Burnaway is excited to announce a new partnership with the National Performance Network. NPN is a New Orleans-based network of artists and organizations committed to advancing racial and cultural justice through the arts. Burnaway is an online magazine that celebrates art from the South and the Caribbean. Txo initiate the partnership, Burnaway sent contributor Gabrielle Octavia Rucker to NPN’s 2025 Conference in New Orleans in early October.
Gabrielle Octavia Rucker is a writer, editor and teaching artist from the Great Lakes (Waawiiyaataanong) currently living in the Gulf Coast (Bulbancha). She is a 2020 Poetry Project Fellow and a 2016 Kimbilio Fiction Fellow. Gabrielle is the sole operator and practitioner of the The Seminary of Ecstatic Poetics, a non-traditional, non-hierarchical learning space for thepoetically inclined. To date the Seminary has taught over 300 poets and artists. Her debut poetry collection, Dereliction (2022) is currently available via The Song Cave.
Kicking off NPN’s 40th anniversary, the 2025 conference brought together artists, arts leaders, presenting arts organizations, social justice organizers, and funders to “reaffirm the power of art and culture in social movements, meaning-making, civic engagement, and liberation”. The conference’s theme—Stormshaping: Adaptation, Resistance, Reimagination—serves as a call to action in tumultuous times, to not simply weather the storms but to reshape our world through collective strength, imagination, and solidarity. The conference took place alongside the twentieth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina with specific programming to connect attendees with the complex and vibrant histories and cultures of New Orleans and the Gulf South and to uplift communities of color in the South who have historically been the most harmed by national policy.
“NPN believes criticism is an essential component of a healthy arts ecosystem and is thrilled to partner with Burnaway, whose regional storytelling offers necessary and incomparable insight into the incredible work being made by artists in the South. We recognize that we must first understand the material conditions of artists and arts organizations oppressed by political, economic, and social systems in the US in order to change these conditions and ensure they have greater resources and power. Through this partnership, NPN hopes to facilitate dialogue around issues impacting artists of color in the South and amplify their work to national audiences, build stronger regional collaborations, as well as invest in the career of a New Orleans-based writer such as Gabrielle Octavia Rucker.” – Riley Yaxley, Resource Development Manager at the National Performance Network
“We are thrilled to be able to partner with the National Performance Network, a like-minded art organization that also fights repressive forces and champions the cultural production of the American South. We have long admired the racial and social justice mission of NPN and we share in its vision of inclusion, activation, reciprocity, and resilience through art and performance in these challenging times. This partnership is an exceptional opportunity to further foster community and I can think of no one better to represent Burnaway than Gabrielle Octavia Rucker. We look forward to amplifying her perspective on the future of performance and visual art in the South as envisioned by NPN’s convening.” – Courtney McClellan, Editor and Artist Director at Burnaway
Rucker will publish an article on Burnaway that responds to the artists and culture workers presenting at the conference. Look out for Rucker’s contribution in the coming weeks.
