Capitol Hill Arts Workshop Presents Khadija Jahmila for Inside the Artist’s Studio

Virtual Workshop: Saturday, February 20 from 1pm to 2:30pm

The Capitol Hill Arts Workshop (CHAW) welcomes Khadija Jahmila for its February Inside the Artist’s Studio, a monthly virtual residency series. Khadija is a Maryland-based surrealist collage artist best known for splicing disparate iconography to portray and celebrate Black women as otherworldly. For the month of February, Khadija will be the featured artist at CHAW with a virtual gallery display at www.chaw.org, featured work on CHAW’s Instagram @CHAWinDC throughout the month, and a free virtual workshop “Cut It Out” on Saturday, February 20, 2020 from 1:00-2:30 p.m. The virtual residency will offer insight into her influences, processes, and materials and bring us into her studio. For more information, please visit www.chaw.org.

“Collage is my current focus of work,” says Khadija. “I cut, augment, arrange, and paste recycled paper products onto the back of discarded climate change and political posters. Each collage is an Afro-centric composite mini-universe of layered, fragmented experiences navigating cultural erasure, identity politics, and mental health.”

Khadija continues “My art is the embodiment of my surreal, self-preservation and serves as a visual reminder that there is agency in being able to dissect and put yourself back together. There is authorship in exploring and reinserting your own narrative. There is place and space for Black, immigrant, queer, women to live and create as we journey towards self and communal wholeness.”

“When introduced to Khadija’s work, I was particularly struck by her use of color themes to create vibrant and surreal images. Her work has a certain lushness that invites the viewer to linger over the images and begin to notice the disconnected and disturbing content. We are delighted to share the work of this artist with our community.”

Ellen continues, “The goal of the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop’s Inside the Artist’s Studio Residency is to showcase working artists —giving visitors, students, staff, and faculty insight and inspiration into process.”

Maryland-based surrealist collage artist Khadija Jahmila (b. 1993) is best known for splicing disparate iconography to portray and celebrate Black women as otherworldly. She utilizes salvaged paper sources to explore Afrofuturism and defy the myth of Black inferiority. Jahmila was selected as one of three awardees for the NextGen award (2020) at VisArts in Rockville, MD. Her artwork has been exhibited in Washington, DC and Maryland— including at The Emergence Community Arts Collective, Anacostia Arts Center, Howard Theatre, and VisArts.