African Descent Archives - Page 7 of 78

Sarah Vaughan

Singer Sarah Vaughan (1924-1990) launched her jazz career at the world-renowned Apollo theatre’s amateur-night contest.

Dr. Frazier is a physicist in the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), managing scientific and technical projects established to ensure a safe, secure, and effective nuclear weapons stockpile without nuclear explosive testing.

Nora Ezell

Ezell is a master of embroidery and appliqué, the process of fastening one piece of fabric to a ground fabric with tiny stitches.

Natasha Trethewey

U.S. Poet Laureate, 2012-2014

CeCe Mazyck

Military veteran and Paralympian

Mozell Benson

“Her quilts are the visual equivalent of jazz or blues. She will take a basic pattern and then do variations on it just like a musician will do with a jazz piece.”

Naomi Gedo Diouf

Liberian-American dancer and dance teachers who has contributed to the practice and performance of West African dance, drum, and culture in African diasporic communities for more than four decades.

Mary Jackson

A descendent of the Gullah community of coastal South Carolina, Mary Jackson learned the art of making baskets at the age of four from her mother and grandmother.

Mary Jane Manigault

Manigault’s baskets have attained widespread recognition because of the sculptural quality of the forms she created and the imaginative use of natural design and color. She often experimented with different forms, but never overdecorated, understanding the value of the plain, unadorned traditional designs.