This virtual panel will focus on archival practice and historical accuracy in creative work.
About this event
This virtual panel will focus on archival practice and historical accuracy in creative work. Nix Mendy (Tulane University Special Collections' Processing Associate) will present on Anne Rice’s research process when writing historical and supernatural fiction, including how Hermann-Grima + Gallier Historic Houses inspired her worldbuilding in Interview with the Vampire and The Feast of All Saints. Mara LePere-Schloop, Production Designer for the new Interview with the Vampire TV series, will demonstrate how AMC’s production team balanced historical and fictional accuracy with their desire to update the novel for a modern audience.
*Image Innocent Anne by Stan Rice, courtesy of Tulane University.
About the speakers: Nix Mendy is a Library Associate at Tulane University where they are responsible for processing archival collections and contributing to the Inclusive-Reparative Working Group around the representation of marginalized communities in archives. They also serve as the Digital Archives Consultant for OUTWORDS, an oral history archive centered on LGBTQIA2S+ elders. They received their MLIS in Archives Management from Simmons University and BFA in Writing, Literature, and Publishing from Emerson College. As a poet and archivist, their interests include oral histories & traditions, horror, fantasy, and folklore, especially related to African and LGBTQ+ communities.
Mara LePere-Schloop, with a master’s degree in architecture from Tulane University, Mara has worked as an architect, furniture designer and builder, and has volunteered as a Project Manager for the international non-profit, Learn to Live, building rainwater catchment and filtration systems in North Sulawesi, Indonesia. LePere-Schloop’s work as an art director garnered her an Art Director’s Guild nomination for Outstanding Art Direction for her work on Django Unchained and a win for her work on True Detective for which she was also nominated for an Emmy.
As a production designer, Mara has worked with directors such as Cary Fukunaga, M. Night Shyamalan, Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, Phil Abraham as well as many others. Mara was nominated for an Emmy for her design work on The Alienist and won an Art Director’s Guild Award for the show. Her work in film and television has taken her all around the world where she continues to pursue an education of the built world. Last year she completed work on the acclaimed Apple TV+ series, Pachinko.
This event is made possible by funding from the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities. Funding for 2021 Rebirth grants has been administered by the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities (LEH) and provided by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) as part of the American Rescue Plan (ARP) and the NEH Sustaining the Humanities through the American Rescue Plan (SHARP) initiative.
Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.