Winston-Salem Delta Fine Arts Names New Executive Director
WINSTON-SALEM, NC – Winston-Salem Delta Fine Arts, Inc. (WSDFA) has named its next Executive Director, Kashif J. Powell, Ph.D. Dr. Powell will be the first male Executive Director in WSDFA‘s 50-year history.
Dr. Kashif J. Powell is a graduate of Morehouse College in Atlanta, GA, and has been a public speaking professional since 2003. A five-time national champion as a member of the Morehouse College Speech and Debate team, Dr. Powell’s collegiate success led him to earn a Master of Communication Studies from California State University, Long Beach in 2009, and a Ph.D. in Critical Race Theory and Performance from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill in 2014.
After completing his studies, Dr. Powell took a position as Northwestern University’s Black Arts Initiative Post-Doctoral Fellow. Over his two-year fellowship, he collaborated with institutions such as Chicago’s Harold Washington Library, the city’s Carnaval Latino/a Theatre Commons Festival, and the 5E Hip Hop and Visual Art Gallery in Detroit, MI to develop institutional programs that engaged Black and Brown culture through research, performance pedagogy, artistic practice, and community activism. Since leaving Chicago, Dr. Powell has served the students at East Los Angeles College as a tenured Professor of Communication Studies. Engaging creativity, performance, and “the power of the spoken word” as pedagogical tools, Dr. Powell used public speaking as a means for students to hone their critical thinking skills, articulate their passions, and discover their personal strengths.
As Winston-Salem Delta Fine Arts Inc.’s next Executive Director, Dr. Powell is excited to allow his administrative leadership experience to work in concert with his research, artistry, and activism. Together, the Delta Arts Center and Dr. Powell look to create more expansive avenues for discovering, creating, and preserving knowledge(s) produced by Black and African American contributors to the Arts and Humanities.
Dr. Powell is relocating from Los Angeles and will be on sight as the full-time Executive Director beginning September 27, 2021.