Kelly Greenlight
Ritual Performance Artist/Organizer
Nairobi | USA
Currently based in Nairobi, Kenya, Kelly 'GreenLight' Thomas is a ritual performance artist, wellness worker and cultural organizer. A New Jersey girl with roots in Alabama and The Commonwealth of Dominica, Kelly is currently pulling from her diverse cultural background to build a body of children’s music that addresses positive self esteem, cultivating healthy relationships and embracing the natural world. For over a decade, Kelly has been creating music & performance around emotional health, women’s narratives, and nature. As a performance artist, Kelly conceives interactive & transcendent arts experiences that activate her background in gender studies, theater, group dynamics, Afro-Diasporic cultural practice, and holistic healing.
Kelly is the foundress of Black Arts Retreat, a community arts organization which focuses on exploring African diasporic art and culture, communing with nature and holistic wellness through retreats, workshops and affinity groups in the US, digitally and around the world. Through Black Arts Retreat, Kelly has facilitated groups in Bahia, Brazil Berlin, Germany and throughout Haiti since 2016. Kelly holds a Bachelor's Degree in Educational Theater from NYU's Steinhardt School and a Sound and Music Integrated Practitioner Credential from the New York Open Center
Vanessa Mwingira
Photographer
Dar es Salaam | Tanzania
Vanessa Mwingira is a photographer based in Tanzania. "Punkandblack" is the artistry name used by Vanessa and it explores her photography foundation which is rooted in portraying black and brown individuals as her main subject matter. The photographer aims to amplify the presentation of black people in mainstream media visually through usage of complementary tones and colors which provide a perspective of richness and beauty.
Valerie Fab-uche
Visual Artist
Lagos | Nigeria
FAB-UCHE Nnenne Valerie (b.1996) has spent most of her life and work in Lagos, Nigeria. Danfo as she is fondly called due to her “never stop, never settle” attitude and insatiable love for Lagos metropolitan life and street culture is constantly using her art practice whether in form of painting, drawing, installation, photography or performances, to document, mirror and question everyday life and challenges as a human being first and a female millennial. Valerie is a fellow of the art in medicine fellowship an initiative of tender arts Nigeria and holds a national Diploma in General arts from Yaba College of Technology Lagos, Nigeria.
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Nico Phooko, The Music Painter
Visual Artist
Johannesburg | South Africa
Nico Phooko is one of Africa's most gifted visual artists who has embraced and popularised the unique concept of LIVE PAINTING, through which he captures the essence of special events live on canvas!
This novel entertainment genre becomes a truly unforgettable part of the event, which is captured and memorialized as an artwork. Guests love watching how the event unfolds on canvas, representing the mood, the sounds and rhythms, and the highlights of the evening in a most unique and colourful way. The final product is the perfect memento of the event, for the client to keep.
Nico has been invited to artistically capture events such as A Tribute to Samora Machel, painting alongside world renowned musicians and politicians who had come to honour the life of the late Samora Machel. The painting was presented to Mrs Graca Machel, her husband Dr Nelson Mandela, and the Machel’s Family.
He has also painted live on stage with Africa's great musicians, Miriam Makeba, Hugh Masekela, Sibongile Khumalo, Yvonne Chaka Chaka, Ringo Mandlingozi, Joyous Celebration, Joe Nina, Bongo Maffin, Voice and a host of Traditional and Jazz Musicians throughout South Africa and abroad.
Nico's live painting cv includes many award ceremonies, private and corporate gala dinners, conferences, weddings, children’s celebrations, music launches, and many more prominent events.
Agaba Solomon Peabo
Photographer
Kampala| Uganda
My name is Agaba Solomon Peabo, a photographer and digital artist born and raised in Uganda. My inspiration behind my street photography and afro-futurism is we always dream for a better Africa bringing that dream into reality through my work is what motivates me each day.
Arafa C. Hamadi
Visual Artist
Tanzania/Kenya | Tanzania
Arafa Cynthia Hamadi is a non-binary, multidisciplinary artist working in Tanzania and Kenya. They create artwork in various mediums that address the intersections of the conceptual and the physical, as well as the ephemeral and the permanent, in hopes of provoking their visitors into considering their daily realities. Arafa’s work also explores their queerness in relation to space and occupancy. They work in the realms of 3D design, graphic design, sculpture, and architecture.
