Kearra Amaya Gopee
"play yuh role (yard fowl at the last supper)", 2018
Ink on transparency, permanent marker
11 x 8 inches (27.9 x 20.3 cm)
Courtesy of the Artist

Selected by Gee Wesley

Kearra Amaya Gopee (they/them) is an anti-disciplinary visual artist from Carapichaima, Kairi (the larger of the twin-island nation known as Trinidad and Tobago), living on Lenape land (New York). Using video, sculpture, sound, writing, and other media, they identify both violence and time as primary conditions that undergird the anti-Black world in which they work: a world that they are intent on working against through myriad collective interventions. Their work has been exhibited at venues such as documenta15, The Kitchen, and at film festivals internationally. Previously, they have been awarded fellowships at MacDowell, the Leslie Lohman Museum, Queer|Art, the Global Fund for Women. From 2023-2024, they were an Elaine G. Weitzen ISP Studio Program Fellow at the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program.

In 2024, they will be in residence at the International Studio and Curatorial Program as well as Headlands Center for the Arts. They have participated in residencies at Skowhegan, Red Bull Arts Detroit and NLS Kingston in Jamaica, among others. They have guest lectured at Emory University, Rutgers University, and the Caltech-Huntington Program in Visual Culture. They hold an MFA from UCLA with a concentration in Interdisciplinary Studio and a BFA in Photography and Imaging from New York University.