Uniting Creativity and Wisdom

Click Here to Purchase Tickets

Click Here to Register for Creative Movement

News

Feb 21, 2024

ARTIST CALL!! Dance Africa Pittsburgh 2024

Feb 21, 2024

Oct 30, 2023

Support the Arts on Giving Tuesday, Nov 28th!

Oct 30, 2023

Register Youth Today for Creative Movement!

Aug 14, 2023

The Legacy Arts Project is a place where you can learn the artistic traditions of Africa & the diaspora, while adding your life experience from other places.

Photos by Erin Perry

The mission of the Legacy Arts Project, Inc. is to preserve, promote, and create Africana arts that honor the history, heritage, and cultures of Africa diaspora in ways that advance healing and wellness, education, and community empowerment.

The origins of the LAP begin with its founder Linda ‘Imani’ Barrett and her love of the arts. An avid dancer and arts enthusiast, she was influenced by Selma Burke, an artist during the Harlem Renaissance, who created an arts center in Pittsburgh as an arm of her art center in Harlem, New York. There Sister Imani was exposed to a range of art forms that allowed her to experience the power of the African legacy. Around the same time, Sister Imani joined the Pittsburgh Black Theater Dance Ensemble, led by the late Bob Johnson. Here they experimented with art, delving into dance forms inspired by Africans throughout the Diaspora.

These experiences became a part of the foundation and formation of the LAP. From this platform, Sister Imani was able to bring together artists from the community to gather and share in expression. Drummers and dancers, elder and youth, played rhythms and danced. Interspersed with that has been spoken word, poetry, singing, and visual art. The LAP has been a space used to cultivate and share a variety of art forms, bringing the community together to grow.

Leadership

Board Of Directors

Dr. Anthony Mitchell, Professor of African American Studies at the College of Liberal Arts, Penn State-Greater Allegheny
Bekezela Mguni (Treasurer), Master of Arts student at the University of Pittsburgh, studying Library Sciences
K. Chase Patterson, CEO, Urban Academy Charter School
Lawrence Uradu, MD, UPMC
Lea Blumenfeld, Certified Librarian
Turahn Jenkins, Attorney
Tina Daniels, Business Owner

Staff

Erin Perry, Executive Director

Since 2011, Erin Perry has been the executive director of the Legacy Arts Project. As a graduate of the Katz Graduate School of Business, she applies her academic training within a community setting, utilizing arts as a tool for transformation both individually as well as collectively. Miss Perry has been an active member of Legacy since 2005, participating as a member of the dance ensemble through present day. With an extensive background in teaching, Miss Perry has impacted children and adults from Wilkinsburg to Taiwan, teaching classes in English, Math, Photography, and Movement. As a mother of 3 growing children, two boys and a girl, her focus continues to be grounded in the upliftment of humanity through knowledge of self.

Funders

The Heinz Endowments
The Pittsburgh Foundation
Eden Hall Foundation
McElhattan Foundation
PA Humanities
PA Commission on Crime and Delinquency
Community Development Block Grant

Grable Foundation
The Opportunity Fund
PA Council on the Arts
Stauton Farms Foundation
Partner4Work
Allegheny County Department of Children’s Initiatives

Partners

At the Legacy Arts Project, we’re a part of a family of arts organizations that collaborate on performances, share office and studio space, swap resources, and more. Below are a few of the organizations that currently work with us. We’re always growing the list, so contact us to see how you can get involved.

Kelly-Strayhorn Theatre
Consortium for Public Education
Pittsburgh Public Schools
Partners 4 Work