Josie Fischels
Arts & Culture ReporterExpertise: Performance art, visual art, Iowa life
Education: The University of Iowa
Favorite Iowa Destination: Dunnings Springs, Decorah
Experience:
- Covered local and statewide arts, news, and lifestyle features for <i>The Daily Iowan</i>, <i>The Denver Post</i>, NPR and currently for IPR
- Has written features on Iowans participating in the Hollywood writers’ strike, the nation’s largest historic theatre backdrop collection – housed in Iowa, the reopening of the African American Museum of Iowa and an ‘inside-the-culture’ feature on local drag kings, among others
- Is an award-winning reporter, including a retrospective of Iowa’s first poet laureate, Marvin Bell, following his death in 2021
- Writes regularly for IPR’s internationally award-winning newsletters
- Covered the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics, climate and the Kabul takeover by the Taliban in 2021 for NPR’s news desk
- Served as an editor and mentor for multiple projects with NPR’s Next Generation Radio
- Created IPR’s weekly news quiz and launched IPR’s TikTok (follow us!)
My Latest Stories
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The announcement of the venue's closure by the end of the year marks another blow for Des Moines' local music scene. -
A University of Northern Iowa professor is helping local men find community and purpose in retirement through a global initiative that’s the first of its kind in the state. -
After years of financial struggles and community fundraising efforts, Cedar Rapids’ Mirrorbox Theatre will close its doors by the end of the year. -
After coming to an abrupt conclusion in 2023, the long-running book sale once run by Planned Parenthood North Central States is starting a new chapter under the leadership of a new, volunteer-run nonprofit. -
Monica Holt, a nationally recognized arts leader and former senior vice president of artistic planning at The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, will serve as DMPA's next president and chief executive officer. -
For Qore, a new facility in Eddyville, the next frontier for sustainable fashion is growing in Iowa's fields. -
The Greater Des Moines Public Art Foundation's AR Mural Project is the latest investment in interactive art in central Iowa. -
A survey in Des Moines and surrounding cities found that residents overwhelmingly preferred trick-or-treating to occur on Halloween instead of the night before, on Beggars' Night. -
Marching bands from across the state are currently competing against one another with high-energy spectacles, complete with props, costumes, sets and intricate sound systems. -
Three Iowa City West high schoolers founded a book club that reads some of the country's most frequently banned books after a state law removing books with sexual content was signed in 2023. Two years later, many of the books have been reshelved and parts of the law can't be enforced.
