AphroChic Magazine: Issue No. 8

APHROCHIC 

a curated lifestyle magazine 

ISSUE NO. 8 \ FALL/WINTER 2021 

DESIGNING COMFORT \ BACK TO LIFE \ THE WORK OF PEN AND GUITAR 

APHROCHIC.COM

APHROCHIC INTERIORS 

BOOK A PERSONAL DESIGN CONSULTATION 

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Well, it was no 2020, but 2021 has still been a long year. For many of us it’s felt like 

several years wrapped up in one. We began the 21st year of the 21st century with 

great hope. The whole world waited with bated breath for a vaccine to change the 

world that COVID had created. When it arrived, for a time, there was a feeling that 

life would return to normal. But then suddenly there was vaccine hesitancy, and the 

Delta variant, and more that we never predicted. 

Cities began returning to life, some slowly, some recklessly. But things were different. Life in quarantine 

meant time to think, and many of us are looking at things a bit differently now. Slowly the realization is dawning 

that the world has not returned back to normal at all, and maybe that’s a good thing. A global pandemic changes 

everything. COVID-19 has changed our world in some truly complex ways. But as this long year marches on, we’re 

beginning to see something new take root. A new world is emerging - and we all have a part to play in shaping it. 

As 2021 is ending, we’re thinking ahead about this new world that we are entering and those who are at the 

forefront: the artists, designers, musicians, fashion savants, chefs and more who are charting a new creative 

path. And in this issue we’re going around the world to visit some of our favorites, and explore some exciting new 

fronts. Like 2021, this issue is about revolution, remembrance, and rebirth. 

In Dubai, Chef Alexander Smalls is launching a first-of-its-kind food experience celebrating the culinary 

revolution taking place in Africa. In New York, as Fashion Week returned, House of Aama launched a collection 

remembering the elegance of 20th century Black resort towns. In Philadelphia, Chanae Richards is carving out 

space for rest, relaxation, and meditation. And in Los Angeles, our cover star, Jennah Bell, is part of a renaissance 

of music that is indie, soulful, and written from the heart. 

In this issue we take you to The Deacon hotel designed by Shannon Maldonado. And in our Wellness section, we let 

you in on our own road to rebirth, through the journey with long-haul COVID that has defined our lives this past year. 

In our Reference section, we explore new thoughts on the African Diaspora. Looking beyond the history and 

behind the word to explore the idea itself, opening new worlds of possibility as we begin working to understand 

what the African Diaspora actually is. And we take you inside the importance of the emerging Black art scene 

heralded by the Obama portraits which, now well into their national tour, made a memorable stop at the Brooklyn 

Museum. 

2021 has been a long year. The world is re-emerging, and the work being done by Black creatives today is 

setting the stage for a bright new future ahead. 

Jeanine Hays and Bryan Mason 

Founders, AphroChic 

Instagram: @aphrochic 

editors’ letter

FALL/WINTER 2021 

DEPARTMENTS 

Read This 10 

Watch List 12 

The Black Family Home 14 

Mood 22 

FEATURES 

Fashion // House of Aama 26 

Interior Design // Chanae Richards: Home Again 38 

Culture // The Creator's Dinner 56 

Food // Alkebulan 62 

Travel // A Place to Gather 74 

Wellness // Back to Life 82 

Reference // The Structure of Diaspora 94 

Sounds // Jennah Bell 100 

PINPOINT 

Artists & Artisans 108 

Hot Topic 114 

Who Are You? 120

CONTRIBUTORS 

Cover Photo: Jennah Bell 

Photographer: Mallory Talty 

Publishers/Editors: Jeanine Hays and Bryan Mason 

Creative Director: Cheminne Taylor-Smith 

Editorial/Product Contact: 

AphroChic 

AphroChic.com 

magazine@aphrochic.com 

Sales Contact: 

Ruby Brown 

ruby@aphrochic.com 

Contributors (left to right below): 

