Internationally recognized artist Jeff Koons (b.

Gary Hoover is the Executive Director of the Murphy Institute at Tulane University. He is also a professor of economics and is an affiliate professor of law.

Brittany Paige Alexandra Gondolfi is a children’s author, attorney, and creative educator from Louisiana whose work sits at the intersection of storytelling, environmental justice, and joyful learning. She wrote Look Up!

Michael Clune is the author of the novel Pan (Penguin, 2025), and the memoirs White Out (second ed., McNally Editions, 2023) and Gamelife (FSG, 2015).

Olivia Worley is an author born and raised in New Orleans.

Philippe VILLENEUVE

RICKEY LAURENTIIS is the author of Boy with Thorn, which won the Cave Canem Poetry Prize and the Levis Reading Prize.

Daniel Kehlmann was born in Munich in 1975. His novels and plays have won numerous prizes, including the Candide Prize, the Doderer Prize, the Kleist Prize, the Welt Literature Prize, and the Thomas Mann Prize.

Sigrid Nunez is the author of nine novels, including The Vulnerables, What Are You Going Through, and The Friend, which was a New York Times bestseller and winner of the 2018 National Book Award, and made into a 20

Ian McNulty is a writer for The Times-Picayune / The New Orleans Advocate and NOLA.com covering restaurants and food culture. His commentary series Where Y’Eat airs weekly on NPR affiliate WWNO, and he is a frequent contributor to WWL radio in New Orleans.