AT A GLANCE

• $9,828+ in grant and residency funding secured

• $6,000 directed toward BRED Hip Hop Theatre Festival youth and family programming

• 11+ in-depth Music Dad + Daughter interviews

• 17 selected exhibition artists

• 4 public exhibition activations

• 36 families served through free Hip-Hop Family Hours (BRED Hip Hop Festival)

• 50,000+ Instagram views across 23 project-related posts

• 2,700+ Instagram likes

• 300+ Instagram comments

• Ages 13–65+ reached through Instagram content

• 100+ exhibition visitors

• 18+ paid artists, vendors, cultural workers + organizations

• 2 media features

ABOUT BABA JUKE™

Baba Juke™ is a storytelling and cultural preservation project created by Detroit artist and storyteller Brittini Ward that documents the musical relationships between fathers and their daughters.

The project began as a personal tribute to Ward's late father, Lamarr Ward, whose relationship to music deeply influenced her own creative life. Born from grief, remembrance, and gratitude, Baba Juke™ grew from Ward's realization that many daughters carried similar stories of musical inheritance—fathers who introduced them to instruments, shared records, brought them to rehearsals, played music throughout their homes, or simply gave them their first relationship to sound.

Through oral history interviews, photography, visual art, musical artifacts, sound, and community storytelling, Baba Juke™ preserves these relationships as part of Detroit's larger cultural memory. The archive honors professional musicians alongside DJs, community artists, collectors, passionate listeners, and everyday fathers whose influence helped shape the artists their daughters would become.

At its core, Baba Juke™ explores music not only as art, but as relationship, mentorship, memory, and inheritance. What began with one father and daughter ultimately became a multimedia exhibition, living oral history archive, series of artist activations, community programming, and an opportunity to invest resources back into Detroit's creative ecosystem.

“Baba Juke™ is always growing, note by note.”

MY ROLE

Founder + Creator • Creative Director • Lead Storyteller • Oral Historian + Interviewer • Producer • Curator • Archive Development • Fundraising + Grant Management • Partnership Development • Artist Coordination • Community Engagement • Marketing + Communications

Through Eye N Eye™, Brittini led Baba Juke™ from concept through implementation—developing the project's creative direction, conducting oral histories, building relationships with participating families, coordinating artists and partners, securing funding, producing public programming, managing communications, developing the archive, and stewarding the project through its exhibition and community investment phases.

PROJECT ROLLOUT

STORY COLLECTION + ARCHIVE DEVELOPMENT

Identified Music Dads and Daughters throughout Detroit's creative community, conducted in-depth oral history interviews, gathered family histories and materials, and began developing the Baba Juke™ archive.

ARTIST CALL + EXHIBITION DEVELOPMENT

Launched a public artist call, selected 17 artists, coordinated participating artwork, and collaborated with Omo Misha and Irwin House Art Gallery to translate Baba Juke's themes into a multimedia exhibition.

JUNE–JULY 2026 | EXHIBITION + ACTIVATIONS

Opened Baba Juke™ at Irwin House Art Gallery and extended the exhibition through live music, artist conversations, storytelling, sound, performance, wellness, and community-centered activations.

AUGUST 2026 | COMMUNITY INVESTMENT

Extended Baba Juke™ beyond the gallery through the BRED Hip Hop Theatre Festival, directing $6,000 toward free youth and family arts programming.

ARCHIVE + LEGACY

Preserved interviews and multimedia documentation digitally while developing a forthcoming sonic collaboration with Bryce Detroit using excerpts from the Baba Juke™ oral histories.

FROM ARCHIVE TO EXHIBITION

On June 2026, the stories gathered through Baba Juke™ moved from private conversations into public space.

Presented at Irwin House Art Gallery in Detroit and curated in partnership with Omo Misha, the first Baba Juke™ exhibition transformed oral history into an immersive multimedia environment.

The exhibition brought together recorded interviews, documentary photography, installations, visual artwork, sound, artifacts, family histories, music, and commissioned or selected work from collaborating artists.

The exhibition intentionally opened during African American Music Month and in proximity to Father's Day, Juneteenth, and Men's Mental Health Month, situating these intimate family stories within broader conversations about Black fatherhood, musical history, emotional inheritance, and cultural memory.

