We Are One: The Collective Fashion & Spirit of Frankie Beverly

Curated by Kelly Harris-DeBerry, We Are One: The Collective Fashion & Spirit of Frankie Beverly explores the late singer's unique ability to create community through fashion with a talk by Torrence L Taylor. Following the talk, poets DeuceThePoet, Peteh Muhammad Haroon, Kristina Kay Robinson, Sha'Condria "iCon" Sibley, and Akilah Toney will share pieces in honor of Frankie Beverly.

Free and open to the public; donations gratefully accepted. Donations support One Book One New Orleans' year-round community literacy outreach.

The Andre Callioux Center for Performing Arts and Cultural Justice is accessible to community members who require mobility-related ADA accommodations. Parking near the venue is free, though somewhat limited. The nearest RTA stop is at N. Broad and Columbus.

MEET THE ARTISTS

DeuceThePoet is an accomplished Spoken word artist, song writer, pianist, Emcee, and a half of the DrumBo production. As a native of New Orleans, DeuceThePoet has represented his city in national slam competitions such as HBO's Brave New Voices and Southern Fried Poetry Slam competition as a member of New Orleans Youth Slam team and the New Orleans Slam. Deuce has hosted many long lasting events in the City of New Orleans such as, "Speak Sunday's", “Neutral Grounds Open mic”, and the "Underground Mocha Room". Recently he has been producing tracks for artists and short films as well as mentoring young performing artists the same way some of the more seasoned artists helped mentor and inspire him and his work.

Kristina Kay Robinson is a poet, visual artist and essayist born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana. Her written, visual and curatorial practice centers and interrogates the modern and ancient connections between world communities. Robinson’s work both at home and abroad focuses on the impact of globalization, militarism, and surveillance on society and their intersections with contemporary art and pop culture. Her writing in various genres has appeared in Art in America, Guernica, The Baffler, The Nation, The Massachusetts Review and Elle among other outlets. Robinson is a 2019 recipient of the Rabkin Prize for Visual Arts Journalism. Currently she serves as the New Orleans editor at large for Burnaway magazine.

Among many things, SHA'CONDRIA (“iCon”) SIBLEY is an Alexandria, Louisiana native and longtime New Orleans-based poet, writer, and multi-inspired healing artist, whose work spans across page, stage, canvas, music, talk radio, and short film.Sha’Condria shares art as a healing and liberation tool in many spaces, including inside prisons, juvenile detention centers, and schools. She has toured the college circuit nationally and has worked for over a decade (and counting) creating, organizing, and hosting arts-driven, community-centered events. A legendary multiple-time national poetry slam champion and multiple-time viral spoken word artist, she has appeared on TV One's Verses and Flow, has performed on Essence Music Festival mainstage, and her work has been featured on many worldwide platforms including Huffington Post, For Harriet, Teen Vogue, and BBC World Radio. She is also featured on multiple recording projects alongside Grammy Award winning artists. Sha’Condria is the author of My Name Is Pronounced Holy: A Collection of Poems, Prayers, Rememberings, and Reclamations.

Torrence L. Taylor a native New Orleans. In 2013 Torrence decided to make his passion his profession. Since then he has premiered several fashion shows and showcases. Torrence has had the honor of styling many artist from singers to poets etc. His approach to style is taken from his study of Black History predominantly the black man's style. Torrence company name is "SOUTHERN STYLE INTERNATIONAL". His motto as a fashion/wardrobe stylist is "HE DOESNT CHANGE PEOPLE, HE EXPANDS THEM". He's not a celebrity stylist, he's a stylist to the STARS. Because everyone should SHINE. He is most notable from his mission work to help change the negative images of the BLACK MALE with his organized movement "NOLA NOBLES".

Akilah Toney is a published writer, spoken word artist, dancer, teaching artist, and digital creator from New Orleans, La. From beginning her journey in the study of creative writing and dance at age ten, Akilah investigates rhythm and word as sacred forms of communication that shape our human experiences and ultimately transform us. Through this Akilah calls upon her own identity and the histories of her Southern foremothers as praxis in her search of sacred rhythm. With a background in Psychology, Akilah prioritizes the intersection of wellness and arts for inter-generational Black, Brown, and Queer communities in order to nourish alternative modalities for community healing and flourishing. Akilah has been featured in Medium’s Heated magazine. Nola.com, Vogue.com, the New York Times, the I Am New Orleans Poetry Anthology, and the Jesuit Social Justice Research Institute monthly publication.

Kelly Harris-DeBerry is an award-winning poet and the author of Freedom Knows My Name and the chapbook, Home Girl. Her poems have been published in various publications, including Yale University's Caduceus Journal, Southern Voices, and more. In 2022, one of her poems was translated and displayed in Germany. She is known not only for her poetry but also for the ways she experiments with sound, music, and delivery to bend language. Kelly is always trying something new on the page or on the mic. Kelly, a nationally respected arts consultant, supports various festivals, conferences, and organizations. Kelly has worked for Poets & Writers Inc. and served as a guest poetry editor for Bayou Magazine. Kelly was selected to the first cohort of the Random House Pathways to Publishing Fellowship program. Currently, she is completing her tenure on the national literary committee for a project sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts and the Smithsonian. Her poem, The Water Next Time, appears in the 64 Parishes Magazine Fall 2024 Issue. She was a lead writer for Portraits of Us: A Book of Essays Centering Black Women Leading Philanthropy, a book on black women in philanthropy, in which she authored chapters on Ohio and New Orleans. Not only a writer, but her expertise in non-profit work and philanthropy makes her a writer in publishing and professional spaces. Her years of research on the Southern University Black Poetry Festival in the 1970s will be published in 2025. Kelly is the recipient of fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center and Cave Canem and earned degrees from Kent State University and Lesley University’s MFA Program. In 2018, Kelly wrote the grant and curated the first Black Writers programming track for the Words and Music Festival called Black Joy & Justice to create more opportunities for writers of color in the festival.

Host or Publisher One Book One New Orleans