SARAH HSIA is an Intellectual Property and Entertainment Attorney, admitted in both New York and Jamaica, and based in Kingston, Jamaica. She graduated from Brown University and Harvard Law School and spent 7 years working for Alston & Bird in their New York office before moving to Jamaica in 2010. Since then, she has built a client roster working remotely for some of the world’s biggest brands in apparel, consumer goods and financial services industries, as well as some of the biggest names in dancehall, reggae, soca, alternative jazz, and afrobeat, as she works with producers, artistes, managers, authors and composers from across the US, the Caribbean and beyond.
Ms. Hsia’s experience, combined with her understanding and knowledge of both American and Jamaican business, culture and customs gives her a unique perspective on the industry. She has taught courses in Copyright and the Business of Music in conjunction with UWI and Utech in Jamaica and is the founding presenter of the CopyrightX Caribbean course taught under the auspices of Harvard Law School’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society.
She is a Director of PREE Literature Limited, an online magazine for contemporary Caribbean literature, and The American Friends of Jamaica, a US 501(c)(3) organization that has raised more than US$19M for charities in Jamaica. Her firm, Rockstone Legal, is a First 50 partner of Kingston Creative, a non-profit arts organization based in Kingston, Jamaica.
PAUL ISSA is currently Deputy Chairman of House of Issa, and its subsidiary Issa Hotels & Resorts Ltd. which owns and operates Couples Resorts. He is Chairman of the Issa Foundation, the Edna Manley College of the Visual and performing Arts in Kingston, Jamaica, and Paul Issa Publications.
As Chairman of the Issa Trust Foundation, Paul has made significant contributions to education and health care in Jamaica, partnering with leading global nonprofits to contribute approximately US$40 million in medical equipment, medication, training and supplies to the Jamaican public health sector.
With a long standing love for philanthropy, theatre, literature, and art in general, Paul has been part of the Jamaican cultural scene since the early 1970s. He is married to Spanish painter Oriente Davila Issa and they live in Kingston with their five children.
KRISTINA NEWMAN-SCOTT is an award-winning cultural strategist with over 20 years of experience across the public, nonprofit, and media sectors. As VP/Arts Knight Foundation, she leads investments that advance the role of the arts in building more vibrant and connected communities. Previously, she was the inaugural Executive Director of The Jerome L. Greene Performance Space at WNYC, President of BRIC in Brooklyn, and Director of Culture for the State of Connecticut, the first immigrant and woman of color to hold that position.
A recognized voice in the field, Newman-Scott has been named to City & State’s Telecommunications Power 50, Observer’s NYC Arts Power 50, and is a recipient of the Selina Roberts Ottum Award from Americans for the Arts. She holds an honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts from the University of New Haven and serves on the boards of Americans for the Arts, PAMM, YoungArts, and Brooklyn Arts Council.
Born and raised in Kingston, Jamaica, Newman-Scott began her career as an artist and broadcaster and remains committed to the power of culture to drive inclusion, storytelling, and civic imagination.
SARA SHABAKA— A graduate of Saint Martin’s School of Art and the Royal College of Art, London, Sara draws from her involvement in the London and New York art scenes to inform her multidisciplinary design studio, in Kingston, Jamaica.
Sara is a design lecturer in the visual arts at the Caribbean School of Architecture, University of Technology in Kingston, Jamaica. She is editor of Axis, a biennial journal from the Caribbean School of Architecture. Shabaka Design designed PREE’s inaugural print edition — Bookmarked.
NNEKA JACKSON is an attorney, writer, and cultural strategist based in Kingston, Jamaica, specializing in intellectual property and entertainment law, with a focus on supporting the development, protection, and commercialisation of creative projects across the cultural industries. Through her legal practice, she advises artists, cultural organizations, and businesses on licensing strategies and safeguarding their intellectual property in an evolving global market. She has served as an arts consultant to the British Council, developing initiatives such as SPOTLIGHT: Positioning Jamaican Art in the Global Marketplace, which supports Caribbean artists in expanding their reach and securing their rights.
As a writer and editor, Nneka’s work has appeared in publications and on platforms including Contemporary Art Review Los Angeles (Carla), Contemporary& Latin America, gal-dem, Nike ACG, and others, exploring themes of culture, identity, and resilience. She was Editor-in-Chief of SKEW 3, an arts and dialogue magazine based in Los Angeles, California, and continues to bridge legal expertise with creative advocacy to advance cultural equity and sustainable creative economies in the Caribbean and beyond.