Patrick Cline 

Chinasa Cooper 

issue eight 9

READ THIS 

This month our book selections focus on Black women, a group often overlooked, mischaracterized, 

and uniquely facing racism and sexism at the same time. New research by the American Psychological 

Association coined the term ‘intersectional invisibility,' shining a spotlight on the need for more visibility 

for Black women in media. These three books deliver on that need. The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois focuses 

on a long line of Black women from one Georgia family and the lessons they pass down to one daughter, 

Ailey Pearl Garfield, as she straddles her lives in the North and the South. Three Girls from Bronzeville is 

a memoir about three women who grow up together in the South Side neighborhood of Chicago. It's both 

a celebration of sisterhood and friendship and a testimony to the unique struggles of Black women. Black 

Girls Must Die Exhausted focuses on a woman who seems to have it all, until a major setback causes her to 

reexamine her life and her friendships. All three books create a much-needed visibility for Black women. 

Three Girls from Bronzeville 

by Dawn Turner 

Publisher: Simon & Schuster. $22.99 

The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois 

by Honoree Fanonne Jeffers 

Publisher: Harper. $18.99 

Black Girls Must 

Die Exhausted 

by Jayne Allen 

Publisher: Harper 

Perennial. $29.99 

10 aphrochic

WATCH LIST 

When the Metropolitan Transportation Authority decided to demolish and rebuild the Third Avenue 

Bridge in Mount Vernon, NY, they still wanted to retain the history that the 121-year-old bridge had of 

connecting a community. And they wanted the bridge to also represent that community in a new way. 

So the MTA and the city of Mount Vernon commissioned artist Damien Davis to create a series of panels 

spanning the bridge to tell the visual story of Mount Vernon. The work, entitled Empirical Evidence, was 

created with painted water-jet cut aluminum, and it is meant to question "how cultures code and decode 

representations of Blackness and Black people." The panels invite interaction and discussion about what 

each symbol of Blackness means and how those definitions change over time. Davis said his inspiration 

was language itself and how it works as a bridge, and the symbols he created are also a language of their 

own. "For me, the question becomes how we take these larger complicated ideas, that can be hard to 

explain, break them down into simple shapes, and then allow new dynamic, complicated conversations 

to form around them. That is my hope for this project." 

Empirical Evidence 

by Damien Davis 

Mount Vernon 3rd Avenue Bridge 

12 aphrochic 

serenaandlily.com

THE BLACK FAMILY HOME 

Designing Comfort 

Bedrooms need to be healthy spaces. They need to be restorative. 

And for many in the Black community, they need to truly be places 

of rest. Spaces where we can retreat from the world, get a full night’s 

uninterrupted sleep, so that we can get up tomorrow and continue our 

fight for a better world. As we embarked on creating the bedrooms of 

our dreams in our very first house, we worked to answer the question 

- how do we design comfort? 

We worked in partnership with 

Article to find the perfect pieces for the 

main and guest bedroom in the house, and 

had a conversation with the brand about 

how we approach designing spaces of 

comfort for our home. 

Article: How do you make a bedroom 

feel comfortable and cozy? 

AphroChic: The average person 

spends 1/3 of their life in bed. This means 

we are likely to spend a lot of our time 

in our bedrooms. These spaces need to 

support us while we sleep and first thing 

when we wake up. To make sure this space 

is comfortable and cozy we begin by identifying 

the perfect bed. 

When searching for that perfect bed, 

we like to ask a few questions: do you want 

to be up high, or do you like something 

low and modern? Do you want a bed that 

requires a box spring or would you rather 

go with a simple and streamlined bed that 

just requires a mattress? Do you want a 

bed that’s made with natural materials 

that promotes a healthier lifestyle? 

Once we can answer all of those 

questions and find the perfect bed, then it’s 

about the pieces needed to complete the 

room that add that extra sense of comfort. 

