Keith Calhoun and Chandra McCormick were born and raised in the lower ninth ward of New Orleans, Louisiana. As husband and wife team, they have been documenting Louisiana and its people for more than 25 years. In New Orleans, they have documented the music culture, which consists of Brass Bands, Jazz Funerals, Social and Pleasure Clubs, Benevolent Societies, and the Black Mardi Gras Indians.
Amanda M. Maples is Françoise Billion Richardson Curator of African Art at the New Orleans Museum of Art. She has taught university courses in African arts and served in curatorial and scholarly capacities at the North Carolina Museum of Art, Stanford University’s Cantor Arts Center, the Yale University Art Gallery, the National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, the High Desert Museum, and UC Berkeley’s Hearst Museum of Anthropology.
Sarah LaBrie is the author of No One Gets to Fall Apart: A Memoir, which was a New York Times Editor's Pick and 2024 Notable Book. She was born in Oakland, grew up in Houston and now lives in Los Angeles where she works as a TV writer. She's written for shows including Minx (Starz and Max), Love, Victor (Hulu), Blindspotting (Starz) and Made For Love (Max). Her fiction and non-fiction appear in the Guardian, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Electric Literature's Recommended Reading, Guernica, Joyland, Taste and elsewhere.
Cherice Harrison-Nelson is an educator, narrative visual and performance artist, and arts administrator. As the co-founder and curator of the former Mardi Gras Indian Hall of Fame, she was the co-editor of 11 publications and coordinated numerous exhibitions and panel discussions focused on West African inspired cultural traditions from New Orleans. Her creative expressions have been performed, presented and exhibited throughout the city and world. She has been featured in numerous documentaries, exhibitions and printed publications, including an NPR American Routes Carnival edition.
Virginia Hanusik is an artist and writer whose projects explore the relationship between landscape, culture, and the built environment. Her work has been exhibited internationally, featured in The New Yorker, Aperture, National Geographic, British Journal of Photography, Places Journal, The Atlantic, MAS Context, and Oxford American among others, and supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation, Pulitzer Center, Graham Foundation, Landmark Columbus Foundation, and Mellon Foundation.
Kathe Hambrick is the Founder and former Executive Director of the River Road African American Museum in Donaldsonville, established in 1994 as Louisiana’s first African American museum. She also previously served as the Chief Curator and Director of Interpretation for the West Baton Rouge Museum. Her career as a museum professional includes an expertise in program development, interpretative planning, curation, grant writing, fundraising, and board governance.
Erika N. Witt is a dynamic force in the world of Museology, serving as the Director and Chief Curator of Southern University at New Orleans Museum of Art and Adjunct Professor in Museum Studies. Based in the vibrant city of New Orleans, Louisiana, she is driven by a passion for collections management and museum education, with a particular focus on the arts of Africa and the African diaspora, along with a specialization in Egyptology.
Michael Wallace is a retired military intelligence officer with 20 years of active service. His military assignments included Naval Special Warfare, Defense Human Intelligence, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and the Office of Naval Intelligence. Post-military, he worked as a senior intelligence analyst in the Joint Chiefs of Staff Intelligence Directorate. He has experience in counter-terrorism, counter-proliferation, special warfare, and intelligence collection and analysis.
Doug Thornton is a prominent sports and venue management executive who serves as the regional vice president for SMG, overseeing the Superdome and other major facilities in Louisiana. A native of Shreveport and a graduate of McNeese State, Thornton played a pivotal role in the rebuilding and reopening of the Louisiana Superdome following Hurricane Katrina, coordinating the largest stadium reconstruction project in U.S. history.
