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Aiyana Sha’niel is a 20 year old Black poet born and raised in Los Angeles, California that has been writing for over seven years, beginning at Hamilton High School, where she performed on the school’s poetry team, Hamlit. She was Poetry Out Loud’s 2020 County representative for Los Angeles and placed second in the State competition. Sha’niel was also the Youth Poet Representative for the LA Arts Recover Fund Donors Banquet at the Getty Museum. She hosted an open mic in collaboration with Nate Davis, “The BackYart Show,” from 2018 to the beginning of the pandemic, and has been the featured poet of various mics throughout California. She is a 2021 graduate of the Community Literature Initiative program (CLI), completing the program at 18 years old, with her own full body of work. Sha’niel signed to World Stage Press and released her first collection of poems, “Little Black Poetry Book,” on September 25th, 2022.

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AJ Girard is an L.A.-based independent curator and cultural strategist who is passionate about the arts and social change. He holds a BA in Art History from Howard University, and has worked with The Broad Museum, the California African American Museum (CAAM) and, most recently, The Underground Museum. His critically-acclaimed show, Shattered Glass, which he co-curated with Melahn Frierson at Jeffrey Deitch, featured work from 40 international artists of color.

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Akan David is an enigmatic artist and tutor who currently resides in Nigeria. He studied fine and industrial arts at the University of Uyo, and is a member of Bohemian Art’s Boston-Cambridge community. His works of art thrive on themes [surrounding] African culture, esoteric spirituality, eroticism, folklore and psychology. Akan David’s art moves effortlessly between the material and imaginative realms. He is a multidisciplinary artist with a myriad of creativity who is constantly experimenting and exploring new vistas in the arts.

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Amber Salik is a Los Angeles-based creative using photography and narrative medicine to explore ideas around identity, community, loss and (be)longing from a holistic, person-centered lens. As a trained Expressive Arts Therapist, her work focuses on multidimensional healing and connection by weaving together the threads of storytelling, psychology, vulnerability, and artistic expression. She specializes in environmental, abstract/conceptual and documentary-style work, inspired by the dualities of light and dark, stillness and movement, to signify the spatial and temporal dimensions of human experience.

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Angélica Machado (Tadó Chocó, 1987) is a digital artist, photographer, photoembroiderer, textile entrepreneur and psychiatrist dedicated to the vindication of the Black and diasporic woman [through discourse surrounding] the ancestral African heritage and the culture of the native pacific.

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Asari Aibangbee is an interdisciplinary artist with a focus on filmmaking and art curation from Los Angeles, California. Asari is 24 years old and identifies as a queer Nigerian femme. She has directed, produced, and managed projects that reflect the life of Black Queer folks all over the African diaspora; those are the realities and narratives that she is interested in sharing with the world. One of the first sets that she ever stepped foot on was a senior film thesis for one of her peers in undergrad. She is currently in post production for her first short film, OMWAN’EKHUI, an experimental, documentary-style project about colorism.

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Ashante J. Ford, also known as Angel Ash, is a queer poet, blogger, singer, and interdisciplinary artist residing in Oakland, California. In her writing, she focuses on themes of healing, growth, and community. Their work also reflects their spiritual journey, and her poems often fall into the category of spiritual surrealism. She was named a semi-finalist for the Poetry Nation competition and was awarded her first fellowship from the Writer’s Grotto in San Francisco called “Rooted and Written.” More of their work can be found in Antifragile Magazine, Petrichor Magazine, Pensive Journal, Sad Girl Review and on her personal blog at spirituallyajar.blog

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Athenkosi Kwinana (b. 1995) is a visual art activist based in Johannesburg, South Africa. Kwinana works in both drawing and printmaking. In 2017, she graduated from the Walter Sisulu University in the Eastern Cape with a National Diploma in Fine Art, earning a Bachelor of Technology in Fine Arts in 2018, before embarking on her Masters in Fine Arts at the University of Johannesburg (UJ), which she completed in 2022.

In 2018, Kwinana participated in two group shows: “Finding Albus” and the “Annual Art Exhibition,” held at Ann Bryant Gallery. She also showcased in a group show, “Trial & Error,” held at Art and Collect Gallery 37, in 2021. Kwinana put up her first solo exhibition, “Reimagining Albus,” in 2022, at Number Four in Constitution Hill.

In 2022, Kwinana was invited to join a five week artist program with the Admirals Residency in Muizenberg, Cape Town, which she completed in July 2023. She was awarded the Cultures Resistance Award and was selected for the Tilga Art Fund, an educational scholarship program.

