Author: Ain Bailey, Sayge Carroll, Zenzele Isoke, Amoke Kubat, Ego Ahaiwe Sowinski, and Rehana Zaman

Ain Bailey is a sound artist and DJ. She facilitates workshops considering the role of sound in the formation of identity and recently held a residency at the ICA, London.  Exhibitions in 2019 included “The Range” at Eastside Projects, Birmingham; “RE:Respite” at Transmission Gallery, Glasgow, Scotland, and “And We’ll Always Be A Disco In The Glow Of Love”, a solo show at Cubitt Gallery, London. Last year, Bailey was commissioned by Supernormal and Jupiter festivals to create and perform a new piece of work, “Super JR”. Currently, following a commission by Serpentine Projects, she is conducting sound workshops with LGBTI+ refugees and asylum seekers. ainbailey.tumblr.com

Sayge Carroll holds a Bachelor of Arts in Ceramics from the UMN and is an MFA Candidate 2021 at UMN in Minneapolis. As an artist, Carroll has held residencies with several institutions such as the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis Institute of Art and The City of Minneapolis, given lectures professionally at Macalester College, University of Minnesota and NCECA (National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts). She has curated local and national visual arts exhibitions and received grants. The last decade has seen Carroll making creative space as a working artist. She has been a member of Tantrum Art Collective for over a decade. She lives and has a studio in south Minneapolis with her son. Carroll established the Ceramic department at Juxtaposition Arts. She holds an annual Harvest Feast at her south Minneapolis studio and also founded Women of Color Artist Gathering, Art Church, and the workshop. She is passionate about arts engagement and building a healthy community.

Zenzele Isoke is Associate Professor of Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. She has been practicing meditation in the Insight Tradition since 2005 and has been an active member of Common Ground Meditation Community since 2014. Zenzele incorporates mindfulness techniques in university classroom settings, specifically in the advanced undergraduate course Pleasure, Intimacy, Violence that she co-created with the Aurora Center for Advocacy and Education and the University of Minnesota Women’s Center. She is author of Urban Black Women and the Politics of Resistance, a book-length study of black women’s contemporary activism across the spheres of black queer resistance, hip hop politics and the politics of black feminist homemaking.

Amoke Kubat remains curious about self, the natural world, and the Sacred. She is reclaiming an African Indigenous Spiritual sensibility to reconnect Black people to the natural world, as practice for holistic wellness. Self taught, Amoke uses artmaking and writing to continue to define herself and hold a position of wellness in an America sick with inequalities and inequities. Her first play, ANGRY BLACK WOMAN & Well Intentioned White Girl had two sold out performances at Intermedia Arts in 2016. It continues to tour in Minneapolis and to rural Minnesota cities. As a Naked Stages fellow, her second play Old Good Pussy and Good Old Pussy premiered at Pillsbury House in 2020. Amoke is the creator of YO MAMA’s The Art of Mothering Workshops and YO MAMA’S HOUSE Cooperative. https://www.yomamashouse.com/

Ego Ahaiwe Sowinski is a Minneapolis/London based, mixed-media artist/designer, archivist and organizer. Ahaiwe Sowinski is currently a PhD student at Chelsea College of Arts (UAL) and Tate Britain.  Her doctoral research places much-needed critical attention on the artworks and personal papers of Jamaican sculptor and philosopher Ronald Moody (1900 – 1984), focusing predominantly on his life in Britain (1923 – 1984). She holds an MA in Archives and Record Management (International) from University College London (UCL). Her work explores archives in relation to Black histories and experiences in Britain and throughout the Diaspora, theorizing and sharing her ideas on archives as therapeutic spaces.  Her current research focuses on the synergies between feminist, queer and (self)archiving, as curatorial and artistic practice. Ahaiwe Sowinski’s work is often collaborative, exploring themes of wellbeing, health and women’s collectives and how they connect to wider discourses of women’s projects and collective working practices.

Rehana Zaman is based in London. She holds a BA in Fine Art from Goldsmiths, University of London and completed her MFA in Fine Art at the same place in 2011. She was awarded the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award in 2017; a British Council research grant with Museo de Art Carrillo Gil, Mexico City in 2015 and a Gasworks International Fellowship to Beirut in 2013. Zaman was a LUX Associate Artist in 2012/2013. She is a lecturer on the BA Fine Art program at Goldsmiths, University of London.  Her work was featured in several exhibitions at key galleries and museums, including the Whitechapel Art Gallery and The Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow. Zaman’s solo exhibitions include Studio Voltaire, London; Material Art Fair IV, Mexico City and The Tetley, Leeds. Her work was also part of group exhibitions in Eastside Projects, Birmingham; Whitechapel, London; Serpentine Galleries, London and Syndicate, Cologne.