Dr. LISA WHITTInGTON 

Dr. Lisa Whittington is a multidisciplinary visual artist, filmmaker, educator, author, cultural critic, and Cultural Arts & Heritage Officer for Integrative Arts Creations, Inc. (IAC). Recognized as a Steward of Black Memory, she is dedicated to preserving cultural heritage through the visual arts, storytelling, education, and public scholarship. Through her leadership, she advances IAC's mission of empowering individuals and strengthening communities by connecting history, creativity, education, and cultural understanding through transformative arts experiences.

Dr. Whittington earned her Doctor of Education in Art Education from the University of Georgia and is a Distinguished Fellow of the Hambidge Center for Creative Arts and Sciences. For more than three decades, she has cultivated a research-based artistic practice that bridges fine art, scholarship, filmmaking, design, and storytelling, demonstrating how the arts can preserve history, inspire dialogue, and promote social understanding across generations.

Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally and is included in the permanent collections of the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum and the United States Embassy in Yaoundé, Cameroon. She created thirty-five original paintings for the Apple TV+ series Swagger, and six of her works appear in the forthcoming A Different World reboot. Through monumental works such as Greenwood, along with her films, writing, and public scholarship, she challenges audiences to reconsider whose histories are preserved, whose voices have been overlooked, and how art can serve as a living archive of Black history, culture, and collective memory.

As Cultural Arts & Heritage Officer, Dr. Whittington provides strategic leadership for IAC's cultural arts initiatives, heritage preservation projects, public art experiences, educational programming, exhibitions, and interdisciplinary collaborations. She works alongside artists, educators, historians, cultural organizations, and community partners to create opportunities that celebrate diverse cultural narratives, preserve historical legacies, and inspire meaningful community engagement through the arts.

Her forthcoming memoir, A Museum of My Own Making, and her forthcoming book, Curated Out: Black Women Artists and the Museum's Deliberate Silence, further demonstrate her commitment to documenting overlooked histories, advancing cultural equity, and expanding public understanding of the role artists play in preserving collective memory.

Through her work with Integrative Arts Creations, Dr. Whittington champions the belief that the arts are essential to preserving cultural heritage, fostering education, inspiring civic engagement, and building stronger communities. Her leadership encourages individuals to recognize that history is not simply remembered—it is actively preserved, interpreted, and transformed through creative expression and purposeful stewardship.