Corinne Basabe

Corinne Basabe is a visual artist and tv producer. Art has enabled her to have a life of absolute freedom because it is boundless. She experienced the same kind of freedom as a child in St. John, US Virgin Islands.

She is the producer and host of Corinne's Picks, a. talk show that discusses works of art and the careers of remarkable artists. Corinne is currently living in New York.

Artist Statement

The paintings celebrate the beauty and divinity of ordinary women. It is a celebration of resilience, confidence and steadfastness. They exist every where in the African Diaspora. They are black, they are bold. Many are literally black and painted with black paint because black is beautiful and exquisite.

Alise Eastgate

Alise Eastgate is an Oakland-based painter, designer, and muralist. She was born in the late ’80s on an air force base in England. Born to and adopted by interracial, multicultural couples, her identity, like her art, is colorful, layered, and ever-expanding. After a few years in England and then Germany, Alise spent most of her youth growing up in the northwest corner of Louisiana. Seeking balance for her love of art and the natural world, she earned her Bachelor's degree in Studio Art and Geography from the University of Alabama.

Alise’s work explores her experiences, connections to nature, and belief that all living beings deserve the right to live, love, and be free. She has exhibited work in solo and group shows in Oakland and San Francisco and live-painted at events and festivals in California and the Fiji Islands.

'Spirited' is based on the train scene from Hayao Miyazaki's 'Spirited Away.' The scene is an example of 'ma,' a Japanese concept of silence or emptiness that offers a breather from the action; in this case it's used as a bridge to another world- one that used to run both ways but now only runs one way.
The film and this scene in particular deal with transitions, including the transition into the spirit world. In this piece, the character No-Face is represented with a Dogon-inspired mask. These masks are worn in ceremonies that transport the living to the spiritual world of the afterlife. Another transition dealt with in the film is the main character, Chihiro's transition from childhood to adolescence. In this piece, Chihiro is represented as a black girl of the same age wearing signs of youth and growing maturity of a heroine.

Ashara Ekundayo

Ashara Ekundayo is an independent curator, artist, creative industries entrepreneur and organizer working internationally across cultural, spiritual, civic, and social innovation spaces.  Through her company AECreative Consulting Partners she places artists and cultural production as essential in equitable design practices, real estate development, and movement-building. Her intersectional worldview offers both an Afrofuturist and radical Black feminist framework to the public sector by centering the lives, traditions, and expertise of Black womxn of the African Diaspora. 

As a social practice installation artist who designs site-specific commissioned altar pieces, stewards public meditation ceremonies, and designs public printmaking sessions - often participating in direct actions at political protests, Ashara’s works are intentionally collaborative, interdisciplinary, and intergenerational. Her altars have been installed in galleries and natural landscapes in over 13 countries.

Currently, Ashara serves as Chief Creative Catalyst at the Bay Area Girls & Womxn of Color Collaborative and sits on the Advisory Board of the Oakland Public Conservatory of Music and the Regional Advisory Board for Arts Web Alameda County.  Her newest creative projects include BLATANT - a multi-disciplinary, monthly forum presented in collaboration with the Museum of the African Diaspora as well as a published maga(zine) offered in conjunction with her platform Artist As First Responder which excavates, documents, and archives the stories of present-day and next-generation cultural workers whose art practices heal communities and save lives. Ashara recently launched a mutual aid fund for Black Bay Area creatives and is co-founder of Black [Space] Residency, a physical container for imagination, inquiry, activity, and rest. 

Twisted, fragmented, out of context identities, and ideals represent many Black women's views - our stories made up of strips of fiber, memories, fluid, rage, and pleasure. "Subscribe To Blackness" by multimedia artist Ashara Ekundayo is the first in a series of (3) unique collage prints all created from the exact same set of 38 archival photos and text pulled from a single issue of a 1978 Essence magazine. This collage speaks to the multi-faceted sense of well-being and readiness Black women are publicly presenting while also contemplating their ability to stay safe, wild, and not crazy in the midst of global cry to sign-on to the latest message. Oh, haven't you heard, we love the Blacks now? Meanwhile, Sistahs continue to create counter-imaginations and strategies for how to get free.

Alexandra Renée / Pinwheel Art

Alexandra Renée is a Puerto Rican female, life long artist, from SC. She earned her BFA in General Fine Arts(2006) and MA in Community Arts(2007) from MICA. Renée has been working in communities for over 13 years.

After having her first daughter in 2010 Alexandra began joining more women's groups. Obsessed with all things woman/mother/pregnancy-related she quickly realized there is much need for education about, and normalization of, our many body types; inside and out. Women's stories are powerful and Renée tells stories best through her art.

Artist Statement

Divino Portals is the name of her most recent community art project:
Divino portal, where sacred power dwells; where life and death, creativity and rest, joy and sorrow ebb and flow.
Whether these paintings make you uncomfortable, or you love them, I encourage you to stick around. (especially if they make you uncomfortable) My hope is that there will be a story accompanying each painting (or at least most). This is an ongoing project where many women will share the stories of their Divino Portal (which has many names). From this, I hope we can share knowledge, begin healing (women and the world), make deeper connections, and realize our power, strength, and resilience.

If you are interested in sharing your story please message me on social media:
FB: Pinwheel Art
IG: divino_portals
e-mail: PinwheelAR@aol.com

Afatasi The Artist

Afatasi The Artist, is a cultural curator of Afro-Polynesia. Born and raised in San Francisco, California, Afatasi is a multidisciplinary creative, whose mediums include, and are not limited to: textile artist, designer, writer, poet, photographer, and singer/songwriter. She creates fashion, art, prose, and music, all through her unique Afro-Polynesian lens and perspective. A few of her personal values include: honoring ancestors, the DECOLONIZATION of spaces, Black Lives Matter, self-love and Afros.

