Artist Bio

   
    Tafari Robertson is a multidisciplinary artist based in Philadelphia, PA, originally from Austin, TX. He began his artist journey as a traditional painter and now works across mediums to explore the experiences layered within Black cultural spaces. He questions what are the artistic effects of space, the elements that create those experiences, and what ripples out when these spaces are created, sustained or destroyed. His work is further inspired by the function of new Black institution makers such as Theaster Gates of the Rebuild Foundation and Anaïs Duplan of the Center for Afrofuturist Studies.

    Born in 1996, he grew up within the transience of the internet generation and finds interest in how it intertwines with the expanding notions of global blackness. In conversation with voices often overlooked as temporary, trendy, or fleeting, he explores the ways in which digital spaces can often reiterate this diminished experience. More specifically, however, he is exploring tangible and intangible elements in the Black spaces that allow us to exist permanently despite this experience.

    Across mediums, Robertson views his work as an archiving process. Ultimately, the mission of his practice is to leave something behind not only for present engagement but for the use of future generations in understanding unspoken or unquestioned cultural moments.