Laurie Angela Cumbo, Neighbor

My family came to Brooklyn from North Carolina in the 1930s and settled in Bedford Stuyvesant Brooklyn. They came with an entrepreneurial spirit and opened up several businesses all along Stuyvesant Avenue. I was born and raised in the East Flatbush community of Brooklyn, New York and went to Brooklyn Technical High School, Spelman College and New York University. I was raised in the cultural institutions of Brooklyn and interned at the Brooklyn Children's Museum and the Brooklyn Museum of Art prior to starting MoCADA in 1999 in Bedford Stuyvesant. Over the last twelve years, I have devoted my professional career to building an art museum devoted to the African Diaspora in Brooklyn, New York that reflects the Borough's rich cultural diversity.