re:mancipation

Marka27 + Street Theory (Victor Quinonez), Visual Artist/Muralist
With over 20 years of experience in large scale public art production, artist management, art and design direction, exhibitions and special events, Street Theory uses their expertise to implement and execute Client goals at the highest levels of creative expression and strategic planning in the areas of lifestyle, hospitality, retail, real estate, urban planning and community development.

Lynore Routte’, Reclaimed Materials Artist
From her start, Lynore has been using recycled, reclaimed and repurposed materials. She continues to create with the idea of using, ‘whatcha got, to make whatcha want,’ to paraphrase musician James Brown. This belief in making something new and more beautiful from what is no longer wanted is one of Lynore’s  core values, and it drives how she works and how she lives. Lynore Galore has created wearable art for Beyoncé, Missy Elliot, OutKast’s André 3000. Lynore develops pieces with spiritual intent, often producing work after tarot consultations with her clients. Current work includes collaboration with Sanford Biggers on his Moon Medicin and re:mancipation projects.

Wildcat Ebony Brown, Uninhibited Creative
Brooklyn-based emerging artist Wildcat Ebony Brown, began her career as a professional model in her early 20’s. Despite ample success in the beauty and entertainment industry, Ebony has found a new home for her talents, passions, and uninhibited creativity as an artist and clothing designer. Her journey from subject to architect has led to paintings, installations, and a developing clothing line. Grounded in her aptitude for color harmony, her work is vibrant and exhilarating. Her designs focus on a sophisticated, timeless silhouette, as well as, the comfort and confidence experienced by those wearing them. She is a seminal activist in the Wide Awakes voting movement.

Rich Medina is an elite international DJ who, in the thirty years since he spun his first record, has turned his young love for music into a celebrated career as a platinum-selling record producer, recording artist, poet, journalist, and Ivy League lecturer. From the legendary nine-year-run of his Lil’ Ricky’s Rib Shack party at APT in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District, to his globe-spanning, conscious-raising, dance-floor-shaking party Jump-N-Funk, a sonic tribute to Afro Beat and its iconic creator Fela Kuti, Rich stands without peer as a contemporary DJ of diverse range and taste. A sonic storyteller, par excellence. But his art pushes past those boundaries. As a respected spoken word artist, he has performed on stages around the world, and his sonorous voice has been utilized by everyone from EA Sports to Nike. He’s an intellectual and public speaker who has lectured at TEDX Philly, and his alma mater Cornell, amongst others. He is also a producer of note, crafting work with a range of artists, including Jill Scott, J Dilla, and Bobbito Garcia. In short, Rich Medina is the modern-day renaissance man—an artist and visionary who has built a compelling narrative on his own terms. And his journey continues.

Pharaohe Monch is an American rapper from South Jamaica, Queens, New York. He is known for his complex lyrics, intricate delivery, and internal and multisyllabic rhyme schemes. Monch compares writing and recording his lyrics to writing and filming a movie. His recent project is a heavy-rock-band th1rt3en.  His vocal delivery is inspired by Jazz music and musicians such as John Coltrane.

Keyon Harrold is an American jazz trumpeter, vocalist, songwriter, and producer. Keyon was born and raised in Ferguson, Missouri. One of 16 children in a family of musicians. His grandfather was a former police officer who founded The Memorial Lancers Drum and Bugle Corps. Harrold graduated from the School of Jazz at The New School, New York City. He has performed with Snoop Dogg, Jay Z, Beyonce, Rihanna, Eminem, Maxwell, Robert Glasper & Gregory Porter.

