Zakkiyyah Najeebah Dumas O'Neal

Lives and works in Chicago, IL, USA

Artist statement

Zakkiyyah Najeebah Dumas - O'neal produces images and work that acknowledge the complexities of “family”, “womanhood”, and shared experiences. Her work is most often initiated by personal and social histories related to legacy, queerness, community making, intimacy, and Audre Lorde’s naming of “the erotic”. Zakkiyyah is visually and inherently inspired by ways of being that are entirely unique to very specific experiences. For example, her portrait work depicts multiple ways of being as actualized through queer Black women. As part of making portraits with her collaborators, she's attentive to how Black women/femmes position, style, and affirm themselves in both social and private environments. These moments are depicted through performed posing or candid moments. Most recently, this has been explored via charcoal and graphite drawings that take on messages exchanged between herself and the women she has close relationships with. Another specific “way of being” that is explored through her work is her exploration of my family history through the persona and architectural career of her grandfather Kenneth R. O’neal. This body of work is about mending, uncovering, and questioning related to Black place-making, the desire to belong, and the role of architecture within Black identities through reproductions of his work, para-fictions, and family photographs. Zakkiyyah borrows from visual traditions such as social documentary portraiture, video assemblage, and vernacular...

Artwork