You want bedside tables where you can 

have books and lighting, and maybe even 

a carafe of water if you’d like to have a sip 

of water in the evening. It’s nice to include 

a cozy bench at the end of the bed. It’s a 

useful piece of extra seating in the room. 

You want to be sure that everything you 

need is included in the design of the 

bedroom. And most importantly, that you 

love your bed! 

AR: How do you incorporate your 

personal style into the bedroom? 

AC: That personal style begins with 

bedroom furniture. You can go modern, 

classic, wood, upholstered. There’s so 

many different types of aesthetics to 

choose from. For these bedrooms we went 

The Black Family Home is an 

ongoing series focusing on the 

history and future of what home 

means for Black families. 

Stay tuned for the upcoming book 

from Penguin Random House. 

Photos by Bryan Mason 

Jeanine in the 

Celeste Kaftan, 

see page 23 

14 aphrochic


mid-century modern. It felt right for the 

house, which is a farmhouse. We wanted to 

showcase the beauty of natural wood, and 

we are able to do that with these gorgeous 

pieces from Article. 

Then it’s all about pieces that complement 

that mid-century look and our 

own aesthetic. We love being able to incorporate 

art and artisan pieces in the 

bedroom, particularly by artists of the 

African Diaspora. So we included sculptural 

pieces in this room, some that have 

been handmade by Black designers. The 

personal touches make the room feel so 

warm and it reflects our cultural heritage. 

AR: While incorporating that style how 

do you distinguish between two bedrooms, 

do you like to make those spaces cohesive, 

complementary, or contrasting? 

AC: This is such a good question. 

We actually begin with an entire style 

for the house. In this home, there’s a lot 

of beautiful woods that really make the 

farmhouse style come to life. The love of 

wood was extended into both the main and 

guest bedroom as well, with a shaker-style 

bed for the guest bedroom and a 1950s style 

platform bed for the main bedroom. But 

while wood was a commonality, to give 

each room its own personality, we chose 

different finishes. In the guest room, the 

black ash stain feels fresh and modern. 

And in the main bedroom, the walnut 

warms things up immediately. 

AR: What are some of your favorite 

qualities or features in your Article 

bedroom furniture? How do they contribute 

to the feel you want for the bedroom? 

AC: We live in a 1930s farmhouse in 

upstate New York. This home was beautifully 

built and it has a heritage to it. It’s 

important to us to honor that, and we 

wanted to bring in high-quality pieces 

that shine in every room in this house. We 

have incorporated some beautiful pieces 

from Article into our design projects over 

the years, and we know that pieces from 

Article are made with quality in mind. 

And it’s no different with the bedroom 

furniture. These are beautifully crafted 

bedroom furnishings that are built to last. 

They are also pieces that fit with our 

lifestyle. We love that the Nera Walnut King 

Bed comes with nightstands with wirenooks, 

so that we can charge our phones at 

night. And soft-close nightstand drawers 

mean no disturbances in the middle of the 

night. That is good design and ultimately 

it makes for a beautiful bedroom that you 

can rest and relax in. We moved upstate to 

create a calming retreat for ourselves and 

these pieces from Article absolutely contribute 

to that. AC 

Guest Bedroom Selections: Lenia Black Ash Queen Bed $1099, Lenia Black Ash 2 Drawer Night Stand $399, 

Gabriola Ivory Boucle Bench $379 

16 aphrochic issue eight 17




Main Bedroom Selections: Nera Walnut King Bed with Nightstands $1499, Nera Walnut 6 Drawer Low Double 

Dresser $1349, Chanel Volcanic Gray 56” Bench $349, Candra Oak Media Unit $899. 


MOOD 

RETURN TO LIFE 

It’s time for a new normal. One where health, wellness, and 

comfort come first. This season is all about a return to 

living safely, and these pieces from Nike will help you do 

just that. The latest collection includes hi-tech, sustain- 

Nike Therma-FIT 

Repel Women’s 

Synthetic-Fill 

Golf Jacket $160 

Nike Sportswear 

Club Men’s 

Tie-Dye French 

Terry Crew $75 

Nike Sportswear 

Tech Pack 

Women’s Pants 

$100 

able fashions made from recyclable and organic materials. 