Selected Artists : Lloyd Cheatham • Donald Calloway • Kahn Davison • Thermo Flame • Javier Gonzalez • Escada Gordon • Brian Johnson • Lance Johnson • Jonathan Kimble • Munashe Miller • Venus Moon • Peach • Maliek Phillips • Dawud Shabazz • Natasha Elle Thomas • Brittini Ward (Eye N Eye™) • Dominic Watson

BUILDING THE BABA JUKE™ ARCHIVE

Before Baba Juke™ became an exhibition, it was an act of listening.

Brittini conducted in-depth conversations with fathers and daughters about the music that moved through their relationships.

Participants reflected on childhood memories, instruments, records, performances, creative careers, family traditions, and the often subtle ways fathers influenced who their daughters eventually became.

The resulting archive brings together:

Oral history interviews, documentary photography, Family photographs, Musical artifacts and memorabilia, Recorded sound, Personal reflections, Video, Visual art, Stories of family, creativity, fatherhood, and cultural inheritance.

By the exhibition's opening, Baba Juke™ had completed more than 11 in-depth interviews while building relationships with dozens of additional music dads and daughters throughout Detroit's creative community.

ACTIVATING THE ARCHIVE

Baba Juke™ was designed as more than a static exhibition. Throughout its run, artists, Music Dads and Daughters, performers, vendors, and community members returned to the space through programming that allowed the archive to continue generating new experiences.

OPENING DAY

Baba Juke™ opened June 7, 2026, bringing the project's stories into public space for the first time. The exhibition combined oral histories, artwork, photography, sound, artifacts, and multimedia storytelling, while 17 selected artists interpreted Baba Juke's themes through their individual practices. Music daughter KRW DJed as fathers, daughters, artists, families, and community members gathered. More than an exhibition opening, the afternoon created space to celebrate, grieve, remember, and publicly honor the influence fathers have had on their daughters' creative lives.

MONDAY NIGHT LIVE W/ BRITNEY B. HAYDEN

Monday Night Live transformed Baba Juke™ into an immersive evening of live music, storytelling, food, wine, audience participation, and reflection. Baba Juke participant and Music Daughter Britney B. Hayden performed live and later led a closing sound circle alongside Eye N Eye™, while Nothing But Flavor LLC provided food and The Black Sip offered tastings highlighting Black-owned wine brands. The activation allowed audiences to witness musical inheritance in motion while expanding the project through performance, hospitality, and local business collaboration.

BABA JUKE™ ARTIST TALK

The June 26 Artist Talk brought selected artists, Music Dads and Daughters, and audiences together to explore the stories behind the exhibition. Artists discussed their interpretations of music, memory, identity, family, and cultural inheritance, while participating families shared reflections from their own histories. Brittini discussed Baba Juke's origins, oral history process, and the role of storyholding in listening to, preserving, translating, and returning community stories. The conversation reinforced Baba Juke™ as an archive created with community, not simply about community.

STARKID JUPITER: STARSEED ON A MISSION

On July 3, Starkid Jupiter activated Baba Juke™ through poetic storytelling, live music, a 432Hz sound bath, guided breathwork, open mic participation, vendors, and community connection. The experience expanded Baba Juke's exploration of sound into its relationship with the body, reflection, wellness, and collective care. By inviting audiences to contribute their own voices and experiences, Starseed on a Mission transformed the gallery from a place of observation into a participatory space for story, sound, and connection.

BABA JUKE™ X BRED HIP HOP THEATRE FESTIVAL

When shifts in partner capacity changed Baba Juke's original community programming plan, Eye N Eye™ pivoted by partnering with the BRED Hip Hop Theatre Festival, directing $6,000 in Wayne Metro funding toward an aligned Detroit-based effort.

The funding supported Hip-Hop Family Hours, a free experience where 36 families, ranging from newborns to grandparents, explored MCing, Breaking, Graffiti Art, DJing, and Knowledge through interactive theater, movement, improv storytelling, visual art, STEAM activities, and sound exploration.

Funding supported artists, educators, facilitators, production professionals, food, materials, and educational documentation while compensating Detroit creatives for their work. The partnership demonstrated an important principle of Eye N Eye™'s community-centered practice:

The method can change while the responsibility to the story and community remains.

Through BRED, Baba Juke™ became not only a recipient of cultural investment, but a conduit for moving those resources back into community.

[BRED PHOTO / VIDEO GALLERY]

FUNDING + RESOURCE STEWARDSHIP

Baba Juke™ secured $9,828+ in external grant and residency support across its exhibition, community programming, and creative development.

