Njideka Akunyili Crosby

Njideka Akunyili Crosby is a painter and multi-media artist whose large-scale works express the hybridity of the transnational experience through her choices of subject matter, materials, and techniques.

Born and raised in Nigeria but living now in the United States, Akunyili Crosby layers paint, fabric, and family photos, cutouts from Nigerian newspapers and magazines, and commemorative cloth, onto her surfaces.

While her source imagery often references her African heritage, Akunyili Crosby's works also frequently depict her experiences living in the United States and the point of contact where cultures meet.

In her explorations of the complexities of forging an identity in a globalized society, Akunyili Crosby develops an inventive yet accessible representation for understanding culture and history from multiple viewpoints all at once.

Her work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions at the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Hammer Museum, and the Norton Museum of Art (West Palm Beach), among others. In 2017, she was the recipient of a MacArthur 'Genius Grant' fellowship.

She has been a visiting instructor at the California Institute of the Arts (2015­–2016), the Maryland Institute College of Art (2012), and Swarthmore College (2011).

Akunyili Crosby received a B.A. (2004) from Swarthmore College, a Post-Baccalaureate Certificate (2006) from the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, and an M.F.A. (2011) from Yale University.