Mercedes Cooper

Explorer

Hello new friends! I am the Executive Vice President of Public Programming at ARRAY, a Peabody award-winning arts and social impact collective dedicated to narrative change, founded in 2011 by filmmaker Ava DuVernay. I’ve grown with ARRAY for nearly 15 years and currently oversee initiatives such as the 6-weekend film series ARRAY 360, community movie pop-up ARRAY Drive-In, ARRAY's Filmmaker Tweet-A-Thon, as well as ARRAY's LEAP, the Law Enforcement Accountability Project. LEAP commissioned projects from dynamic visionaries in photography, poetry, music, culinary art, dance, mixed media, design, film and audio art to elevate activist storytelling around the systematic issue of police brutality. I’m an advocate of creating safe spaces for audiences to discover, discuss and engage with films in ways often not accessible to general public. Proud alumna of Columbia College Chicago (M.F.A. Film Production) and University of Maryland College Park (B.A. Economics) with time spent at USP. See you at the movies or in the halls at TED!

Curating community driven film programs… and watching home design tours on YouTube.

The power of narrative change!