Crafting Affrilachia

Please join us at the Carter G. Woodson Center Tuesday, March 17^th from 4-5 pm for a conversation with Marie Cochran

 The Affrilachian Artist Project was created by founding artist/curator, Marie T. Cochran, who adopted the term after the pioneering work of the Affrilachian Poets. (The term itself was coined by Frank X Walker who was  founding member of this group of Kentucky poets.) Inspired by their writings and the old-time/bluegrass musical performances of the Carolina Chocolate Drops, Cochran debuted a digital showcase of the Affrilachian Artist Project during the first “Symposium on Affrilachia” at the University of Kentucky March 2011. Her original motivation was to create a directory of African American visual artists with roots in or ties to Appalachia.

Later that year, Cochran co-curated the inaugural museum exhibition of the Affrilachian Artist Project at the August Wilson Center for African American Art and Culture in Pittsburgh, the region’s unofficial “Urban Capitol.” In time, Cochran took on the task of sharing information amongst artists and community organizers in the region. The Affrilachian Artist Project Facebook page has generated a network of 1,000 + individuals and organizations which celebrate and explore the intersection of cultures in Appalachia

Affrilachian (af-run-Lat-shun) adj. relating to an African American who was born or lives in Appalachia, a mountain system in eastern North America that stretches from Quebec and Maine in the north to parts of SC, GA, AL, and MS in the Deep South.