Artist Statement

Afatasi the Artist's primary medium has been combining textiles of her Afro-Polynesian heritage, to convey abstract stories of her personal life, and her personal experiences growing up in San Francisco, California. Her fine art (TAPA)stries, are hanging wall tapestries which are hand and machine sewn. As additional apart of her art aesthetic, Afatasi creates outfits to match her art pieces, in response to the racism she's faced in the art world.

Afatasi has created her own textiles for various projects, using various techniques like stenciling or spray painting on fabric. Recently, she has incorporated linoleum block printing into her creative arsenal, creating imagery depicting her unique and quirky Afro-Polynesian lens.

For far too long in our society, Black natural hair has been deemed, "unprofessional, unruly, and unmanageable", and has caused black women much stress, anxiety, and in some cases hatred of the hair that grows out of our head. Thus, the 'Afro Bloc Party' lino-block series was created!

The 'Afro Bloc Party Series', will be block printed on various fabrics, as well as on canvas, and in various color ways. It names five different Afro hairstyles; each print is unique and fun, celebrating the fact that, 'OUR HAIR GROWS TOWARDS THE SUN!'

This is a virtual tour of my art studio, which is apart of ARTSPAN's San Francisco Open Studios (SFOS) 2020. This is my first time participating in SFOS, and...

Tiffany Conway

Tiffany’s visual paintings are the break of generational curses and the door to beautiful beginnings. Tiffany overcame stereotypes and an absent mother due to addiction and began speaking life to herself first. Raised in the Bay Area, California by her father and stepmother, Tiffany grew her creativity from life experiences. Like many young women of color, Tiffany struggled in channeling her emotions and creativity with life happenings.

Her college career studying at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco and the Peralta Colleges of Alameda County came to a halt due to life happenings outside of her control. A set back birthed a purpose that changed the trajectory of Tiffany’s life for the better. Seeing the beauty and struggle of the human experience was the driving force behind a new declaration, to see and make visual the beauty and struggle of her experiences.

Using her life’s adversity as a creative mechanism, Tiffany cultivated Project Get Free the Coloring Book for Navigating the Diaspora in 2016. This coloring book was a response to song lyrics transformed into a “visual journal” of emotions that could only be disposed of visually. This was the beginning of a journey of restoration, finding her voice and purpose. These visual “conversations with self” birthed a motivation to showcase her art in several exhibitions including "Right Here, Right Now Richmond" and the "Art of the African Diaspora”.
The textures found in her pieces represent the skin and the scars of life coupling color as language. Even though her work displays the beauty of others, what lies behind that initial layer are parts of her personal story of evolution. Her mission is to heal women through her paintings by displaying them as seen, heard, soft, and resilient.
Recently, Tiffany Conway won an Artistic Achievement Award for the 2020 exhibition entitled, “The Art of the African Diaspora” displayed at The Richmond Art Center in Richmond California. Tiffany Conway continues to visually stimulate conversations and awakenings through her work.

Artist Statement

These paintings currently are my highest connection to spirit and are deeply personal. All paintings were derived from intuition and pure energy.

Paula deJoie

Paula deJoie is a lifelong artist, writer, and teacher. She has worked in many mediums including oil, acrylics, and printmaking. She is currently involved in healing arts using mixed media to create spiritually based paintings.

Artist Statement

While the pandemic has caused a lot of heartache, it has also forced many of us into a period of isolation and self-reflection. Ms. deJoie has used this time to explore her spirituality and reconnect to Spirit through her art and her writing.

Karin Turner - KarinsArt

Karin Turner-karinsArt raises the static of JOY & self-acceptance through positive African diaspora female & watermelon imagery.
Her art is a reclamation of the watermelon & an iconic present day metaphor for Life.
Works examine the combination of brown skin, watermelon, natural hair, voluptuous figures, and offer uplifting affectations. Titles and subject matter encourage the viewer to be introspective and are tools for self-development as an uplifting practice.

These stylized self-portraits are purposely glamorized images that boast idealized femininity; buoyant, tolerant, happy, sexual, and joyously self-loving.

She takes her JOY seriously...Yours too.

“Telling stories that are unheard, or undervalued gives greater meaning to any work.” -RA

“My objective is to make the viewer connect and think outside themselves or what they know to be true. To see beyond the pretty picture on the wall” -RA

Artist Statement

karinsArt is all about JOY! Having it, Getting it, Feeling it, Sharing it! I teach people how to develop & implement JOYful practices into their lives as a cultural lifestyle.
My artwork is a vehicle to convey positive messages that challenge introspection rather than an outward revolution.
Now more than ever, there is a universal need for this abundantly buoyant practice of JOY... Particularly amongst people of color.
I offer fine art original paintings, merchandise, and meditative activity sessions that build and strengthen an individual's JOYful cache!
I believe that we should develop practices to embed JOY into both our personal and work cultures.
My company has accessible, affordable, and scalable solutions for building a culture of JOY.
I would love to host a JOYful Project that utilizes Zoom, or google meeting to engage all who wish to engage in an hour-long positive social fun activity!
Ideas I have would be something like offering a download that can be colored in while listening to my mini-lecture, or simply a JOY filled self-discovery "play" session.