20th Annual Pollak Prizes for Excellence in the Arts
Lorna Pinckney
Entrepreneur and Artist
Lorna Pinckney (Photo courtesy Anthony Chidi Njoku)
From her home in Brooklyn, Lorna Pinckney’s mother, Eleanor Pinckney, remembers her daughter as a dreamer gifted with many talents.
“She would make little business cards, ‘Lorna Pinckney Company.’ She always wanted to be an entrepreneur, and she was an independent thinker,” says Eleanor. When her childhood friends staged living-room productions — talent shows, plays and the like — Pinckney played the mastermind behind the scenes, creating flyers and inviting neighbors to come see.
An active Girl Scout, she flourished as a young artist in Pratt Institute’s youth programming. Her decision to study graphic design at Virginia Union University and Virginia Commonwealth University brought her to Richmond in 1992. Eleanor remembers her daughter “falling in love with Richmond, really absorbing the city” after her arrival.
“She said, ‘I’m staying here, it’s too competitive in New York.’ Your job as a parent is to prepare your children to go out into the world. So I understood why she left, and why she stayed.”
After graduation, Pinckney established herself as a skilled marketer, promoter and event planner; her company, Upside Marketing and Consulting, served organizations such as Ellwood Thompson’s, First Baptist Church South Richmond, and the Black History Museum & Cultural Center of Virginia.
Lorna Pinckney’s contributions to the Richmond creative arts community, as an artist, a businesswoman and one of the founders of Richmond’s longest-running open mic poetry series Tuesday Verses, continue to endure. The 43-year-old died after a brief illness in early October.
Pinckney is perhaps best remembered for co-founding Tuesday Verses, a weekly gathering of poets, vocalists, musicians and artists. The series, which hosted a 15th anniversary bash at the Canal Club in October, was described by Pinckney in a November 2016 interview with Richmond magazine as “a platform where people … come and express themselves creatively.” At Verses, newbie writers reveal their work alongside seasoned lyricists; the atmosphere is one of acceptance, and everyone — from families with young children to elders — is welcome. More than entertainment, Tuesday Verses (and its sister series Wednesday Verses, held each week in Washington, D.C.) acts as a cathartic outlet and emotional release for some attendees. “The ultimate goal is [to] have a space that’s safe and creative and loving,” Pinckney said then. “If what we’re doing is not rooted in love, then we’re wasting our time.”
Pinckney’s legacy lives on through Tuesday Verses and its sister series Wednesday Verses, still held each week in Washington, D.C., and in the reflections of those closest to her. Eleanor brightens when she talks about the greatest lesson she learned from her daughter — compassion. In a reflection of the community of support and creativity built through Tuesday Verses, Eleanor says Lorna showed her, “We are stronger together than we are alone.”
