EMMA KEMP

is a British nonfiction writer and media researcher based in Los Angeles. Her work in narrative documentary explores relationships between environment, sub/culture, and media, with an emphasis on anti-colonial and more-than-human frameworks. At the forefront of Environmental Media Studies, Emma’s interdisciplinary practice negotiates emerging technologies in service of ecological and cultural conservation.

Emma is co-founder of Concerning Landscape, a non-profit research organization whose major project, No Canyon Hills (NCH) is a multiform entity forged in solidarity with the plant and animal communities of the Verdugo Mountains—ancestral land and unceded territory of the Fernandeño Tataviam Band of Mission Indians and the Gabrieleno (Tongva) Band of Mission Indians—that deploys cooperative actions and interventionist strategies across social, political, educational and legislative registers to investigate land use. Alongside NCH, Concerning Landscape oversees Studio Bakersfield, a reparative earthwork and eco-media design studio led by Emma Kemp & Mateo Altman.

Emma is represented by Alison Lewis at Frances Goldin Literary Agency. Her forthcoming book of cultural criticism, At The Bottom of Everything, is an authorized biography of the musical artist Conor Oberst, examining the influence of the millennial media landscape on artistry and fandom. ATBOE will be published in 2026-7 by Grand Central (US) and Penguin (UK/Commonwealth).

Emma is a full-time Assistant Professor at Otis College of Art & Design, where she teaches courses in Transmedia Documentary, Writing in the Post-Digital Age, Contemporary Practice, and more.

She holds a BFA from Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts, London, and an MFA in Writing & Critical Studies from California Institute of the Arts.

Emma has received numerous grants, awards, and fellowships for her work, including a Metabolic Studio/Annenberg Foundation Grant, Utah Humanities Fellowship, and more. Her work as NCH has been written about in the L.A. Times, KCAL, KPCC, and various other print and broadcast platforms.

STUDIO BAKERSFIELD