"Ọwọ́ kan kì í gbé'rù sórí. One hand cannot lift a load to the head. Teamwork is essential.
"Ọwọ́ kan kì í gbé'rù sórí. One hand cannot lift a load to the head. Teamwork is essential.
WHEN WE SAY BEAUCOUP HOODOO, WE DO MEAN BEAUCOUP HOODOO!
Meet Our Facilitators
Courtney Alexander
Courtney Alexander is a multimedia artist, writer, and ritual practitioner whose work operates at the intersection of art, spirit, and remembrance. Her practice is rooted in listening—attuning to body, land, ancestry, and the unseen—and translating those relationships into forms that heal, reclaim, and reconfigure meaning.
Her early work emerged from intimate inquiries into fatness, duality, and self-awareness, creating space to witness her lived experience as a Black, fat, queer woman without distortion or apology. Vulnerability was not an exposure, but a method. Art was never separate from ritual—it was the ritual.
In 2016, Courtney made history as the first Black person to successfully publish and widely distribute a tarot deck. Dust II Onyx, funded through a groundbreaking Kickstarter campaign, introduced 78 mixed-media paintings that offered Blackness not only as identity, but as a spiritual and cosmological language. The deck became a touchstone—opening doors, shifting narratives, and laying the groundwork for a larger body of work.
Building on this foundation, Courtney developed The Spiral Tarot System, an expansive reimagining of tarot that centers wholeness, cyclical wisdom, and ancestral alignment. Rather than treating tarot as a fixed structure, the Spiral positions it as a living technology—one that evolves through relationship, context, and embodied practice.
Today, Courtney’s work extends beyond any single medium. Through installations, systems, and ritual frameworks, she creates vessels that invite transformation rather than spectacle. Her practice continues to make room—for complexity, for reverence, and for those historically rendered unseen—offering art not as object, but as sustenance.
CREATOR, DUST II ONYX
Juju Bae
Osunfunmilola affectionately known as Juju Bae is a practitioner of multiple West African and diasporic traditions, including Hoodoo Conjure, Ifa, and is an Ọṣun priestess in the Yoruba Orisha tradition. She is the author of The Book of Juju: Africana Spirituality for Healing, Liberation, and Self-Discovery, a work of creative nonfiction that combines memoir, history, and guided prompts for readers to begin (or strengthen) their ancestral spiritual practice. She is the founder of Juju Bae, a multimedia Black-centric resource that seeks to demystify traditional spirituality through storytelling and lighthearted conversations with twenty-first-century relevance. She is the host of the award winning show A Little Juju podcast, which encourages people of the Diaspora to find a home in Africana spiritual spaces and thought. She starred in the 2023 Hulu paranormal docuseries Living for the Dead, produced by Kristen Stewart. Juju is a sought-after spiritual teacher who loves to sing and holds a BA in psychology from Spelman College. She lives in Brooklyn, NY.
AUTHOR, THE BOOK OF JUJU 
Lucumi Obatala Priest and IyanifaIya taj anwar baoll
taj anwar is a native Atlantan and descendant of the well-known Perrin Family (South Carolinian geechees who relocated to Atlanta after World War II). Tajhiek Anwar Baoll (taj’s full name) is a mother, sociologist, veteran community organizer, activist, farmer, direct- entry midwife and breastfeeding specialist, business owner, event organizer, panelist, initiated/ crowned Iyalosa Obatala in the Lucumi/ Santeria tradition and Iyanifa in traditional Isese (Ifa). Her businesses, events, and co-ops have refined her skills and centered them around the guiding principles of food, clothing, and shelter; prison reform, and access to quality medical care.
taj anwar founded MOBBB- Mothers of Black and Brown Babies in 2006, which naturally evolved into Real Whole, Inc (501c3) and the Real Whole House; a community holistic health center, bed and breakfast, birth and postpartum center was founded by taj anwar, in which she serves as an innkeeper, farmer, birth worker attendant, and caretaker.
In addition to her community work, taj is also a career paramedic Captain with a major metropolitan public safety department, a critical and trauma care Paramedic for the number one trauma hospital in the state, a civil service member in Atlanta; and a blue-collar, working-class champion.
Nicknamed “Beretta Scott King,” BSK for short was earned in her youth for a being proficient firearm operator of the Beretta M9. taj anwar can also be found working with weaponry training classes all over the country.
taj anwar is an active member of the FTP Movement, Zulu Nation, Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc., 256 Arts and an affiliate of several community organizations.