These thoughtfully designed sportswear pieces will keep 

you warm, comfortable, and looking right for the life you 

want. It’s fashion-forward clothing that’s perfect whether 

you’re working at home, working out at home or stepping 

out — masked up — for some outdoor fun. Our favorite items 

from Nike can be mixed or matched for a complete capsule 

collection of comfortable staples that will support you as 

you embrace living again. 

Nike Heritage 2.0 Small Items Bag $30 

See more at Nike.com. 

AphroChic is partnering 

with Nike to identify ways 

to safely return to life. See 

how Jeanine and Bryan 

style their own Nike capsule 

collection @aphrochic on 

Instagram. 

Nike x sacai 

Women’s Skirt 

$500 

Nike Daybreak 

Women’s Shoes 

$100 

Nike Swoosh 

Luxe Bra $60 

Nike Yoga 

Dri-FIT 

Men’s 

Pants $80 

Nike Manoa 

Men’s Boot $85 

Nike 

Sportswear 

Tech Fleece 

Men’s Full- 

Zip Hoodie 

$140 


FEATURES 

House of Aama | Home Again | The Creator's Dinner | Alkebulan | 

A Place to Gather | Back to Life | The Structure of Diaspora | The Work 

of Pen and Guitar

Fashion 

House of Aama 

Fashion Beyond the Gaze 

White gaze has been a part of the African American 

experience from the very beginnings of the culture. It 

began with the traders, the owners, and overseers. As 

we’ve grown, it’s grown with us, judging and stereotyping, 

prescribing, oversimplifying — and more often than not, 

outright lying — demanding a response, even when the 

response is overt and intentional disregard. Even today, 

when we so often place ourselves consciously beyond this 

gaze, it is still there to be transcended. But white gaze 

isn’t ubiquitous. There are quite a few times in our history 

when it hasn’t been there. And when those moments came, 

it was like a day at the beach. Thankfully, LA-based fashion 

house, House of Aama is here to take us back. 

Words by Bryan Mason 

Photos by JD Barnes 

26 aphrochic

issue eight 29

Fashion 

Headed by the mother/daughter design team of 

Rebecca Henry and Akua Shabaka, House of Aama seeks to 

probe and explore the many sides of the Black experience 

in America and all over the world, presenting its pieces as 

acts of spirituality as much as feats of design. The subject 

of the brand’s first New York Fashion Week event, a Spring/ 

Summer ready to wear collection for 2022, evokes the 

feeling and style of America’s Black beaches. 

In 1893, Charles Douglass — the youngest son of 

Frederick — and his wife Laura were refused entry to a 

restaurant in Chesapeake Bay. The couple responded 

by purchasing 40 acres of land and founding Highland 

Beach, the first Black beach resort, some 35 miles east 

of Washington DC. Douglass also sold portions of the 

land to friends and family, a long list of which included 

such notables as U.S. Senator Blanche K. Bruce, Virginia 

Congressman John Mercer Langston, Louisiana Governor 

P.B.S. Pinchback, and Judge Robert and Mary Church 

Terrell. The resort was hugely popular, incorporating itself 

as a town in 1922 under Charles Douglass’ son, Haley. The 

practice quickly caught on and more Black resort towns 

began springing up along the east coast such as Oak Bluffs 

in Martha’s Vineyard, Carr’s and Sparrow’s Beaches in 

Maryland and several beaches in Sag Harbor (see Issue #1). 

Titled “Salt Water,” in honor of those who survived 

the Middle Passage, House of Aama’s beach collection is a 

fond look back on those beaches, what they meant to Black 

people then and what they mean to us now. It’s also a tribute 

to Okolun, Agwe, and Yemaya, water spirits connected to 

traditions found throughout the Diaspora. Boasting a variety 

of looks, from form-fitting and flowing dresses to jumpsuits 

and bikinis, this collection not only offers us all a chance to 

hit the beach looking fierce, it reminds us that we always did. 