She exhibited in THE ANNUAL WINTER SHOW and SENSES and LENSES at Berman Contemporary, as well as 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair in London.

Athenkosi Kwinana is represented by Berman Contemporary.

SKEW 04 Managing Editor, she/her
Bri Stokes is a writer, poet, producer and curator born, raised and based in Los Angeles. Her writing, which explores themes of love, loss, mental health and the sacred Feminine, has been featured in various publications, such as Visual Verse and The Myriad. A current student of journalism at UCLA, Bri is deeply passionate about social reform, the power and accessibility of storytelling, and the work that must be done to build a more humane world for women and femmes of color.

In 2018, Bri interned at BuzzFeed as the first editorial intern to be employed in the company’s LA offices. From 2020 to 2021, Bri acted as poetry editor at the now-disbanded Hecate Magazine, and at the literary magazine, Storyteller’s Refrain. In fall of 2022, she curated and co-created the art exhibition, “POLARITY: The Tension of an Emerging World,” which featured work from more than 20 predominantly Black and queer creatives within the Los Angeles region and beyond.

Bri is the Manager of Communications at Level Ground and the Managing Editor of Issue 04 of SKEW.

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Brittney S. Price is a Los Angeles-based fine artist and muralist specializing in impactful visual commentary on current events. As a female Black American, Brittney’s perspective on life is unique, and her art brings representation for this often overlooked demographic. It is Brittney’s intent to uplift, celebrate and teach her community using art as a vessel.

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Caitlin is from Compton, CA. Writing [became] a hobby for her while spending time in school for Criminal Justice. With a Master's Degree from CSULB, Caitlin is looking to making writing a more prominent aspect [of] her life.

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Chase Irvin is a visual artist and architectural designer based in Oakland, CA. Irvin's art is a practice of self exploration and vulnerability that leans into psychological transparency as a form of creative expression and resistance.

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Chidinma Nnorom is a visual artist and photographer working out of Lagos, Nigeria. She explores the concept of identity through the architecture of spaces and people, and investigates the ideologies that govern them. She was a member of the Invisible Borders Project, and has participated in various other projects over the years, like [the] CCA Asiko residency, [the] Nlele Institute Projects, and [the] Belgrade Art Studio online residency, amongst others. She is a two-time finalist in the National Art Competition by AAF, and a recipient of various project grants, like the Architectural Photography grant by AAF, “Female Artists Perspective to Urban Planning in Lagos” by [the] Heinrich Böll Foundation [in] Nigeria, and “Cosmologies of the South” by [the] Goethe Institute [in] Lagos. She took part in the Agora Awards’ “We the Women” exhibition at ExpoDubai [in] 2022. Chidinma is a curatorial assistant at [the] Nlele Institute, and has also executed other curatorial projects, like the Fobally Art World Africa Exhibition.

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A surface look into the world of Lagos-based, inter-disciplinary creative artist “KING DUKE” (CODENAME: KND) only gets deeper when you dive in.

Born on the 14th of May, 1997, the Nigerian explores within his practices an experimental approach to what he defines as “Afro-futurism.”

Working with mediums such as film, music and digital art to express life, his work buys you a one-way ticket [to] an audio-visual station, before leaving you to figure out the rest of the journey.

The streets of Lagos and its buzzing electronic, dance and house music scene remain the core influences of his artistic direction. Aiming to connect the spiritual and physical realms, his works create a bridge between the soul, body and mind that brings forth a psychological and emotional balance to any misplaced individual.

Creating experimental art that tackles subject matters such as identity, spirituality and sexuality, when asked why he chooses this path, his favourite quote remains:

“Own your reality, release your emotions, [and] impact your immediate community, because at the end of it all, everything is connected.”

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Dro Watson is an LA-based educator, filmmaker, and artist.

Though filmmaking has always been Dro’s first love, they work in all types of mediums, from puppetry to performance to bookmaking, mostly as a way to explore representations of mental health, transness, and the self. Their work has won awards and screened both in the states and overseas.

Above all, Dro just wants to have a good time.

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Gio Kyre in an American filmmaker, visual artist and writer born In New Port News, VA and raised in several parts of the southeast.

He is a graduate of Savannah College of Art & Design with a B.F.A. in Film & Television. Over the past decade, he has traveled and worked as a freelance multi-hyphenate artist within the industrial, commercial and entertainment industries.

