Louisville is a Place:
A Dialogue with Black Artists from Louisville living Elsewhere
Jasmine Wigginton
Photography by Stevenson Michael
Louisville is a place that exists in the gray of the Midwest and the South. It is a place where Blackness is confined into segregated quarters of our city but finds ways to play, thrive, survive, and create. Louisville is a place that pressurizes, engages in nostalgia, and because of its uniqueness creates stories that stick with creatives and artists even when there is distance between them and native and their home.
Take some time in your car, while you clean, or even before bed to sit and listen to this collection of interviews of four Black artists/creatives from Louisville and the way it has inspired their work and continues to inspire them even though there is now distance between themselves and their home. From poetry, culinary arts, film/photography, and fashion Louisville has cultivated each of the individuals interviewed.
Listen as they dream of what Louisville could be, a place where queer kids have spaces to create and engage in the ballroom scene feeling comfortable and inspired. An outdoor area for children in the West End to escape and become aware of other possibilities outside of the enclosure of riverside pollution. A place where Southern food can be revered and stay close to the land. Where Black artists can be supported and given the space to fully take control of their writing and spread their stories far.
Danielle Bell
Age: 39
High School: Central
Current Location: Los Angeles, CA
Danielle Bell is a baker and co-founder of de Porres with her partner Pablo Osorio who for seven years has worked in the culinary arts in Los Angeles and New York City through dinner series and catering. Their work is rooted in the palates of their upbringing “From Lima to Louisville.” During the pandemic they transitioned to providing de Porres as a weekly delivery/take-out service in Los Angeles. Danielle’s work has been featured in the New York Times, LA Times, The Infatuation, and other publications.
How are you creative?
Danielle: I started thinking more about how do I tap into this certain nostalgic feeling people have for ice cream … But one that really stood out to me was Superman ice cream…. I thought that it was something every kid of the 80s and 90s had, but it's a regional thing, and Louisville is enough on the cusp to have been included in this very Midwestern ice cream tradition. But what's funny is when I was asking people about it on my Instagram, but also my Facebook, I'm like, OK, so who remembers what this tastes like? Because I remember having that feeling like I had to have it. But honestly, it's so much - what did it taste like exactly?”
How has Louisville cultivated you as an artist/creative?
Danielle: My mom was very instrumental in teaching me how to bake and giving me a love for baking. So with regard to my work, just growing up around so much food, really, really, really influenced how I approach food. Sometimes, I think, like even growing up eating weird stuff like chitlins and all the stuff that I feel like a lot of young black people aren’t even touching. But for me, that meant that if I went somewhere abroad or even in New York City and was offered something that was unusual in my head and thinking, repeating that as a delicacy, surely I can try this or that. And so that's informed me to just be around strong flavors.
How do you continue engaging/cultivating within Louisville through your art? (If not, why is there a disconnect?)
Danielle: Cooking is something that really helps me connect with my family … Every time I make my mother's cake, I feel like they're sort of having some sort of conversation with her.
What art/creativity would you like to see cultivated in Louisville currently?
Danielle: Understanding and the love of the food, so for me personally, what I would like to see is just not just in Louisville but anywhere is a Southern cuisine that really reveres the history.
Accomplishments:
Danielle: But I mean, other accomplishments are different, simply the sort of love for our clients and people telling me often how our food has helped them throughout the pandemic and it's been really humbling.
J LeVe
Age: 28
High School: Manual/YPAS
Current Location: NYC, NY
J LeVe is a creative director based in New York City, NY. Brown is a classically trained singer who most recently transitioned to fashion styling and living and creating work that focuses on, “gender fluidity, sass, 90’s Parisian fashion, rebellion, and sophistication.” Brown now hosts “Live at Fashion Week Brooklyn” and their styling work has been featured in GMARO Magazine.
How are you creative?
J LeVe: So for me, creating, creating is like you are in tune with what inspires you and how it should be used. You surrender to inspiration. You surrender to processes, you surrender to what is needed.
How has Louisville cultivated you as an artist/creative?
J LeVe: It set my foundation of what an artist can be, how you can discover your creativity, what that looks like, what it doesn't look like, the many ways it looks like, and how to like find it especially I guess for me, like just a lot of my memories are just around like very shitty situations normally. And that's OK. You know, things happen in families. But like, I had to find my creativity through survival.
How do you continue engaging/cultivating within Louisville through your art? (If not, why is there a disconnect?)