“I belong to the people. I belong to the city of Atlanta. I belong to the world. It’s not about me. It’s not about who the credit goes to. It’s about the work and getting the work done.”
~ taj anwar
Heather Hilliard Bonds
Heather Hilliard-Bonds is a local artist in the Altadena and Pasadena area. She has been an artist since she first picked up a crayon. Heather currently teaches art at various facilities in conjunction with the Armory Center for the Arts. She has also work for the city of Pasadena and the Pasadena School district.
Heather was born in Fullerton California, but raised by her mother Nancy Hilliard in Pasadena California and has lived here most of her life. She has always had a love for children and began her career in childcare. From this experience and an internship with the Armory Center for the Arts she realized she could combine her enjoyment of working with children with her other passion in life which is art. This directed her down the path of becoming an Art Instructor for many children in Altadena and Pasadena.
Heather attended college at Texas Southern University and later returned to Pasadena attending Pasadena City College and Cal State of Los Angeles. She has a degree in Art Education. She works with all ages, from preschoolers to the elderly and enjoys it all. She has also worked many for many years with children with special needs and with senior citizens in assisted living programs who also were diagnosed with special needs.
She has participated in several art shows such as Family, Friends and Black History month at Loma Alta Park in Altadena, Armory Center of the Arts and Art Walk in Los Angeles at Urban Life Cleaners and Gallery as well as Art Night in Pasadena at Jackie Robinson Center, just to name a few. She has several murals painted around the community. Norma Coombs Alternative school displays a school lion on the play ground as well as an angel created in the middle of Praise Tabernacle Church. She also has collaborative mural pieces displayed at many local Parks, Victory Park, Villa Park, Jackie Robinson Park and Escalon Head Start preschool in Altadena all created under her direction.
Heather is a proud mother of four and a grandmother. She says she can see the influences of her love in art trickling down to her children and loves it. She hopes to bring smiles to the children she works with and a greater appreciation of art to the next generation.
CONTEMPORARY VISUAL ARTIST
Bossy Bruja
Paris Marion (also known as Ayodele Fuega) is the owner of Bossy Bruja -- an online brand and eCommerce shop dedicated to serving reawakening witches and practicing occultists of varying paths and diverse backgrounds. She started her spiritual journey as a yogi when she was 17 and has worked as a diviner for 14 years. She currently teaches majikal theory and practice through her new app BRUJAS which welcomes all practitioners. She is an initiate of Palo Mayombe and has received her warriors in the Lucumi faith. Her favorite work is crafting oils and sharing daily prayers with her online community to inspire others to pursue a direct and personal relationship with the Divine. To find more information about Paris and her work through Bossy Bruja you can find her online at www.instagram.com/bossybruja and www.bossybruja.com.
FOUNDER + OWNER BoSSY BRUJA
FOUNDER, BLACK GIRLS GUIDE TO BE MENOPAUSEIya Omisade Burney-Scott
Omisade Burney-Scott (she/her) is a seventh-generation North Carolinian, Black Southern feminist, priest, storyteller, and reproductive justice advocate. She is also the Founder and Chief Menopause Steward of The Black Girls’ Guide to Surviving Menopause (BGG2SM), a multidisciplinary narrative and culture-shift Reproductive Justice project focused on normalizing menopause by centering the stories of Black women, LGBTQIA+ individuals, formerly incarcerated/system-impacted people, and other marginalized groups within the Global Majority.
Founded in 2019, BGG2SM is rooted in the principles of Black feminism, Reproductive Justice, and Healing Justice. Its core program offerings include intergenerational community programs, peer learning and menopause training, leadership and advocacy focused on menopause, a digital zine titled "Messages from the Menopausal Multiverse," and a podcast that offers guidance and support for marginalized communities navigating the various stages of Menopause.
She has been featured in prominent media outlets, such as Katie Couric Media, Oprah Daily, Forbes, VOGUE, WebMD, NPR, The Washington Post, Callaloo Literary Journal, and The New York Times. Additionally, she has written articles and essays for Yes! Magazine, Blavity, Oprah Daily, The Honey Pot Company, Scalawag, Ms. Magazine, and the anthology “Bloody Hell!
