Shaun Levin is a writer and book artist whose work explores how inherited stories shape identity, memory, and belonging. His practice examines narratives of survival, violence, migration, and the pressures they exert on the self. He is the author of Seven Sweet Things, Alone with a Man in a Room, and Snapshots of The Boy, amongst other books.

Around 2012, as an experiment, he began making illustrated and book-based work under a pseudonym, exhibiting internationally at events including the New York Art Book Fair and the London Art Book Fair. His artists’ books are held in the special collections of Harvard Library, the University of Delaware Library, and the Universities of California at Irvine and Santa Barbara. Born in South Africa, he has lived in Israel, London, and now Madrid. He has taught creative writing for over twenty years, runs online creative writing courses on Domestika, and is the creator of Writing Maps.

Across text and image, his work treats repetition as a form of movement toward insight, and the book as a site of encounter where inherited narratives can be questioned, reimagined, and gently undone.

My Walk is Always Towards Nature
I’m Shaun Levin. I’m an author and a writer, and I’m an author-in-residence here in Trenčín in January 2026.

One of my main sources of inspiration is change — especially noticing what happens when I’m removed from my usual environment. Instead of thinking, “This is where my inspiration comes from when I’m at home, and I’ll just bring that with me and use it here,” I’m trying to stay open. I’m already trying to be open to the landscape, open to the weather, open to the people here, and open to the energy, which feels very different from where I live.

Walking is a big part of my practice — both as a source of inspiration and as a way of processing what’s been happening, whether in the studio, in my life, or at home. That process of walking is also part of the inspiration itself. It’s a way of finding solutions, discovering new things, and experiencing sudden insights that often arrive while you’re walking.

My walking is always towards nature. It’s about getting away from the city, away from living within four walls and straight lines, and moving towards water — mainly towards water. I grew up by the sea, and I lived by the sea until my thirties, so a river feels like a kind of sea to me. What I try to do is to pay attention. I notice what’s happening to me when I’m by the river, and I observe where my attention is drawn.

So often it’s about events that are happening on the river. Yesterday, when I was walking, the ice was about three or four meters from the shore. There was a black cat walking on the white ice, right at the edge. It was either watching the ducks, or some other birds I didn’t recognize — big ones, almost like cranes, but black. The cat seemed completely unbothered by the cold, by the ice under its feet, just doing its cat thing no matter what was happening.

For me, it’s about being aware of where my attention goes — what draws my attention, and what that might be telling me about my own story. I feel a bit like that black cat, prowling along the banks of the river, looking for inspiration, for stories, for nourishment.

How do you find what to make work from when you’re not at home? That’s something I find really interesting. It’s almost like you bring your tools with you, in a way. But if the conversation is with the landscape, then just deal with the landscape. That’s what I keep telling myself.