I am an Independent Curator, Writer, Researcher and occasional Florist who moves regularly between West Africa. and the UK. My interest in global modern and contemporary art is cross-disciplinary although this understanding is filtered through the lens of performance art. 

My most recent curated exhibition Body Vessel Clay: Black Women, Ceramics and Contemporary Art surveyed how ceramics have been disrupted, questioned and reimagined by Black women over the last seventy years beginning with seminal Nigerian potter, Ladi Kwali. New and recent works by an intergeneration of contemporary artists Magdalene Odundo, Bisila Noha, Phoebe Collings-James, Shawanda Corbett, Vivian Chinasa Ezhuga, Jade Montserrat and Julia Phillips featured in the exhibition. The critically acclaimed exhibition was on view at Two Temple Place, London (29 January – 24 April 2022) and toured to York Art Gallery (24 June – 18 September 2022). It was reviewed and featured in publications including The Financial Times, Wallpaper*, The Guardian, Cultured, The Sunday Times Culture Show and Evening Standard.

I hold a doctorate in Curating Art and Science: New Methods and Sites of Production and Display from a partnership with Royal Holloway, the University of London and  Arts Catalyst and funded by Arts Humanities Research Council (AHRC); an MA in Curating Contemporary Art (Inspire), Royal College of Art, London funded by Arts Council England (ACE); and a BA (Hons) in Material Culture, Architecture and Museum Studies from the University of Leeds. In 2022, I was awarded a two-year early career fellowship from Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art as part of the New Narratives Awards and I am the inaugural recipient of the Early Career Fellowship.

My most recent role was as Deputy Director of Deptford X, London’s longest-running visual arts festival and played a key role in maintaining the organisation’s strategic direction reporting to the Director and Board alongside overseeing all aspects of the organisation’s operations, financial, HR, and artistic programmes. I was also responsible for the curation and delivery of the 10-day festival overseeing seven new artist commissions which concluded with a community-led parade through Deptford High Street by renowned  Nigerian artist, Jelili Atiku. Previous curatorial and editorial roles include Camden Art Centre (2021), MVRDV, Rotterdam (2016-2018), Arts Catalyst, London (2013-2016), Etemad Gallery, Dubai (2011-2012) and MIMA Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (2009-2011).

I travelled across West Africa in 2019 visiting Ghana, Nigeria, Senegal, Mali, Benin, Ivory Coast and Togo to major cities and off-the-beaten-track on an explorative 3-month research trip funded by Arts Council England where I witnessed activist-led, community-centred performance art. I began writing about contemporary art on a personal blog called Artistes Only between 2008-2011 leading in some ways to developing as an ‘accidental’ art critic. My writing has been featured in international publications (online and in print) including Artsy, The Art Newspaper, DOMUS, PIN-UP Magazine, It’s Nice That, Wallpaper*, Ocula Magazine, Bomb Magazine, World of Interiors, Apartmento, Bonhams Magazine, CNN Style, Frieze, Nka Journal of Contemporary African Art, Leonardo Journal, X-TRA, Primary Paper, The Culture Trip, Hyperallergic, ARTNews, Burlington Contemporary, Cultured, The Fashion and Race Database, Crafts Magazine and WePresent.

I have also contributed to exhibition catalogues and publications for artists including Theaster Gates, Ndidi Dike, Phoebe Collings-James, Shawanda Corbett, Tunji Adeniyi-Jones, Martin O’Brien, Sasha Huber and exhibition texts for The FLAG Art Foundation, Hayward Gallery, kó, Visual AIDS, and Maxmillian Williams Gallery/Apartmento Magazine. Additionally, I have given talks at institutions including IKON gallery Birmingham, Whitechapel Gallery/Jarman Awards 2022, Association for Art History, Camden Art Centre, Chelsea College of Arts, Swansea Metropolitan University, Waag Society, The Centre for Curatorial Studies (CCS) Bard, VO Curations, The Africa Centre, The University of Arizona, The Leach Pottery and Royal College of Art.

For future curatorial projects, advisory, speaking engagements and writing commissions drop me a line via my contact page.