artist, speaker & cultural worker

director of media 2070: media reparations project at free press • co-creator of media 2070: media reparations • convenor of zojo Black wellness project • creating safe cultural spaces for power building and radical change.

award-winning soul/r&b artist behind the EP “coco by request” and the independent album “juneteenth revolution.” past opener for lauryn hill, dwele, amel larrieux, boyz ii men and more. music featured on BET series ‘breakup x makeup.’ Listen to Collette’s duet with Eric Roberson, ‘Touch.’

director of award-winning short documentary ‘Black in the Newsroom’ for media 2070 project. this film follows the experiences of a Black woman journalist navigating life in a major Arizona newsroom. Winner of “Best Documentary Short” at Peachtree International and Detroit Black Film Festivals.

sought-after public speaker on topics including storytelling for community power, narrative justice, media inequality, Juneteenth, Gullah Geechee heritage, arts empowerment, reparations, and Black history. watch my interview with Indie Film Fest.

Collette “Coco” Watson is a multidisciplinary social impact artist, writer, and cultural strategist whose work bridges sound, screen, stage, and community. Based in Phoenix, she leads Black River Life, a creative studio transforming stories of Black migration into pathways for liberation and care. Her practice spans immersive installations like Temple of Traveling Mercies, soul-infused albums, soundscapes, and documentary film. She directed Black in the Newsroom, an award-winning short documentary that exposes the emotional toll of systemic racism in mainstream media. Her work has been featured in TIME, PEN America, EBONY, and the Columbia Journalism Review. With a background in mass communications, organizing, and cultural strategy, Coco uses storytelling as a tool for ancestral memory, collective care, and narrative justice across the African Diaspora.

View Collette’s full CV here.