“Courageous. Writing and singing full-frontal.” —NPR 

Licity Collins is fearless. A multidimensional genre-busting artist, Licity combines her raw passionate voice, intense rhythmic guitar, free-form piano, with penetrating lyrics, dynamic stage performance, spoken word, and conceptual art. She sees people’s minds and hearts as her primary artistic medium. Licity creates music, word, and art experiences that are unique, immersive, memorable moments designed to ignite fearlessness in the blood of her audiences. 

As a singer, guitarist, and performer, Licity’s raw and rhythmic style draw audiences deeply into the vulnerability of her voice—as real as it gets. She has been described as “perfectly delicious. moving...genuinely heartfelt,” and “shaped by emotion, confidence and shared vulnerability...more than a show—giving listeners a sense of uplift.” (VC Reporter) and “Courageous. Writing and singing full-frontal.” (NPR)

As a composer, writer, and songwriter Licity pushes boundaries in all directions. Licity grew up in the cello section of the Washington DC Youth Orchestra and hears the world like a symphony. Her albums One Girl Town, Love, Courage, Yes, and Touch This combine folk intimacy, classic rock bravado, and intimate spoken prose into a genre-defying, captivating experience. Her unique spoken prose combined with collaboratively composed music The Flower in the Mirror was Dead is classified as 21st Century Classical for its unique and fresh combination of music and text. Her instrumental mindfulness music Currents collapses the mythology of linear time. Passionate about the power of music, Licity also served on the BRAVO Community and Education Committee of the prestigious Ojai Music Festival. Licity’s newest work-in-progress is a spoken-sung Opera titled One Death in Seven Doorways. 

Licity’s passion for theatre prompted her to co-found the Portland, Oregon boundary-pushing consensus-based defunkt theatre company, where she also designed award-winning found-object sets. She helped create community-based scripts with Cornerstone Theater in Los Angeles. She designed and founded the Women’s Theatre Project in Providence Rhode Island which brought theatre as a tool of expression and healing to women in prison and is now a national model. 

As a conceptual artist, her works utilize installation, assemblage, and performance in the gallery, museum, on the stage, and in the street, with tools from house paint to audio, to hand-sewn textiles, to electrical devices, to her own body—often incorporating sound as part of the experience. Licity was one of a handful of trailblazing artists to manipulate the nascent internet, creating satirical culturally interrogatory work that dissected racism. She is the author of two related satirical humor books one which gained an Honorable Mention from The Gustavus Meyers Center for The Study of Bigotry and Human Rights. This body of work gained world-wide attention, received awards, and was featured in numerous stories on NPR, and Public Radio International and is cited in several art history books and classroom courses worldwide. 

Licity obtained her bachelor’s degree from Brown University in American Civilization and Public Policy, and her Master of Fine Art from Portland State University, after a successful launch as a self-taught artist. Having lived in Washington DC, Providence, Chicago, and Ojai, California, Licity is currently based in Portland Oregon.