Although he continues to be of service to these industries, he now focuses his time on his own visual storytelling projects. He is also [the] founder of Color After Dark, an LA-based production house formed in 2021.

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Cianna Cunningham is a British-Caribbean multi-media artist, born in 2002 and raised in Berkshire. Cianna works primarily within the fields of Fine Art, Photography and Fashion, usually under the name of “Krayzeekid” for its “dare to be different” tone and eclecticism. Studying art at school and media production [at] University, she has managed to bridge the gap between mediums to create projects that hone in on the Black experience, her heritage, and the subversion of societal norms through gender personal identity and more. Cianna’s photo series, “The Street Party,” a photojournalistic project taken during lockdown, [was] shown as part of [the] Tate Collective's “Finding Home” Exhibition in Tate Britain (2021), and virtually by the Holy Art Gallery in June 2022. Her most recent project, previewed at her University degree show, encompasses the relationship between masculinity, nature and male vulnerability. A key aspect of her artistry is authenticity in all forms [through] collaborating with alike creatives whose work push boundaries, giving voices to the underrepresented.

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Elijah Ndoumbe is a multidisciplinary artist, storyteller, dream-weaver, and collaborator.

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Imani Tolliver is an award-winning poet, artist, educator and producer. She is the author of Runaway: A Memoir in Verse, available from World Stage Press, Amazon, and the Los Angeles Public Library. She is a graduate of Howard University, where she received the John J. Wright Literary Award, served as Poet Laureate for the Watts Towers Arts Center, and was awarded literary fellowships from the Cave Canem Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, and George Washington University.

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Jacarrea Garraway is an image maker and scholar with roots in poetry, performance and fine arts. Her artistic practice combines visual aesthetics and anthropology, incorporating film, still images and creative design. She is working towards creating art that reflects on how to live sustainably in a world of consumerism.

Her recent work examines the psychology of fashion, fluidity and personal boundaries.

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Jaden is a survivor organizer, poet, educator, and cannabis enthusiast cultivating healing-centered spaces committed to collective liberation. He believes in the beauty of vulnerability and the strength in the stories our bodies hold. Jaden believes dancing has the power to heal and entice. Jaden has facilitated healing-centered writing workshops and has performed all over Los Angeles, including LA Pride, Long Beach Pride, Venice Pride, and DTLA Proudfest. Jaden self-published his first chapbook, Intentional Musings on Staying Alive When I Want To Die (2019), an honest depiction of navigating mental health and systemic oppression, and leaning into his own healing.

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Jenelle Samuels (a.k.a Neptune Naiadis) is a versatile creative in the fields of writing, poetry and the applied arts. She is a poet whose work has appeared in the Caribbean Writers Journal, Torch Literary Arts and Rebel Women Lit. As of 2023, she is a Young Writers Prize for Poetry Winner from The National Library of Jamaica, and a Mentee at Christian Dior Couture in their Women@Dior program. In her spare time, she explores film and a wide spectrum of creative storytelling through her comics, illustrations, and short screenplays. As of 2023, her favourite book is Cannibal by Safiya Sinclair.

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Juniper Johnson (b. Inglewood, CA, 2000) is a West African-American artist who alchemizes the visual and literary world. Often described as a multi-hyphenate, she explores the beautiful yet labyrinthine nature of BIPOC culture with a focus on literature and documentary work. She aims to make Black art more accessible to Black people by highlighting identity, youth/early adulthood, and the beauty of unspoken togetherness.

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Kerine Wint is an Afro-Caribbean writer, editorial designer, and reviewer exploring global media (books, shows, podcasts), especially with short fiction, speculative elements, and explorations of gender identity and expression. Her CNF mostly consists of media (shifting focus outside of North America), books, and examining gender practices and norms that existed in pre-colonial societies.

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Ky Cornish is a multidisciplinary artist and community organizer living in Brooklyn, NY. Ky's art explores the connections between Black and queer communities and their environments.

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My name’s Kodi. [I was] born in Chicago and I’ve always been the fattest, Blackest and loudest in the room, and I want that to show in my photography. I want to show things and the standards the world wants to dismiss and eliminate, [while] showing all body types, all people, all genders, everyone. People need to know [that there are] people who look like them and [who are] rooting for them.

SKEW 04 Art Curator, they/them
Langston Alimayu lives and works in Los Angeles, CA. They are a self-taught multi-disciplinary artist who works primarily abstractly with acrylic paints, as well as figuratively digitally. [They] also create through sculpture, animation, performance art, and as a recording musician using the moniker “Sweet Lang”.

