Marie T. Cochran is a native of Toccoa, GA in the Northeast Georgia Mountains. She is the founding curator of the Affrilachian Artist Project, which celebrates the intersection of cultures in Appalachia and nurtures a network of individuals and organizations committed to the sustainability of a diverse region. As a visual artist, Cochran creates mixed media pieces that address community history and are often grounded in interdisciplinary dialogues focused on social justice. She has exhibited extensively throughout the Southeast and nationally. Cochran received degrees from the University of Georgia (BFA) and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (MFA). She has been an art faculty member at colleges in Georgia, New Jersey, Maryland, and North Carolina. Cochran was recently named the Lehman Brady Visiting Professorship in Documentary Studies at Duke University and American Studies and the University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill.
Marie T. Cochran uses visual art to ignite sustainable collaboration in the pursuit of social justice. Born and raised in Toccoa, Georgia, she received degrees from the University of Georgia (BFA) and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (MFA). Selected exhibition venues include the High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA; Lyndon Johnson Presidential Library & Museum, Austin, TX; the Center for African American History and Culture, Smithsonian Institute, Washington, DC; and the Studio Museum of Harlem, NYC. Fall 2011, she co-curated the pioneering exhibition, Common Ground, Affrilachia! Where I’m From at the August Wilson African American Cultural Center in Pittsburgh, PA. Cochran is the founding curator of the Affrilachian Artist Project which celebrates the intersection of cultures in Appalachia and provides a networking platform for African American creatives.
A brief selection of Cochran’s awards include a Georgia Council for the Arts individual artist’s grant; a Mid-Atlantic Arts Council’s “Artist as Catalyst” grant; NEA/Southern Arts Federation Sculpture Fellowship, and an NEA Fast-Track Challenge Grant. She is included in Southern Women: More than 100 Stories of Innovators, Artists, and Icons, from the editors of Garden & Gun magazine (2019, HarperCollins Cochran was the 2020-2022 Lehman Brady Visiting Professor, with Duke University’s the Center for Documentary Studies and the the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill’s Department of American Studies.