J LeVe: Memories that I created through creativity in Louisville is kind of what anchors me everywhere I go, you know what I mean? And I feel like that's the whole pressure of the diamond pressure effect. Like it’s just the pressure of the city compressing this beautiful diamond. And the residuals are like the memories that are jewels.”
What art/creativity would you like to see cultivated in Louisville?
J LeVe: I wish, because there are so many queer kids, I don't know if it's as many now, but like when I was growing up, there were a lot of poor kids that were just black queer kids, especially, that were just looking for their other tribes.
Accomplishments:
J LeVe: The fact that I can say that I'm here and queer as fuck and black as fuck and growing into that and pushing in that and learning how to not be afraid of that, that is worth celebrating.
“Louisville is a place that exists in the imagination even when you’re no longer there.”
- Jasmine Wigginton
Joy Priest
Age: 32
High School: Central
Current Location: Houston, TX
Joy Priest is a poet whose most recent book HORSEPOWER (Pitt Poetry Series 2020) was selected by U.S Poet Laurete Natatsha Trethewey as the winner of the Donald Hall Prize for Poetry and is nationally celebrated. Her work has been featured in The Atlantic, Academy of American Poets, ESPNW, and other publications. She is currently a doctoral student in Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Houston.
How are you creative?
JOY: I think that my creativity, like poetry, is probably just a model of how I think, and I think, like most artists, the art they do is …. it has a lot to do with how they process the world and I would say when I'm walking around the world, I'm always making connections between things.
How has Louisville cultivated you as an artist/creative?
JOY: Well, it's allowed me to figure out how to navigate contradictions because it's Southern and Midwestern and, you know, it's one of those places that is in the in-between for so, so many things.
How do you continue engaging/cultivating within Louisville through your art? (If not, why is there a disconnect?)
JOY: I stay connected to people back home or I always try to shout out anybody that’s still there doing the work because I left. Some of the homies are still back there and I just try to rep and make connections as much as possible. Obviously, I wrote a book about Louisville, I just keep Louisville in the conversation.
What art/creativity would you like to see cultivated in Louisville?
JOY: I've lived now in New York, South Carolina, Massachusetts, Texas. New Jersey as well, and I just feel having some distance, and living in all these different spaces, huge cities, but also small towns even, every place has felt more up to speed than Louisville in how the city understands its social and political realities. … I would like the city to be a less hostile place for working-class people of color who are writing and doing art.
Accomplishments:
JOY: I survived, I consistently tell the truth in my work, that the decisions I made have been made with integrity, and that I can still write after the book.
Jeris Johnson
Age: 26
High School: Brown/Western
Current Location: Los Angeles, CA
Jeris Johnson is a filmmaker, artist, photographer who recently moved from Louisville to LA to pursue his dreams. While in Louisville, he worked as a production assistant for VideoBred, a nationally awarded and recognized production company, and has been a volunteer at the Sundance film festival two years in a row. While in Louisville, he also created music videos for local artists and made short films. He now creates line drawings that can be found on his Instagram and are available for purchase (one is in my very own home).
How are you creative:
JERIS: By letting people know that even if it's a bad idea, you still got to get it out, even if it's a good idea, you still got to get it out.”
How has Louisville cultivated you as an artist/creative?
JERIS: Louisville keeps me inspired and especially with all the stuff that’s been going on recently. Being in the city while everything was going on and seeing it first-hand, so many eyes on Louisville and just seeing how we acted and just how we represented either for the good or for the bad, for the ugly or for the nice.
How do you continue engaging/cultivating within Louisville through your art? (If not, why is there a disconnect?)
JERIS: I represent Louisville on such a different scale. And that's even when people shoot music videos, they're making music and they make Louisville references, if you like the song, you'll dig in deeper to what that reference even means and it makes you feel more involved.
Accomplishments:
JERIS: Honestly, my biggest accomplishment has been moving to LA. Especially as much as I had to go through to move here. I was in a wreck that pushed me back a whole year and then the pandemic happened. So, my biggest accomplishment was definitely moving out here and taking that initiative to move forward.
Jasmine Wigginton
Jasmine Wigginton is a youth worker and sometimes a writer who recently moved from Kentucky to Baltimore two weeks before states across the country entered lockdown. Through her writing, she explores intergenerational trauma, her ancestors, and the inherent magic of being Black and from Kentucky.