him-5 - Mortality Series
Contact idiStudios:
Stay in touch with idiStudios!
Bio
Ijeoma D. Iheanacho was born in Fort Worth, Texas. As a child she lived in distinctly unique spots in the South like Tucson, Arizona and Charlotte, North Carolina. She left the South to attend Cornell University’s College of Architecture, Art, and Planning. While majoring in Architecture, she took photography courses and independent studies with a focus on using the frame work of architecture to influence her artistic practice. Upon completing her degree, she relocated to New York City and began parallel careers as an architect and visual artist. Her early childhood in the South contrasted her adult development in New York and gave her a heightened awareness of the formulation of identity. In her work as a visual artist she explores the creation, manipulation, and reconstruction of personal identity with a focus on how cultural, political, and personal circumstances influence the creation of both personal and social identity with a focus on the marginalized people of society. She uses her training as an architect to create photographic installations that are designed to arrest the body while the eye is focused on the photography, thus intensifying the viewing experience. She has been exhibited throughout New York City in spaces like Art for Change Gallery, Local Project, the Bronx River Arts Center, Bronx Art Space, and La Vuelta. She has received recognition nationally, showing in the Elmwood Playhouse in Nyack, NY and the New Visions Gallery in Salt Lake City, UT. Her images have been used in the independent film Afropunk, as well as in a four part photo series for the Afropunk.com website. Her early series, Cloth, has been accepted into the Photographs and Prints Collection of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Her most recently exhibited body of work, Faces of the Great Recession, focuses on the people behind the statistics of our current economic turmoil, recently debuted in the Faces of the Economy exhibition at Art For Change Gallery. She is currently producing her largest installation to date, the reImagining. This work will be the culmination of her more focused work with identity and the Black female image. She is creating a 300 image installation that will allow 100 Black women to re-represent themselves based on their journey to reclaim and reaffirm their personal identities. The reImagining was awarded fiscal sponsorship by the New York Foundation for the Arts. Ijeoma is currently living and working in New York, New York.
Artist’s Statement
I believe an artist’s function in society is to be constantly and consistently evaluating how all aspects of our culture are influencing our individual realities. My work is focused on telling the stories that are constantly overlooked, the stories that are brushed under the rug or politely stepped over. I hope that each photograph speaks to each viewer. The main goal I have as an artist is to continuously explore, represent, and present the narratives that are only whispered in selective phrases for specific audiences. I believe that all issues should be brought forth for a full presentation and discussion by all facets of society.
CV
Education
1996-2001Cornell University College of Architecture, Art, and Planning Ithaca, NY
Bachelor of Architecture
2000 Cornell Rome Program Palazzo Lazzaroni Rome, Italy
An intense semester abroad during which I studied design, history, and spatial concepts through painting and photography
Selected Exhibitions
2016 Bronx Council of the Arts, Bronx:Africa Exhibition
2015 BxArts Factory, Innuendoes: The Voices of Ten Bronxite Women
LH Horton Jr. Gallery, Women in Art: HerStories Exhibition
2013 Creative Colloquy, Principle photography for 2013 Wine in the Wilderness production
2011 Rush Art Gallery, New York, New York CurateNYC 2011 Finalist Exhibition
2011 Bronx Art Space New York, New York Fantastic Funds Exhibition
2011 Arts for Change New York, New York Faces of the Economy Exhibition
2010 Bronx River Arts Center Bronx, New York BRAC Harvest Fundraising Exhibition
2004 Local Project Long Island City, New York Life, Death, and Taxes Exhibition
curated and produced the Life, Death and Taxes Exhibition
New Visions Gallery Salt Lake City, Utah Dangerous Art Exhibition
The Caladan Gallery Online Exhibition “Eclectica - Directions in Visual Art”
The Nocturnes.com Online Exhibition Night Photography New York Nocturnal
La Vuelta Long Island City, NY Group Exhibit “The Photo Show”
2002 La Vuelta Long Island City, NY Solo Exhibit
Elmwood Playhouse Nyack, NY Solo Exhibit
2001 Cornell University Ithaca, NY Afro-fem-tricity Group Exhibition
Collections
2011 “Cloth Series” Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture
Publications
2011 “Afropunks: Life in Technicolor” four part photoseries on Afropunk.com
2002 Independent film Afropunk images from the Human Conditions portfolio used in the film
Photographer’s Forum - Best of College Photography Annual 2002 - Finalist
Awards
2013 CurateNYC 2013 - Finalist for online exhibition curated by Wim Van Sinderen, Senior Curator at the Hauge Center of Photography
2011 CurateNYC 2011 - Finalist, Exhibited at Rush Art Gallery
2010 New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) - Fiscal Sponsorship for the reImagining project
ARTICLES