Theodore Edmonds
Creative Place Healing
Director of the Center for Creative Placehealing at the University of Louisville School of Public Health & Information Sciences and co-founder of IDEAS xLAB
Born and raised in the Appalachian mountain town of Jackson, Kentucky — same community that is the focus of NY Times Best-seller, Hillbilly Elegy — Theo is an artist, innovator and culture evangelist who was named one of “50 People Changing the Face of the South” by Southern Living Magazine. He is a faculty member of the University of Louisville School of Public Health & Information Science where he leads the Center for Creative Placehealing – a 21st Century entrepreneurship program at the intersection of public health and the creative industries. His research is focused on using cultural analytics to measure and predict innovation capacity while introducing an entrepreneurial model that moves systems beyond diversity toward full inclusion.
Theo guides the next-gen entrepreneurship program for the Derby Diversity & Business Summit, serves as the founding Vice-Chair of Civitas, Louisville’s new LGBTQ Chamber of Commerce and co-chairs the Louisville Health Advisory Board’s Cultural/Social Impact Committee. He is the co-founder of IDEAS xLab, an arts-based nonprofit focused on civic innovation, activism and health, and was co-leader for Louisville’s successful 2016 bid to be named a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Culture of Health Prize winner.
