Celebrating Ndi-Igbo

Faraday Okoro is a New York City based Nigerian-American filmmaker. Named after Michael Faraday, a 19th century English physicist and chemist, the idea of pursuing a career in science has been instilled in Faraday since birth. Though, despite his upbringing and name for that matter, Faraday was inspired to pursue a career in filmmaking after watching 20 minutes of the film Road to Perdition . He graduated cum laude from Howard University, a historically black college in the heart of Washington, DC. At Howard, he was awarded the Trustees’ Scholarship, which allowed him to attend college tuition-free. Currently, Faraday is completing an MFA in filmmaking at NYU Film School, where he is a recipient of the Peter D. Gould Scholarship. Faraday’s debut short film Full-Windsor has screened in 14 major film festivals, including the Los Angeles Film Festival, Austin Film Festival, Chicago International Film Festival, Seattle International Film Festival and the Montr...

Iké Udé is a photographer, performance artist, author and publisher. He is best known for his conceptual photographic portraits that explore issues of representation and sexual, gender, cultural, and stylistic identity.  Born and raised in Lagos, Nigeria, Ike attended the Government Secondary School, a British boarding school in Afikpo Nigeria. He was a habitué of London before he moved to New York[2] in 1981 to study Media Communications at Hunter College, CUNY. He began his artistic art career in the late 1980s with abstract painting and drawing. Since the 1990s, photography has been Udé's primary medium Udé is the author of Style File: The World's Most Elegantly Dressed, published by Harper Collins in 2008. The volume profiles 55 influential arbiters of style. The publication provides information on all of the 55 women and men profiled, including John Galliano, Oscar de la Renta, Carolina Herrera, Diane von Furstenberg, Dita Von Teese, and Christian Louboutin. ...

One to watch Ijeoma is the CEO/Co­founder of Beavly. Beavly is an online marketplace that connects people to top professionals with the purpose of learning alongside them in their workplace. Trainees gain practical knowledge and hands-on experience by interacting physically with the professionals. Ijeoma Oguegbu graduated from the Meltwater Entrepreneurial School of Technology ( MEST ), a non-profit post-graduate training and mentoring program and startup incubator, in June, 2016. She had studied Computer Science and Business Management at Wisconsin International University College in Ghana. Sources: AngelList, LeadingLadies Africa, SheLeadsAfrica, TechPoint Nigeria

Happy New Year Dame Elizabeth Nneka Anionwu DBE FRCN is a nurse, health expert, tutor, lecturer and medical professor of Irish and Igbo descent. Elizabeth contributed to opening the first sickle cell and thalassemia counselling centre in the UK. As the Dean of the School of Adult Nursing Studies and a Professor of Nursing at University of West London, she helped create the Mary Seacole Centre for Nursing Practice.  In 2001, Anionwu, along with Professor Atkin, wrote the book The Politics of Sickle Cell and Thalassemia. Anionwu then in 2005 wrote a book called A Short History of Mary Seacole. Dame Elizabeth was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 2001 for her services to nursing. In 2004 she was awarded the Fellowship Of the Royal College of Nursing (FRCN) for developing the sickle cell and thalassemia counselling centre. In 2007, following her retirement, she was appointed Emeritus Professor for Nursing at the University of West London. In ...

Chioma Ude is the enigmatic founder and executive director of Africa International Film Festival (AFRIFF). An avid film watcher and commentator, her passion for the industry grew more intense after her involvement in the production of the 2007 Nigerian Film and Video Censors Board (NFVCB) UK Roadshow. The ensuing relationship culminated in Chioma producing the 2008 Africa Movie Academy Awards and the institution of a brainchild of hers called the AMAA Charity Benefit. This novel initiative was designed to be an annual Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) platform for industry practitioners and stakeholders to give back to society.  In 2009, she went on to become the local producer of the ION International Film Festival (IONIFF), held in Port Harcourt, Rivers State in Nigeria. IONIFF is a global touring festival originating from Hollywood, whose objective is the promotion of global awareness and peace through arts, culture and films. Chioma has a degree in marketing fro...

Yvonne Orji is an actress and is best known for her work on HBO’s  Insecure (2016), Sex (Therapy) with the Jones(2013) and The Conversation: Talk Show Series (2016). Yvonne was born in Nigeria and moved to the U.S. when she 6 years old. Orji was on a path to become a medical doctor, but the opportunity to be in a beauty pageant changed that. She decided to defy her parents’ wishes and pursue a career in writing, stand-up comedy, and acting. She began writing for the TVOne show Love That Girl, which starred Tatyana Ali, and was named the new Queen of Comedy by Ayiba Magazine.  Yvonne also created a web series called First Gen. The show told the story of a Nigerian immigrant daughter who forgoes her medical degree to pursue stardom. The series’ pilot went viral and Orji gained attention from HBO producers who then cast her in Issa Rae’s new show, Insecure. Yvonne has a bachelor's degree in sociology and a master's degree in public health from Geor...

Ifeanyi Awachie is a writer and curator. She studied English at Yale, where she produced a multimedia novella as her senior project in the competitive Writing Concentration. She wrote, performed, and competed with Teeth Slam Poets, Yale's nationally-recognized slam poetry team, of which she was Artistic Director. She was chosen to perform her poem Let's Commence as the Ivy Ode, an annual tribute to Yale College, at the 2014 Class Day Ceremony. A visual thinker, Ifeanyi uses photography as a means of storytelling. Determined to find images of Nigeria she sensed were missing from mainstream media, she traveled alone to the country for the first time since birth to start the multimedia project Summer in Igboland, aimed at documenting Nigeria in a nuanced way and rebranding it in a positive light. She won the Tristan Perlroth Prize for Summer Foreign Travel to support the project and has hosted multiple exhibits at Yale. In 2015, she published a book based on her experienc...