Tis Kaoru Zamler-Carhart (they/them) is a designer, writer, singer, composer, medievalist, and, in a duo with Vitaly Zamler, a visual artist and archeologist.

Tis’s composition output encompasses opera, stage, chamber and solo vocal music, and has been performed in the US, Europe, East Asia, and the Middle East. Tis has taught several subjects at The New School in New York, including transdisciplinary design and medieval multimedia at Parsons School of Design, medieval literature at Lang College, and music history at Mannes School of Music.

Tis formerly taught medieval music and Latin at the Royal Conservatoire The Hague (Netherlands), was the artistic director of the medieval music vocal group Ascoli Ensemble, and the lead singer of the troubadour band Zamler-Carhart/Rauh/Greenberg.

Tis’s ongoing archeological research with Vitaly Zamler focuses on fragile contemporary household spaces, most recently houses in rural Rwanda and abandoned apartments in Poland. Tis’s literary output evolves around materials and objects, speculative worlds, Africa and its futurisms, linguistics, the European Middle Ages, and the fragile boundaries of seriousness.

Tis’s first book, The Goths and Other Stories, came out in 2020 (Punctum Books), with a second edition in 2023. Their second book, The Diary of Anna Comnena, or the Very Political Adventures of a Transgender Byzantine Princess in African Elevators, is coming out in 2024 (also with Punctum Books). Tis & Vitaly’s visual art is visible at Galerie Mhaata in Brussels, Belgium, and at Galerie Mitobo in Southampton, New York. Tis’s ensemble music is published by Naxos Concordance, the Austrian Academy of Sciences, and other labels.