To launch the collection at fashion week House of Aama 

invited guests to “Camp Aama,” a fictionalized remembrance 

of a Black resort town located in the Freehand Hotel in New 

York City. There, mother and daughter showed off the many 

layers of their design aesthetic including their variety of 

illustrations, fabrics, and prints, all created in house by their 

design team in LA. 

Combining historical research and oral tradition with 

a sharp eye for celebrating days past in modern garments, 

House of Aama’s Salt Water collection is fashion in its highest 

form — an act of society rather than a simple adornment of it. 

By reminding us once again that we have never been passive 

observers in our own story, Salt Water seeks to inspire 

conversations on the present and future even as it sheds light 

on the corners of our past we don’t often see commemorated. 

It’s a reminder that regardless of how long the gaze has been 

with us, it’s never been a part of us. AC 

30 aphrochic

Fashion 


issue eight 35

Fashion 

Global Attic • 312•767•4928 • Chicago 

www.globalattic.com 


Interior Design 

Chanae 

Richards: 

Home Again 

Home isn’t always where you think it should be. Sometimes the 

twists and turns of life take you back to a place you’ve already 

been, but didn’t quite recognize the first time around. Where it 

goes from there is anyone’s guess, but there’s a good chance it 

won’t be anything you expected. That’s the way it was for interior 

designer, Chanae Richards, and the home in Philadelphia that 

she had to leave to love. 


Photos by Chinasa Cooper 

38 aphrochic

Interior Design

Interior Design


The founder and creative director of Oloro Interiors, 

Chanae was only 22 years old the first time she set foot in her 

house, and just a short time away from graduating from Temple 

University with a BS in criminology. Built in the 1960s, in a style 

that is much older, the Philadelphia row home had seen its 

share of hard times — and things had not improved much since 

then. “It was awful,” Chanae remembers. “There had been a fire 

years before. Then someone got ahold of it at a sheriff sale. They 

flipped it and sold it to me, but they did extremely shoddy work.” 

Leaking pipes, unstable flooring, and an ancient boiler all 

proved challenges for the young homeowner in her first year. “I 

also learned you should always hire your own home inspector,” 

she advises. Ultimately, buying the house had been a good idea, 

even though it wasn’t exactly hers. 

“I’m a Bronx girl,” she offers proudly. And though Philadelphia 

had been her city of choice for an education, she‘d 

never had any intentions of staying. “I knew that I was going 

back home to the Bronx after graduation, because that's what 

you do,” she says. “You graduate, then you go back home.” But 

a mentor of hers had other ideas. She persuaded Chanae to 

check out some homes in the Germantown area of the city. “I 

didn’t know anything about Germantown,” she laughs. "But 

before I knew it, I was looking at houses with her realtor before 

I graduated.” 

Chanae’s home is designed to be a place of comfort. Its 

island-inspired minimalism, juxtaposing moments of color 

with an abundance of open space, is at once a testament to her 

Caribbean roots — “My parents immigrated from Jamaica in 

the '70s,” she explains — and to what she wants from her life in 

this home. To that point, her front door opens into a spacious 

sun room. A traditional staple of Philadelphia row homes, the 

room is dominated by a single, wall-length window designed 

to catch every moment of sun. Chanae has decorated with soft 

blue curtains against bright, white walls, and a modern lighting 

pendant. Opposite the door, the room’s lone piece of furniture 

sits against the far wall. A vase of limelight hydrangeas and a 

low-hung artwork complete the vignette, while the bench sits 

waiting for coats, keys, and anything Chanae needs to leave at 

the door when she gets home. 

