Marques Redd is a traditional African cosmologist, independent scholar, multimedia artist, and co-founder of Rainbow Serpent, a Black LGBTQ nonprofit organization. The foundation of his work is the reclamation, modernization, and extension of traditional African knowledge systems, particularly from ancient Egyptian and West African (Yoruba, Dogon, Dagara, and Igbo) contexts, and he seeks every medium he can – film, sculpture, academic scholarship, spiritual retreats, performance, and public installation – to bring the multidimensional depths of African cosmologies to the 21st century world. Redd has published essays on a wide variety of topics, including the poetry of jazz musician Sun Ra, the novels of Ishmael Reed, the art of the Women of Visions collective, and global 19th-century poetry. He has led multi-day retreats such as "Harnessing the Power of Creation Through African Ritual" at the Esalen Institute. He has also curated art projects and exhibitions around the country in cities such as Denver, CO; Miami, FL; Columbus, OH; Tampa, FL; Macon, GA; Pittsburgh, PA; Boston, MA; Atlanta, GA; Cleveland, OH; and Baltimore, MD. With his collaborator Mikael Owunna, he has released several artistic projects. They co-directed "Obi Mbu (The Primordial House)," an experimental film presenting illuminated dancers reenacting an Igbo myth of creation. The sequel, a multimedia live performance entitled "The Four World Ages," explores the history of humanity from an Age of Divine Unity to our current Age of Chaos and Suffering. "Playing the Cosmic Strings" is their public art collaboration with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra centered around the unveiling of a 1,200 sq. ft. billboard influenced by Igbo conceptualizations about the origin of music. They have also completed "Myth-Science of the Gatekeepers," a series of 16 glass sculpture of Black queer African deities.