Gatekeeper Adrian Elim

Featured Leader: Gatekeeper Adrian Elim

Photographer: Cocoa Rae

Cocoa Rae David is a New York based visual artist, curator, photographer and business owner of By Cocoa Rae LLC, who creates captivating portraits and art of unique and diverse people and captures their true essence. Her style consists of vivid colors, Afrocentric shapes and vibes, as well as bold lighting techniques. Cocoa's goal is to create a new style of photography and art that promotes individuality, authenticity, body positivity and self love.

Essayist: Jevon Cooper

JEVON COOPER, is a writer, artist and creative born
and raised in Rochester, NY. Writing as early as they can remember, Jevon’s writing is unapologetically personal, inviting readers to see the world, and the ways that it can be imagined, through the experiences of a person living at the intersection of Black, queer, femme and gender nonconforming. Jevon has also contributed to HIV/AIDS work in the Black LGBTQ community in Western New York, working as a health educator since 2009, focusing on how identity impacts health outcomes for communities and using history to inform the future of personal liberation and autonomy. If you have been to a ball in Rochester then it’s likely you have seen them there, dazzling the crowd in the vogue femme category.

“I just be as kind as I can and have as much fun as I can.”