Adventures in Menopause From Around the World” edited by feminist author and journalist Mona Eltahawy. Additionally, Omisade's work has been featured in the documentaries “The M Factor: Shedding the Silence of Menopause” and “Periodical”.
Over the past 30 years, Omisade has been deeply involved in social justice movements seeking to liberate marginalized communities, beginning with her own. Currently, she serves on the advisory boards of Elektra Health and the Honey Pot Company Pulse Panel. In 2023, Omisade was awarded a Soros Justice Fellowship from the Open Society Foundation. This fellowship supported her efforts to expand the narrative shift work of the Black Girl's Guide to Surviving Menopause by including the stories and experiences of formerly incarcerated and system-impacted individuals.
In October 2025, the Black Girl’s Guide to Surviving Menopause hosted an innovative intergenerational menopause conference catering to the Global Majority, the queer community, and current and formerly incarcerated individuals. In 2026, BGG2SM plans to launch a research project advancing intersectional research, led by our team in partnership with NYU's School of Nursing. This project will be informed by the lives of Black women, queer individuals, trans and gender-expansive people, as well as those who are currently or formerly incarcerated, and anyone else marginalized in terms of care.
Omisade is an initiate priest of Osun and Egungun in the IFA Yoruba spiritual tradition. She is a 1989 graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill. She resides in Durham, North Carolina, and is the proud mother of two beautiful sons.
Djali Cepeda-Brown
Djali Brown-Cepeda (JAH-LEE) is a Capricornian Cultural Preservationist and Visual Storyteller, rooted in tenets of reclamation and rematriatrion, her work as a film and television producer centers oral tradition and lived experiences as a tool of cultural restoration. An archivist, she is book worm and self-taught public historian, with a penchant for all things red, black and green. An Olorisha Yemayá, memory worker, alchemist.
A steward of remembrance, a mother to a sun. An eldest daughter and vinyl collector of Caribbean, Afro Native, and Southern Heritage. Fifth Generation Gullah Geechee from unceeded Wecquaesgeek Territory in Lenapehoking (Upper Manhattan, New York City). She enjoys tending to her altars and conspiring with the Universe for all good things.
You can find her annotating her books while, to, sipping on wine she usually can’t afford, and any Pilsner or Lager. Prefers a cup of dark roast coffee, speaking to spirit, and being barefoot on the grass. Where she goes, so do her ancestors.
FILMMAKER + FOUNDER, NUEVAYORKINAS
Iyalode Yeyefini Efundobade
Iyalode (Queen Mother) Yeyefini Efunbolade is an internationally renowned dynamic author, spiritual life coach, respected diviner, proven spiritual reader, and trusted counselor for whom she is consistently sought. She is the founder and director of the Self-Empowerment Intensive Experience (SEIE), the founder of the International Institute of African Studies and Knowledge, Incorporated (IIASK, Inc.), one of the founders of Oyo Tunji African Village in Sheldon, South Carolina as well as the President of Yeyefini.com/Balanced Living.
She is a bi-lingual African Latina born in the Republic of Panama. Iyalode Yeyefini has over 50 years of experience utilizing a variety of unique healing methods as an African Cultural Consultant, Spiritual Counselor, Holistic Life Coach, Teacher, Diviner, and Ordained Priestess who has initiated, ordained, trained, and mentored over 150 godchildren in the U.S. and other parts of the world into the African spiritual practice.
She has inspired spiritual rejuvenation, healed negative thought patterns, and assisted in the elimination of blockages of present life challenges.
Iyalode Yeyefini is a shape-shifter, light-worker who understands the limitless potential of Spirit, its complexity, and its ever-evolving nature. She is committed to communicating through Spirit, revealing the inner-workings of her client’s needs, meeting them wherever they are on their journey, and guiding them towards fully acknowledging and embracing the power of their mind, body, and spirit. She believes that through this realization change is ushered as the spirit begins to remember its purpose and transformation begins.
As an ordained Priestess, she has counselled and performed countless weddings; naming ceremonies for infants, children, and adults; and grief healing ceremonies. He infectious love is felt across the Republic of Panama, the United States, Costa Rica, Ghana, Nigeria, Barbados, and Jamaica as she conducts and advises thousands of seekers.
Iyalode Yeyefini Efunbolade’s spiritual walk of over 50 years has honored her with a full roster of spiritual gifts and accolades including training and ordaining some of the world’s most superlative Priests and Priestess in the Ifa system. Iyalode Yeyefini’s vivacious and loving personality leaves you feeling as though you have known her all of your life. She is the proud mother of three children and six grandchildren. Additionally, her Rites of Passage for tweens and teens (ages 10 to 18) has received notoriety worldwide as she continues to empower young people.
