As curator of public programs and performance, Marie Casimir leads the development of exhibition and contemporary art-related programming that emphasizes diversity, innovation, collaboration and community. Marie brings 13 years of experience and a passion for engaging artists and community members across imaginary borders, both geographic and social, through art. She is an arts administrator, producer, multidisciplinary performing artist and educator. She currently also serves as an adjunct lecturer in the Clara Luper African and African American Studies Department at the University of Oklahoma.
Prior to moving to Oklahoma City, Marie was the associate director of Links Hall, a performance venue and incubator in Chicago that received the MacArthur Award for Creative and Effective Institutions. She has served as a curator for the National Performance Network Asia Exchange Program, as an advisory council member for the relaunch of the Robert and Erna Flagg Haitian Collection at the Milwaukee Art Museum, as co-chair of the DuSable Heritage Film Festival and was the Consulate of Haiti in Chicago’s arts and culture consultant.
In 2016, she founded Djaspora Productions to produce artistic work by BIPOC artists and facilitate cultural exchanges and performances in the United States, Haiti and Brazil. She co-founded the Instigation Festival in Chicago and New Orleans and recently partnered with Afrikanation Artists Organization to curate an interdisciplinary art exhibition, Still Here: The Cosmology of Black Resilience, at the Myriad Gardens.
Marie has received a Ragdale Artist Fellowship, OneLove Nola Residency, SixTwelve Artist in Residence, a National Performance Network Mobility Grant and has had work featured at Living Arts Tulsa, Myriad Gardens, Links Hall, Constellation, Contemporary Arts Center New Orleans, The Music Box Village and Neustadt Literary Festival at the University of Oklahoma.
Marie holds a master’s in nonprofit administration from North Park University and a Bachelor of Science in Journalism from Ithaca College.
Email: education (at) okcontemp.org