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Lateisha Davine Lovelace-Hanson (b. 1989) is an interdisciplinary artist, educator and social justice practitioner of Jamaican heritage, based and raised in London and Huddersfield.

Lateisha enjoys inhabiting spiritual-bodily-nature relationships as communal dreaming spaces. Their writing, performance-making, facilitation, earth-work and visual art practice centers transformation, healing and ceremony [through] sci/cli-fi, ancestral/seasonal/non-linear time, and embodied meditation as powerful tools of repair and connection. [Their goal is] to interrupt ongoing systems of oppression and ask what it means to feel “well.”

As a writer, Lateisha is currently working on their debut poetry collection with Burning Eye Books (UK), and has shared work extensively through residencies, commissions and organizations across the UK, including: Camden Art Centre: The Botanical Mind, Wretched Of The Earth (BIPOC climate justice collective), Glasgow Zine Library: Call & Response, [Performance s p a c e ]: PSX 10, Live Art Development Agency, Artsadmin: Apocalypse Reading Room, Chelsea Physic Garden: Queer Botany, Apples & Snakes, Inua Ellam’s R.A.P Party, She Grrrowls, and Dada Fest / Yewande 103. Lateisha is a Roundhouse (London), and Hammer & Tongue (London) Poetry Slam Finalist.

Lateisha’s exhibition show, “An Offering // an installation of a world-building, to come- back to home,” a multi-layered installation weaving poetry-film, sound, documentary, text, and plant medicine portals, was commissioned by Bethlem Gallery for An Ecology Of Mind (2022).

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A woo woo jawn since way back, Lenée A. Voss is a grief companion, death doula, and reiki master. She hails from and lives in Philadelphia, where she has a lot of houseplants, Air Max 90s, and crystals. Lenée's body of work includes Hip Hop is For Lovers Radio, the #AnonymousCrowdfund, and her well-curated Twitter account (@dopegirlfresh). A featured writer at Complex, Feministe, and ColorBloq, Lenée is expanding her artist’s practice to include visual art and music. Connect with her at sayheylenee.com, or support her work at patreon.com/dopegirlfresh.

SKEW 04 Social Media Manager, she/they
Liliana Epps is an emerging artist born and raised in Los Angeles. She is a Staff Artist and Board Member at Level Ground where she connects directly with artists across mediums to provide the support, care, and resources they need not just as artists but as human beings ‒ work that truly feeds her soul. Liliana produced Leslie Foster’s MFA Thesis Project Black Honey (Or an Exuberance of Drapetomania) which was part of the UCLA DMA Annual ‘22 MFA show and she also produces and puts out her own music the 1st and 15th of every month. She holds a B.A. in Gender Studies from UCLA and is Yoga Teacher Certified (200-hour) through YogaWorks.

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Maddi Wells is a young architectural designer. She was born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana. As a New Orleans native and a Black woman, she believes in creating, designing, and developing equity. She graduated from Tulane University with a Bachelor of Architecture and a Bachelor of Science in Real Estate. While at Tulane, she spoke at the virtual TEDxTulane conference, Beyond the Conversation. Her speech, “The Self-Reparation of Black Communities,” discusses historic discriminatory policies, interventions, and contemporary mentalities that have contributed to the continuous divestment of Black communities. In 2022, Wells graduated with a Master of Business in Architecture & Design from IE University. This fall, she will begin pursuing a Ph.D. in Sociology at Howard University. Wells strongly believes in the power of interdisciplinary collaboration and action.

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Magnify Creations is an intersectional, QTIBIPoC-focused community that stands for God and love, healing and wellness, and is centered around storytelling and art. The core mission of our group is to help heal and uplift our community, and our culture is built on honest communication.

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Marantz Moon (b. 1989, Chicago, IL) [is] currently based in Los Angeles, CA. [Moon] is a visual, performance and installation artist. Moon is currently exhibiting at his artist co-founded studio gallery space, the DMST Atelier, located near the downtown LA.

