Bodhizwanya
Malika Zwanya Crutchfield is a California-based artist, educator, and community advocate.
With a focus on urbanity in the 21st century, her work examines spatial poetics, racialized space, and the influence that space and architecture have on the human psyche. Her work suggests the existence of a uniquely Black architectural phenomenology. She showcases her work regularly in exhibitions, galleries, and publications across the U.S., internationally, and online, including the International Symposium on Black Europe, in Amsterdam, Netherlands, and the Art Basel festival in Basel, Switzerland.
Selections of Exhibitions and Publications
- “The Diaspora,” University of California, Berkeley, CA
- Kalyani Magazine, Brooklyn, NY
- Wix Lounge, San Francisco, CA
- Art Basel, Basel, Switzerland
- The Teufelhof Hotel, Basel, Switzerland
- Silicon Valley Women’s Caucus for Art, San Francisco, CA
- Arc Gallery, San Francisco, CA
- Quadratfub, Berlin, Germany
- Zozi’s Lounge, San Francisco, CA, (*solo show)
- Farley’s East, Oakland, CA (*solo shows)
- Oakland’s Art Murmur, Oakland, CA
- The Good Hop Bottle Shop, Oakland, CA (*solo shows)
- Sanchez Contemporary Gallery, Oakland, CA
- American Studies Association Conference, Denver, CO
- University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
- Omi Gallery, Oakland, CA
- Marin Society of Artists, San Rafael, CA
- International Symposium on Black Europe, Amsterdam, Netherlands
- Journal for Equity and Excellence in Education
- Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive
- Black Box Gallery, Portland, Oregon
- Museum of Social Justice, Los Angeles, CA
- Gallery Ring
- ZAZA Magazine Vol. 1 and 2
Upcoming exhibitions
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Jun 12 - Jul 16
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Jul 28 - Aug 20
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Sep 16 - Oct 8
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The Art of Photography
My work is based on my theory of racialized space and spatial poetics. I examine the effect of space and architecture on the psyche.
After being diagnosed with epilepsy, I was forced to change the way I speak, the way I communicate, and the way I move in the world. Photography gave me a visual language that replaced words with shapes, light, and shadow. With this new language, I found a new vocabulary with which I could communicate with people across barriers of speech, cognition, and even geography.
Malika Zwanya Crutchfield
Photographer / Artist