Int’l Elder, Author + Co-Founder Oyotunji Village
FOUNDER, BLACK LOTUS HOLISTIC HEALTH COLLECTIVEDr. Cassandra Renee Ferguson
Dr. Cassandra R. Ferguson is a highly accomplished and dedicated mental health professional with a diverse and global impact. As a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC), PhD, published author, and Master Addiction Counselor, Dr. Ferguson has demonstrated an unwavering commitment to improving the mental health and well-being of individuals worldwide. She is a seasoned Global Chaplain, International Trauma Specialist, HIV Counselor/Educator, Coach, and Trainer, who has provided her expertise to communities and organizations across various countries.
Additionally, as the founder of Diaspora Within Inc, a global nonprofit organization, Dr. Ferguson has pioneered efforts to destigmatize mental illness and create access to mental health treatment in underserved regions such as Senegal, South Africa, Germany, Thailand, Philippines, Ethiopia, India, and Kuwait. Her leadership has led her to engage with high-level officials, including the Ethiopian President, Ethiopian Ambassador, Ethiopian Minister of Health, and U.S. Embassy of Ethiopia, on platforms aimed at reducing the stigma surrounding mental health.
Dr. Ashley Gripper
Dr. Ashley Gripper is a grower, healer, spiritual herbalist, and community-rooted scholar from Philadelphia. Ashley is the creator of Land Based Jawns, a care-based initiative cultivating spaces for safety, softness, and connection through herbal medicine, workshops, and skillshares. Rooted in ancestral wisdom and inspired by Octavia Butler’s Parables, her work reframes preparedness and community safety as practices of healing and collective power.
She carries this same commitment into her role as an Assistant Professor in Drexel University’s Department of Environmental Health and Ubuntu Center on Racism, Global Movements, and Population Health Equity. There, she supports students and researches the ways we remember, return to, and practice land-based ancestral wisdom.
Ashley holds a bachelor’s degree in Sociology from Arcadia University, an MPH in Epidemiology from Columbia University, and a PhD in Population Health Sciences from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Founder, LAND BASED JAWNS
Iya Michelle Hunton
Michelle Hunton was born in New York to a blended family, the seventh of eight children, andraised in Hempstead, Long Island. Her early life was marked by contrast—the beauty and the struggle. Against the odds, she enrolled at North Carolina A&T State University, where a profound spiritual shift occurred. Later she With a Master of Divinity and CPE completed, Michelle entered federal service as a Chaplain with the Bureau of Prisons, relocating her family to Rochester, Minnesota, and later to Pekin, Illinois, where she helped open a new institution—an uncommon honor early in her tenure. It was during this period that her theology shifted profoundly. Answering the call of Orisha, guided by Egun, she began her journey into African Traditional Religion. Returning to New York, she continued her service with the Bureau of Prisons and, in 1998, was initiated into the cult of Ọ̀sóòsi by Chief Bey Aya Ilu and Iya Barbara Bey Ogunrelekun.
Now known as Iya Michelle, she has served on numerous boards, received multiple awards, and recently spoke at the United Nations on protecting the right to worship according to ancestral belief systems. She is a contributing writer to two books and the author of The Adura Circle: Prayers for the White Table. A full-time Yoruba priest, Iya Michelle regularly conducts Misas and creates sacred garments and beadwork for Ocha ceremonies. Prayer, Orisha, and service remain the center of her life.
ELDER + author of Adura CIRCLe: PRayers for the white table
FOUNDER, SAMANTHA JO'S BALMYARDSamantha Jo
Samantha Jo is the founder of Samantha Jo’s Balm Yard, a botanica and apothecary rooted in ancestral wisdom, sensory alchemy, and everyday ritual. Inspired by her Geechee roots and Southern lineage, she creates intentional skincare, small-batch perfumery, medicinal herbs, and spiritual tools designed to support emotional, mental, and spiritual well-being. Through her offerings and community workshops, Samantha blends herbalism, scent, and ritual into accessible practices that honor cultural heritage while inviting healing into daily life.