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San Francisco born, Inglewood-based contemporary artist Marie-Jose began painting in 2016, employing surrealism as a tool for inspiring a previously indiscernible future, and occasionally reimagining the past. Along with painting, collage and mixed media are [their] vehicles for exploring the multiplicity of the Black femme experience. Influenced by artists such as Rene Magritte, Kerry James Marshall, and the artist’s Nigerian heritage, many scenes [in their work] depict Black figures amongst dreamlike cloudscapes, and thematic metaphors that refer to the intricacy of life, the consequence of introspection, and feelings of vulnerability, hope, and courage. Defining their style as “Afro-Surrealistic’” the work re-examines the pre-conceived barriers of Black liberation. Marie-Jose has participated in numerous art markets and festivals nationwide, and had paintings in the Affordable Art Fair in New York and Aqua Art Miami in Miami Beach in 2022. They have shown work with the LA LGBT Center and the Museum of Science + Industry in Chicago. They were also a recent 2022 Artist in Residence participant in Albuquerque, NM and Fukuoka, Japan, and made their international debut with an exhibition with Studio Kura.

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Using photography as language to interpret the space between the physical world and that of spirit, San Diego-based artist Nykelle DeVivo finds their voice referring to histories of Afro spiritualism and Black queer/trans expression. Exploring the concept of the portal, their work presents ethereal bodies of light, sensual self portraits, and quiet moments of prayer which portray states of Black timelessness that act as the artist's spiritual practice.

SKEW 04 Designer, she/her
Nikki Pressley is a mother, artist, designer and grower. Before moving back to her native southeast USA, she lived and worked in Los Angeles and Upstate New York as an artist, designer, educator and urban farmer. Nikki is currently apart of a collective that supports and resources BIPOC farmers and land stewards in the southeast.

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My name is Marina Griffin, but I also go by Rina Nicole. I am a photographer located in Fontana, CA. I have been photographing for 3 years now. My first love [in] photography is creating editorial and fine art photographs. I love designing sets and photographing my subjects in a way that I know will best compliment them, and making my subjects look powerful by showing off their beauty in their own unique ways.

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paris cyan cian is a movement architect, educator, and bodypoet working with and through various interdisciplinary forms of dance, drawing, film, photography, and sound. Rooted in New Orleans, cyan’s creative work mobilizes embodied memory and ecological play into a worldmaking practice.

SKEW 04 Editor-in-Chief, she/they
Reneice Charles is a writer, recipe developer, and food photographer exploring the intersections of race, sexuality, food and body politic in Los Angeles, CA. She is the current Editor-in-Chief of SKEW Magazine. Publications include Autostraddle.com, where she authored the popular baking column Femme Brulee, Visit California, Outside Magazine, and Active Cultures. Reneice has a multi-hyphenate career and is also Director of Communications at Level Ground, a plus-size model, outdoor enthusiast, and body liberation advocate. You can support her on Patreon (www.patreon.com/Reneice) and by following her @reneicespieces on Instagram!

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Rhys Langston Podell is a musician, visual artist, and writer born, raised, and based in Los Angeles, California. Publications such as the NY Times, the LA Times, AFROPUNK, LA Weekly, STEREOGUM, and SPIN have praised his multimedia efforts. Notable projects include 2020's dissertation and musical album “Language Arts Unit: a Rap Textbook” and 2022's “Grapefruit Radio,” which melded his outré rap, visual art, and absurdist prose. Ever composing and plotting between disciplines, he remains the poet laureate of his living room and has a higher vertical leap than your favorite rapper.

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Rise is a Black, disabled, gender fluid femme from St. Louis, currently in Chicago. Rise is a meditation facilitator, gender affirming and trauma informed care and disability justice educato,; poet, and birth/postpartum/grief and loss/abortion care worker. They have been a healing practitioner for over 10 years, and are deeply invested in disability justice, access, centering wellness for Black queer folk, trauma education, and rest. They enjoy doing the most, daydreaming and hanging with [their dog], Jelly Ferocious.

Rise started Riotous Roots 1 year ago as a means to house their talents, passions and dreams for their communities in one place. You can learn more about them at www.riotousroots.com

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Robert L. Newman III is a self-taught American multi-disciplinary artist, prominently known for his expressionist portraits. He currently lives and works in Harlem, New York City. Newman’s work primarily follows and examines the narrative of the Black American post civil war reconstruction era. Newman’s artistic journey began in Tulsa, Oklahoma in the front window of his Grandmother’s doll shop. From there, Newman has traveled and lived all over the United States, with most of his time spent in what is known as the “Jim Crow South:” Florida, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Georgia. He weaves in his experiences with Black culture from these multitudes of vantage points to highlight the brilliance and resilience of Black Americans.