$6,000 | WAYNE METRO - Directed toward youth and family programming through BRED Hip Hop Theatre Festival, including artist and facilitator fees, production professionals, materials, food, equipment, and educational documentation.

$2,828 | CULTURESOURCE CREATORS OF CULTURE - Supported the development of Baba Juke™ community engagement and educational programming.

$800 | CONTAINER ARTIST RESIDENCY - Supported the creation of a commemorative Baba Juke™ T-shirt, creating additional paid collaboration with Detroit designer JohnXGenius and local printer All Motion Studio.

$200 | CONTAINER ARTIST RESIDENCY - Supported art supplies used in the development of Baba Juke™.

The project also benefited from significant in-kind curatorial, gallery, and community support, including the time and expertise of Omo Misha and Irwin House Art Gallery.

A SMALL CULTURAL ECONOMY BUILT AROUND STORY

Baba Juke™ became more than an archive or exhibition; it created a small cultural economy around story.

Stories were collected and documented, artists responded through their own creative practices, a curator helped shape the exhibition, a Music Daughter was paid to DJ the opening, and Detroit creatives were hired to design, print, perform, document, produce, and feed the community.

Through the BRED partnership, grant resources extended even further, supporting artists, educators, facilitators, technicians, vendors, production professionals, and free Hip-Hop Family Hours for 36 families.

Across the larger project ecosystem, Baba Juke™ engaged local collaborators including KRW, JohnXGenius, All Motion Studio, Fire Ass Vegan, Nothing But Flavor LLC, The Black Sip, BRED Hip Hop Theatre Festival, Irwin House Art Gallery, participating artists, performers, facilitators, and additional cultural workers.

In this way, cultural preservation and economic investment became interconnected: story preserved memory, created gathering, generated paid opportunities, supported local organizations and businesses, and circulated resources back into the community from which the stories came.

Through Baba Juke™, Eye N Eye™ built a small cultural economy around story.

Story became not only a way to remember, but a way to invest.

DIGITAL STORYTELLING + REACH

Baba Juke™ extended beyond the physical exhibition through an ongoing digital storytelling campaign developed by Brittini Ward.

Original social content introduced participating Music Dads and Daughters, amplified artist stories, promoted public programming, documented activations, and translated the project’s larger themes of music, fatherhood, memory, and cultural inheritance for digital audiences.

Across 23 Instagram posts, Baba Juke™ content generated:

• 50,000+ Views

• 2,700+ Likes

• 300+ Comments

• Hundreds of Shares + Reposts

• 70+ Saves

• Audience Ages 13–65+

[EXPLORE THE FULL BABA JUKE™ INSTAGRAM →]

MEDIA + PUBLIC STORYTELLING

Media coverage extended Baba Juke™ and its conversations about music, fatherhood, memory, family, and Detroit cultural history beyond the physical exhibition.

WDET

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DETROIT IS DIFFERENT

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KAHN SANTORI DAVISON

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ADDITIONAL MEDIA

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PRESERVING WHAT REMAINS

The physical exhibition ended, but the stories did not.

Baba Juke™ interviews have been preserved through a digital archive, allowing participating Music Dads and Daughters to remain accessible in their own voices.

Multimedia works that played throughout the exhibition further translated interviews, imagery, music, and family histories into audiovisual storytelling. Photography and video documentation preserve the exhibition itself, its public activations, and the people who gathered within it.

Together, the oral histories, photographs, artwork, videos, and exhibition documentation allow Baba Juke™ to exist beyond the temporary gallery experience.

[EXPLORE THE YOUTUBE INTERVIEW ARCHIVE →]

[WATCH THE MULTIMEDIA EXHIBITION FILMS →]

[WATCH THE FINAL BABA JUKE™ RECAP →]

STORYHOLDING FRAMEWORK™ IN ACTION

Baba Juke™ demonstrates Brittini Ward’s Storyholding Framework™ as a practice of listening, tending, translating, and returning stories.

The project moved from intimate oral histories to an archive, from archive to exhibition, from exhibition to public programming, and from programming into community investment and preservation.

Participants were not simply subjects of documentation. Their stories became part of an ecosystem connecting families, artists, audiences, businesses, organizations, cultural workers, and future creative work.

LISTENING → TENDING → TRANSLATING → RETURNING