Darlene Okpo
Darlene Okpo is the founder and owner of Adanne Bookshop, a community-centered independent bookstore dedicated to celebrating Black and African diaspora voices. Founded with the belief that “Reading is Healing,” Adanne Bookshop serves as a cultural hub where literature, art, and intentional gathering intersect.
Born and raised in New York City, Darlene created Adanne as more than a bookstore, it is a third space. A space where children discover themselves in books, where authors feel deeply seen, and where community members gather for workshops, conversations, and creative expression. Through curated author talks, youth literacy programming, hands-on craft workshops, and immersive cultural events, she has built a space that centers identity, storytelling, and connection.
In addition to running Adanne, Darlene has worked in education and youth programming, designing literacy-focused curricula and leading community initiatives that amplify marginalized voices. Her work bridges entrepreneurship, cultural stewardship, and education.
Whether hosting a nameplate workshop, facilitating a discussion on Black girlhood, or building partnerships that expand access to books, Darlene’s work is rooted in one guiding principle: books change lives, but community sustains them.
Founder, ADANNE BOOKSTORE
Sunni Patterson
New Orleans Native and Visionary, Sunni Patterson, is an internationally acclaimed Poet, Performer, Workshop Facilitator, Certified Spiritual Life Coach/Consultant, and an Initiated Priestess and Minister. She began her career as a full-time high school Teacher, and much of her life since has been devoted to serving as a Cultural Worker and Activist. Armed with an engaging story and voice, Sunni deliberately uses art, poetry, and praise (Ancestral remembrance) to encourage dialogue, connectivity, spiritual awareness, and healing. She has had the privilege of studying under great Scholars and Teachers, allowing her to become a diligent student in the Healing and Spiritual Arts. Her Artistry and Gift has allowed her to grace a plethora of stages and platforms. Whether speaking at TEDWomen, featuring on Grammy award winning Hip-Hop albums, officiating a wedding, or cooking up breakfast for families in the Community, you can rest assured, Sunni’s way and words bring us all to a place of recollection, remembrance, and hope.
Sunni is a 2020/2021 John O’Neal Cultural Arts Fellow. She currently serves as a Resident Artist for both the City of New Orleans’ Claiborne Corridor Cultural Initiative and Junebug Productions. She is also co-founder, along with Scientist and Atmospheric Chemist, Cherelle Blazer, of Environmental Arts and Public Health Organization, Breath is Lyfe.
IYANIFA + MULTIDISCIPLINARY ARTIST
Liberation cartographer Saki Savavi
Saki Savavi is a liberation cartographer whose work examines how spatial narratives challenge colonial frameworks and heal disconnection from land and lineage. Their practice integrates African American folk traditions through monthly fire ceremonies in the Sonoran Desert and archival research that centers counter-cartographic methodologies.
Savavi created the Leyline Almanac, an annual planning tool mapping sacred sites and liberation movements across cosmic time, and the Great Hoodoo Migration Maps, tracing how Black Americans encoded spiritual knowledge into geography. Their work bridges rigorous historical research with embodied spiritual practice. Their Substack Wayfinder's Field Notes explores these intersections, and they are currently completing a documentary on their desert-based fire practice.
Savavi's counter-cartography positions mapping as repair work for descendants of chattel slavery navigating forced separation and insurgent survival. Through labs, consultations, and published work, they build tools helping communities orient toward their own histories and practice spatial sovereignty.
Tangina Stone
I am a multidisciplinary artist based in Brooklyn, NY. I have ten years of experience working in music and advocacy. I am driven by the possibilities for radical healing and reimagining a better world. Art is my vehicle to contribute to the future that I believe in.
MULTIDISCIPLINARY ARTIST
Spyboy Walter
Spy Boy Walter Sandifer III of the Beautiful Creole Apache is a second-generation Masking Indian born into the Creole Wild West tribe in 1996. His father, Walter Sandifer Jr., also known as Big Chief Beautiful, masked as a Spy Boy for the Creole Wild West for over 20 years and introduced Walter to the sewing techniques when he was 11 years old. He has been turning heads and dropping jaws with his unique art sense and singing skills ever since. Spy Boy Walter has performed onstage at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival numerous times, holds beading classes for youth, and teaches Masking drumming rhythms in local schools to preserve the unique culture and tradition of New Orleans, Louisiana. He is a young entrepreneur, a family man, and the owner and operator of Tribal Pro Moving.
SPYBOY, CREOLE APACHE MASKING INDIAN TRIBE