Nuri Hazzard is an Actor, Most recently featured in this year’s Super Bowl LVI ads (2022), he has appeared in TV series such as Wu-Tang: An American Saga and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. Nuri will serve as a co-host for the National Education Association’s Conference on Racial and Social Justice, serving as a field correspondent, extracting the narratives from participating artists

Chris Walker Prof Dance Department & Director, Division of the Arts
Dr. Walker is a multi-hyphenate contemporary dance and performance artist. Rooted in “Resistance Aesthetics,” Walker’s work draw upon the danced rituals, mas traditions, and embodied performance history of the African diaspora. The founding artistic director of OMAI/First Wave, Walker developed the First Wave Process. His research intersects dance choreography for the concert stage with collaborations with visual and performance artists for museum, alternate spaces, professional theatre, and video/film.

Yorel Lashley 
Yorel Lashley serves as the Director of Arts at PLACE. Dr. Lashley is an educator, percussionist, songwriter, and educational psychologist. In 2001, he founded Drum Power, which has used the process of learning West African Traditional, Afro-Brazilian, and Afro-Cuban percussion to help more than 3,800 young people develop and practice social-emotional skills. In addition to Drum Power, Dr. Lashley also created the Relationships First professional development for building and maintaining healthy classroom culture and fully-integrated social-emotional learning. Dr. Lashley previously performed professionally in New York City for 12 years. www.drumpower.com

Kacie Lucchini Butcher is a public historian dedicated to building empathy, helping communities write their history, and to advancing social justice and social equity. She has worked in museums and for community organizations, helping communities reclaim their narratives through collaborative public history projects. She has experience engaging marginalized communities through historical partnerships, creating and sustaining community-centered archives, and producing historical research that foregrounds social justice. Kacie is the Director of The Public History Project and teaches History 401 at UWM. Thirteen (13) of Kacie’s students have actively contributed responses to the Emancipation Group. 

Faisal Abdu’Allah, Associate Dean for the Arts in the School of Education
Dr. Abdu’Allah, an internationally acclaimed artist and professor with the School of Education’s Art Department, is the Chazen Family Distinguished Chair in Art and the associate dean of the arts in the School of Education. DARK MATTER, opening Sept. 17, 2022, explores cultural representation and the systems of power that structure our experiences of the world. The exhibition includes a selection of Abdu’Allah’s most celebrated series, as well as a reconstruction of his work, “Garden of Eden” (2003), an architectural installation the artist created in collaboration with renowned architect Sir David Adjaye. Exploring issues of privilege, exclusion, and the voyeuristic gaze, this interactive piece separates visitors based on genetic traits — in this case, eye color — in order to undermine our perceptions of difference and alienation. With “Garden of Eden,” Abdu’Allah points to the privileges conferred to certain people based on the nuances of their genetic matter. DARK MATTER will also feature a counter-monument by Abdu’Allah, which he first conceived of several years ago in response to debates about the role of monuments and their removal from public view. His solution was to commission artists of color to create new monuments that represent their own aesthetics, histories, and experiences.

Dr. Baron Kelly is a four-time Fulbright Scholar and has traveled extensively as a Cultural Specialist for the United States Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairsteaching and lecturing on the theatre in Russia, Scandinavia, Africa, Europe, London, and Asia. Teaching acting has led him to teaching and lecturing residencies in more than a dozen countries on five continents and in twenty American states, including London’s Central School of Speech and Drama, Moscow Art Theatre, Beijing Central Academy of Drama, National Theatre School of Finland, and National Theatre of Ghana.  In August 2020, he joined the Theatre and Drama Department at University of Wisconsin-Madison. Between 2014 and 2020, Dr. Kelly was a member of the faculty of the University of Louisville, where he was Head of MFA Acting, and Director of Graduate Studies at the University of Louisville.

Milwaukee Students

Sanford Biggers, first received critical attention when his collaborative work with David Ellis, Mandala of the B-Bodhisattva II, was included in the exhibition Freestyle, curated by Thelma Golden at the Studio Museum of Harlem in 2001. Since then, his works have been presented internationally including at the Tate Modern in London, the RenaissanceSociety in Chicago, Prospect 1 in New Orleans and the Whitney Biennial, The Kitchen, and Performa 07 (curated by Roselee Goldberg) in New York. Mr. Biggers is affiliate faculty member at Virginia Commonwealth University’s department of Sculpture + Extended Media and was a visiting scholar at Harvard University’s VES Department in 2009. He was previously an assistant professor at Columbia University’s Visual Arts program.

