Simon Matiwos

Award-Winning Screenwriter, Poet, Playwright and Dramaturg

Simon Matiwos is an praised poet, playwright, screenwriter, and dramaturg from Husby, Stockholm. He is a Swedish Grand Slam Champion in Poetry Slam and the creator of the critically acclaimed theatre success 8 Square Meters. His artistic practice moves at the intersection of poetry, drama, and social analysis, with a strong focus on class, identity, in-betweenness, and the human experience.

He is also the award-winning co-founder of the cultural phenomenon Ortens bästa poet (The Suburb’s Best Poet), one of the largest poetry festivals in the world.

Simon works across formats, allowing each story to live where it functions best, whether as a stage play, poetry, TV series, feature film, short film, or documentary. Together with Murre Gonday, through Monday Rise, he develops projects with the ambition to portray contemporary life without filters, honest, intimate, and without simplifying complex lived experiences.

Simon is particularly drawn to stories that exist in the space between the private, the public, and the political, where small individual choices reflect larger societal structures.