Nicholas Grafia
Josephine III (Pretty Guardian Josephine)

In this piece, the Black dancer, entertainer and civil rights activist Josephine Baker appears in an outfit reminiscent of Japanese Manga comic heroine Sailor Moon.  It reaffirms Baker’s influence on Black, feminist, and queer resistance. The image is part of an ongoing series of paintings meditating on Baker’s life and iconography.

Nicholas Grafia (b. 1990, Angeles City, Philippines) is a Dusseldorf-based artist whose work negotiates the processes of memory formation,  and the inclusion and exclusion of subjects from written history. Characterized by an absurdist aesthetic, his practice is also informed by postcolonialism and post-humanism. Grafia holds an MFA from the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. His work, often in collaboration with Polish artist Mikołaj Sobczak, has been exhibited at Kunsthal Aarhus; Museum Ludwig, Cologne; K21 Museum Düsseldorf, the Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw and Capitain Petzel, Berlin, among others. He also participated in the recently launched digital IIV Moscow International Biennale for Young Art.