Rashaun Rucker (b. 1978, Winston-Salem, NC is a product of North Carolina Central University and Marygrove College. He makes photo- graphs, prints and drawings and has won more than 40 national and state awards for his work. In 2008 Rucker became the first African American to be named Michigan Press Photographer of the Year. He also won a national Emmy Award in 2008 for documentary photography on the pit bull culture in Detroit. Rucker was a Maynard Fellow at Harvard in 2009 and a Hearst visiting professional in the journalism department at UNC-Chapel Hill in 2013. In 2014 Rucker was awarded an artist residency at the Red Bull House of Art. In 2016 Rucker was honored as a Modern Man by Black Enterprise magazine. In 2017 Rucker created the original artwork for the critically acclaimed Detroit Free Press documentary 12th and Clairmount. His work was recently featured in HBO’s celebrated series “Random Acts of Flyness” and the movie “Native Son”. In 2019 Rucker was the first awardee Red Bull Arts Detroit grant and was named a Kresge Arts Fellow for his drawing practice. In 2020 Rucker was named a Sustainable Arts Foundation awardee. Rucker’s diverse work is represented in numerous public and private collections.

Nastassja Swift is a visual artist holding a Bachelor’s degree in Fine Art from Virginia Commonwealth University. She is the owner and artist of D for Dolls, an online collection of handmade needle felted figures. Along with being a doll maker, she works with fiber, audio, performance, and film within her studio practice. Her short film, and first collaborative performance, “Remembering Her Homecoming,” premiered at the Afrikana Independent Film Festival in Fall 2019, and screened at the Virginia Film Festival in Charlottesville and Current Art Fair in Richmond. Nastassja is the recent recipient of a Virginia Commission of the Arts Fellowship in Craft for the 2020 cycle. Her work is permanently displayed at The Colored Girls Museum in Philadelphia and currently at The Contemporary Arts Network gallery, Eleanor and Hopps, in Newport News, Virginia, where she is an artist in residence for the First Patrons Initiative. She has participated in several national and international resi- dencies and exhibitions, including her first solo exhibit in Doha, Qatar in 2016, an exhibition at the Urban Institute of Contemporary Art in Michigan, satellite programs with 1708 Gallery, Quirk Gallery's Charlottesville location, and fellowships at the Vermont Studio Center and MASS MoCA. Nastassja is currently living and working in Virginia.