A. Cary Brown

Cary is an artist and social entrepreneur, and presides over her family’s foundation, the Fiddlehead Fund. The foundation is focused on global solutions related to climate change and promoting best practices in education, the arts, and environmental stewardship. A native of Louisville, Kentucky, she grew up birding with her environmentalist grandmother, Sara “Sally” Shallenberger Brown, often on horseback. Sally taught her to draw birds in their habitats early on, and today Cary is still recording species either with a paintbrush or a camera. She is a fifth-generation shareholder of Brown-Forman, her family’s international spirits and wine company. She serves as a director of the company’s DendriFund, the Brown family sustainability foundation. She is an active volunteer, currently serving as a trustee of BOMB Magazine; a trustee of the Kentucky College of Art + Design; a trustee of the W.L. Lyons Brown Foundation; a trustee of The Lighthouse Works; and on the advisory boards of the Fralin Museum of Art and the Arts Council at the University of Virginia, and the Amazon Biodiversity Center. She holds a B.A. from the University of Virginia and an A.A.S. from the Parsons School of Design. Cary lives with her family on an evolving sustainable farm with their many animals, including three pet donkeys.