D’mani Thomas
Multi-discipline Writer/Visual Artist
Oakland |USA
D’mani Thomas (he/him/they) is a horror film fanatic, twitter sub-culture enthusiast, and dance lover. He is a graduate of UC Berkeley, where they were a two-time member of CAL Slam ( 2017 & 2018), representing UC Berkeley at CUPSI, an international spoken word poetry festival, earning the “Best Writing As a Team” accolade in 2018. He was a 2019 Pink Plastic House Resident, a 2020 “SHOW US YOUR SPINES” resident through Lambda Literary. D’mani is the 2020 Foglifter Youth Fellow and a “Bakanal de Afrique” fellow conducting research on transportation infrastructure in times of crisis. His work can be found in The Auburn Avenue, Foglifter, MARY: A Journal of New Writing, and elsewhere.
Vivi Karia
Visual Artist
Nairobi | Kenya
I am a photographer who main focuses on showing the beauty I'm surrounded by and Vivi Karia is a mixed media artist who lives and works in Nairobi. Vivi specializes in object design but has also had a background in installation design.
In 2018 alongside fellow artist Magati Maosa, they hosted an installation called Mental Tourist for Africa Nouveau Festival.The installation was a physical visual project that served to give a glimpse into the experiences artists go through when they create.
She is also a 2019 Catalyst Grant artist of the British Council NaNa Art program. Key themes that can be found in her work are religion and storytelling of everyday life narratives. Vivi always aims to pose the unfamiliar to her audience in hopes of triggering even greater conversations.
Habila Sani Mazawaje
Photographer
Abuja | Nigeria
I am a photographer who main focuses on showing the beauty I'm surrounded by and telling stories. I have always enjoyed creating. This is partly what inspired me to photography. The other reason was seeing my uncle do it while growing up and also getting a camera from my dad. Photography gives me the most freedom to express myself and show the world the way I see it. A lot of my experiences and influences have shaped my creative side over the years, part of which is being born and raised in the most populous black nation in the world; Nigeria and being involved in advocacy while growing up.
Mal The Oddity
Musician, Video Artist
Brooklyn, New York| USA
Mal the Oddity is a songwriter, producer, and video artist based in Brooklyn, NY. Drawing inspiration from hip hop, bedroom pop, and neo-noir films, Mal's work explores love, places, and self-reflection through stories drawn from his lived experience. His songs are the soundtrack to the futuristic cityscape developing around him in NYC, and to the sometimes dystopian digital existence we feel ourselves trapped in, where music helps us to feel real again.
Alexis Alleyne-Caputo
Interdisciplinary Artist
New York/Miami | USA
Alexis Alleyne-Caputo lives and works in Miami, Florida, and New York. She received her Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in 2018 from Goddard College and holds a Master of Arts (MA) and Bachelor of Science (BS/MA dual studies) from New York University.
As an award-winning commissioned interdisciplinary artist, her visual narratives include (architecture, mixed media collage, painting, photography, sculpture, and film). The intersections of her artistic practice explore themes of black female identity, black feminisms, critical black studies, oceanic studies, familial and cultural kinship, spirituality, social justice, and art as education and reparations.
Selected Solo Exhibitions are “Colonial Currents: Black Women, Water, Trauma and Baptism”, (2020), “Black Acoustic Narratives”, (2018), “Art Transforming Trauma” (2017). Selected Group Exhibitions are “Bakanal De Afrique” & Afro Urban Society (2020), “Latin American Art Pavilion Project (LAAP) – DOCUMENTA III”, (2019), “Cri de Femmes – Outremer 2019 à’ Paris, A l’ Assemblée Nationale” Paris, France (2019).
She has received fellowships, residencies, and awards from Bakanal De Afrique & Afro Urban Society (2020), Foundation for Contemporary Arts (2020), Yarde Girl PHILANTHROPY-Barbados (2020), UNLIMITED BODIES: PERFORMA Biennial, NY (2019), CATALYST Miami (2019) and the Artist Certificate of Appreciation from the Miami-Dade County Office of The Mayor & County Commissioners (2016).