Seeking Still Waters is a discussion with Johnaé Strong, Cosette Hampton, and Scherezade Tillet on the ways their work uses art to uplift the resilience and beauty of Black girls in the face of gender-based violence, serving as a calling in of the community to deepen its commitment. The evening will include a short screening of films from A Long Walk Home, BYP100, and Johnaé Strong,
About the artists:
Johnaé Strong a 2024 Arts + Public Life/Center for the Study of Race, Politics and Culture Artist-in-Residence, and a writer, filmmaker, and organizer from Cleveland based in Chicago. She has a commitment to healing Black girls all over the world. Johnaé’s work is heavily influenced by her time as co-founder and leader of BYP100 Chicago (2013-2017) (National Co-Director 2024 - Present) and as a mother to Akeim and Jari. In her own work,
Johnaé enjoys experimenting with materiality and time--interweaving film and digital to unearth archival moments. Her work projects symbols quickly decoded by Black folks and asserted for non-Black audiences, animating freedom dreams. She has produced documentary, narrative, and commercial work with companies including Black Public Media and Firelight Media. Her writing has been cited in publications including In These Times, The Nation, and Abolition Feminisms Volume 2. (Haymarket Press) and her artwork has been supported by residencies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Atlantic Center for the Arts.
Scheherazade Tillet is a Trinidadian and African American who is a photographer, art therapist, and community organizer. As a curator and social documentary photographer, Scheherazade uses site-specific work to explore the themes of gendered vulnerability, racial invisibility, pleasure, and play. In 2003, she co-founded A Long Walk Home (ALWH), a Chicago-based national nonprofit that uses art to empower young people and end violence against girls and women. She is also the Artistic Director of the award-winning multimedia performance, “Story of a Rape Survivor (SOARS)” which documents her sister, Salamishah’s 20 year healing from being rape twice in college and her journey to become a renowned feminist activist and sexual assault survivor.
Cosette Hampton
Cosette Ayele is a community builder native to the South side of Chicago. She mothers, loves, and organizes through a Womanist Lens and brings her full self to the work-- be it policy making, data analytics, research, or service. Currently, she is the Director of Advocacy and Workforce Initiatives at Illinois Partners for Human Service. Cosette is also the Founder of Chicago Quilombo, an organization built out of BYP100's She Safe, We Safe Campaign to create housing and third spaces for Black women, girls and GNC folks. The Quilombo Community Center has an anticipated opening in 2026.
Prior to these roles, Cosette supported the proliferation of mobile crisis teams as alternatives to police across the country as Organizing Director at Community Response Works, and she led spatial and data analysis at the Chicago Housing Authority. Cosette holds a MPP from the Harris School at the University of Chicago, where she also completed her bachelors and certificates in Survey Research and Data Analytics.