Mark Hines is the founder and creator of the live streaming platform, Virtual Live Experiences (VLE). He has also served as Vice President of Creative Technology at Russell Simmons’ 360HipHop.com where he was instrumental in the conceptualization and development of the new media platform. Upon BET.com’s acquisition of the startup, Hines was appointed Vice President of Strategy where he was directly responsible for initiating a diverse range of innovative projects including the conception and implementation of music strategies, interactive programming and creative technology. From 1994 to 1999, Hines worked at JP Morgan where he specialized in the development of unique technology applications that provided the bank with its competitive edge. While at JP Morgan, Hines maintained a music production company, Poisoned Ivy Entertainment, which did work for several major labels including Warner Brothers, MCA, Columbia and Def Jam, for which he received a gold record for the Belly soundtrack. Hines’ formal discipline is computer science which he studied with a concentration in music at Princeton University where he received his BA.

Edward Gajadar, Cultural Museum of African Art, Foundational Member, was born in New York City. He grew up in Hell’s Kitchen, Chelsea, The Lower East Side and The South Bronx. As a first-year undergraduate student, he attended Lehman College (CUNY), then transferred to St. John’s University, where he completed his Bachelor of Arts degree in government and politics. Upon graduation, Eddie took an administrative position with St. John’s University, where he worked in the Office of Student Advising, Development and Retention. Eddie received his Juris Doctor degree from the St. John’s University School of Law, graduating in June of 2002. Eddie’s professional career has included working for the NYC Dept. of Education as a teacher (4th grade), the NYC Police Dept. as a police officer, Chief of Staff for a U.S. Congressional candidate and Strategic Project Manager for the Cultural Museum of African Art.

Guy Routte
At the start of 2020, Routte rebirthed Schematics Industries, a multimedia operation with one simple goal: He wants “to build and create the blueprint for the type of content and media I want to see in the world.” On its plate are narrative films, documentaries and series, both web and TV, some that he’ll be writing and directing, including a docuseries about touring artists, that, in the time of coronavirus, has become even more relevant. Expect his signature on fine art projects, along with nontraditional record releases that incorporate striking visual content and presentations. Routte has shrewdly helped craft deals and shape careers of artists like rhyme whiz Pharoahe Monch, hometown protégé rapper/actor Shyheim, funk outfit The Family Stand, Living Colour frontman Corey Glover, R&B group Goodfellas and songbird Sara Devine, who he got signed to Columbia Records, where he served as senior A&R consultant. There, projects by Raphael Saadiq and Consequence fell under his watchful eye.

Alicia Hines, Grants & Development
Carrie-Ann Jean, Senior Executive Administrator
Patrick Parker, Web Development
Arjuna Routte-Prieur, Design

Lindsay Grinstead, Chief of Staff

Katherine Alcauskas Chief Curator

Janine Yorimoto Boldt – Associate Curator of American at Chazen Museum of Art
Boldt received masters and doctoral degrees in American Studies from William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. She has curated exhibitions at the American Philosophical Society and the Michigan Woman’s Historical Center and Hall of Fame, and secured fellowships with the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts, the Virginia Historical Society and the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. She is currently authoring a book based on her dissertation titled The Politics of Portraiture in Colonial Virginia, and is also developing an interactive database based on her research.

Candie Waterloo, Head of Museum Education
Candie personally showed Mark Hines & Sanford Biggers the Thomas Ball Sculpture. Candie brought the sculpture up during dinner as related to Sanford’s work and Chimera Counter-Monuments, thus, serving as the impetus of the re:mancipation project (November 2019).

Kristine Zickuhr, Assistant Director for Administration