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Saira Barbaric is a multidisciplinary, gender-blending hedonist creature in a thicc Black disabled human suit. Since 2015, Saira has been based in Seattle creating performance art, films and events exploring crafts, mythology, sex and Afro-psychedelic dreams. vimeo.com/444barbaric

SKEW 04 Culture Curator, she/her
Salima Allen is a multimedia artist and founder of LA-based photo studio, Acid Smiles Studios. Her personal practice revolves around photography, color, and obsession. [You can] find her styling sets & wardrobe in front of the camera, and amplifying underrepresented stories behind the camera.

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Kay-Ann Henry is a Jamaican multidisciplinary artist currently based in Miami, Florida.

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Dheeraj Kumar, born 1991, hails from Muzzaffarpur, Bihar, and is a trained fashion designer turned photographer and artist. He aspires to define with his lenses [and] his personal approach towards life, beauty and art. Dheeraj is inspired by artists like Frida Kahlo, Robert Mapplethrope and Henry Moore.

Anonymous male bodies have been a constant motif in his art. He uses the body as a canvas over which he experiments by superimposing different styles of ornamentations—ranging from botanical floral drawings to masks and markings inspired by the art of Rangoli. Dheeraj draws from his own experiences of the human body to represent it untethered by the burden of rigid gender conventions imposed by society and his own cultural upbringing.

He exposes, through elaborate staging and meticulous contortions, the landscapes of the human body and the many hidden nooks and crannies that carry traces of untapped and concealed emotions. The body becomes the subject and the object in his work—rendered into abstraction, reminiscent of organic rocks and boulders, but somehow still retaining its “human-ness,” albeit in an unsettlingly intimate way that provokes the viewer’s primal instinct to touch and experience the sensory pleasure of bare skin.

He currently divides his time between Bangalore and Pondicherry.

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Raina Beigler is a Black, queer collage artist, birthworker, budding herbalist and fantasy book lover. Raina received her bachelor's degree in Psychology at California University Monterey Bay in 2020. With collage as her medium, Raina uses images from paper magazines purposefully to address the lack of Black women in media today. When she is not cuddling her dog Luna or tending to plants, she is clearing her mind with the magic that is collage. Collage art has allowed her the space to truly empty her mind and turn her jumbled thoughts into beautiful pieces of art.

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My name is Arielle Hughes. I was born and raised in Los Angeles. I graduated from California State University Long Beach with a Bachelor’s in Studio Art. I consider myself a multi-disciplinary artist with a passion for tattooing, Illustration, and animation. My work is heavily influenced by my curiosity in themes that surround humans' relationship with society, spirituality/animism, capitalism/isolation, and agency. As a queer Afro-Latinx whose reality has been shaped by oppression and underrepresentation, I’ve learned to rely on my artistry as an anchor to my survival and future. My art is me; it’s an extension of myself and it’s what keeps me going.

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"I hope to inspire and reflect the light and darkness in us all as spiritual beings having this human experience. I tell stories that create a sense of comfort and connectedness that reminds us that we are never alone.”

Sydnee Christine is a queer, Black writer, storyteller and muse. Her subjects revolve around spirituality, radical self-acceptance, embodiment, love, and beauty in the mundane. Her vulnerable transparency and abstract tone speak to the spirit that lives within while her bold, sensual and experimental photos invite us to stand in our own power and express ourselves unabashedly.

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Artist Tennessee Jones-Phillips (b. 1999, Toronto, Canada) intuitively employs scanography and assemblage to animate her self-taught practice. Jones abstracts her visage, creating reimagined self-portraits. She adopts an esoteric form through these simulacrums, ultimately denying the viewer her Black body, becoming a gatekeeper. Jones seeks to heal personal and ancestral traumas by creating works that redefine her knowledge of liminal worlds and her roles within them.

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Trécha Gay Jheneall is a fluid Jamaican visual and performance artist currently living in New Orleans, LA. Their work engages mediums of screen printing, installation, performance and video.

Through consolidating personal and collective stories of Afro-Caribbean origin, their work serves as a conduit for communal movement toward liberatory consciousness.

Trécha studied Interdisciplinary Studio Art at Marylhurst University in Oregon and has completed their graduate degree in Studio Arts at the University of New Orleans in Louisiana.

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Yasmine Bolden is a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominated Black American poet, writing instructor, and eldest sibling. Their work has appeared or is forthcoming in Perhappened Magazine, the Feminist Center for Creative Work, Rootwork Journal, Alocasia, and their mom's Facebook page. She's currently majoring in Africana Studies and Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University, where's she's a co-founder of the campus' premier poetry and performance club, Bluejays & Poets.