous awards, including the Cesar Chavez Peace and Justice Community Award, the MSU Distinguished Alumni Award, the Chicano Studies Award for Commitment to Education, the Denver Statement Maker award, the DCIS Global Leadership award, and the Cultura Cura Award. LeFebre has been highlighted as one of Colorado’s Top Creatives by Westword Magazine.

LeFebre’s cultural work includes arts advocacy, and he was appointed by the Mayor of Denver to serve as a Commissioner for the Denver Commission on Cultural Affairs. He served as Co-Chair for two of his six years on the commission. LeFebre has been a Board Member for the Clyfford Still Museum, the Latino Cultural Arts Center, a President’s Cabinet Member for the Metropolitan State University of Denver, an advisor for the Mayor of Denver’s Institute of Equity and Reconciliation, a founding Member of Interfest Denver, and a Cultural Council member for SCFD.

LeFebre wrote the award-winning play "Northside," which was one of the most successful local theater productions in Colorado’s history. Premiering at Su Teatro Cultural and Performing Arts Center, the production intimately addressed the conflict of gentrification in Denver. The production sold out 30 shows, with over ten thousand people attending. "Northside" served as "an unapologetic celebration of cultural preservation and permanence and a eulogy to things lost," and as "an urban-colloquial story of power and privilege, unflinching love, and the innate human need to belong somewhere." This success led to LeFebre being named Colorado Theatre Person of the Year.

Governor Jared Polis named LeFebre Colorado’s 8th Poet Laureate, making him the youngest and first person of color to be appointed to the prestigious position in the program’s 100-year history. LeFebre was named a National Catalyst for Change Fellow and an Academy of American Poets Poet Laureate Fellow. Recently, LeFebre served as the Lead Consultant in reimagining Denver’s Cultural Plan and was appointed by the Governor to serve on the Colorado Creative Industries Advisory Council.