By her own report, Chanae’s home buying experience 

was generally painless — a fortunate exception to the rule that 

makes buying a home a hassle for most everyone, but especially 

difficult for people of color. “It was so smooth,” she marvels. “I 

didn't even realize that we’d had dinner with her realtor a couple 

of times. And now I'm filling out loan applications in my senior 

year. So after I graduated I moved from the dorm and straight 

to this house.” 

While the buying process might have been quick and easy, 

getting settled was anything but. Repairs were just the start of it. 

“It was a huge transition because I’m a first-time homeowner, 

and I'm 22,” she says, “and I have this whole house, but I don't 

have any furniture, I don't have a place to sleep.” So though 

it may have taken only a few months to get the house, shaping 

it into a home was a process for the first couple of years. But 

hardship builds character, and in Chanae’s case, the struggle of 

getting her place into shape was where her new direction would 

start — it would just be years before she realized it. 

“It took a long time to get the pieces that I wanted and 

needed,” she remembers. “I didn’t have any money so I 

developed this philosophy of only buying the pieces that I loved, 

44 aphrochic


because the things that you only like are not going to last.” It’s a 

perspective that has served her well ever since — even if it does 

take a while to sit back and enjoy the results. “I didn't get in a bed 

for maybe the first four months of living here,” she laughs. 

Three years after moving into her home, Chanae found 

herself heading back to New York. “Family obligation,” she 

shrugs. For the next 10 years, the home was occupied by a 

succession of tenants, while Chanae’s life and career path 

continued on in New York. 

That path had already undergone its first big shift even 

before she returned to the Bronx. While pursuing her grad 

degree and career in criminal justice, a rotation in cybercrime 

introduced her to the world of finance. “And I realize, wow, I 

really like numbers,” she marvels. “I really like analyzing bank 

records. So I left and got a second master's degree in Public Administration 

with a concentration in finance.” That change led 

to a series of financial posts for charter schools, non-profit 

organizations and NYU — and a similar progression of apartments. 

“My last full-time New York apartment was in Harlem. 

I still live there part time,” she explains. “And it's great. It gives 

you all the New York vibes. But it's not mine.” 

While even the poshest New York apartments are known 

for their tight confines, Chanae’s Philadelphia home offers far 

more space, and her design appreciates it. The vacation vibe of 

the sun room flows effortlessly into the living room. The walls 

and curtains lead the way, maintaining their color from the 

previous space. Pops of color remain few but meaningful, a 

combination of art, furniture and plants. Textures largely take 

the place of colors here, giving depth and interest to the nearly 

colorblocked room. The rug takes center stage, alternating 

heights and textures in a distractingly engaging design. The side 

table, mantle and even the radiator add to the story, blending 

modern design looks with the house’s beautiful old bones. 

A similar rug adds slightly more color to the slightly more 

colorful dining room. Like the living and sun rooms, this space 

prioritizes giving Chanae room to breathe by concentrating the 

intimate dining setting at the center of the room. The space is 

defined by patterns and colors as the geometric plank arrangement 

of the hardwood floor plays with the similar colors and 

dissimilar pattern of the rug. Around the table, a mismatched 

arrangement of chairs offers a variety of patterns and colors. 

And on the walls, the distinct lines of one painting in bright 

reds, blues and whites sits directly across from the blurred 

lines of another in muted pastels. It’s a subtle yet sophisticated 

interplay that makes the long road to her design career seem 

like a forgone conclusion. 

Much like pursuing dreams of a career in law enforcement 

led to finance, it was finance that led Chanae to a life in design. 

“A photographer friend asked me to stage a gallery for him in 

the Lower East Side. And then his friends started asking me to 

do it.” The constant requests started Chanae thinking about a 

career change, though she was dubious at first — especially 

when she found out that they were willing to pay. “I was like, 

‘you'll give me money to just curate your art,’” she reminisces. 

“And they’re like, ‘Yeah.” 

After a year of double duty, working full time and 

hammering out a business plan, Chanae was ready for a change 

— just about. “I quit my job on January 12, 2018,” she muses, 

"then took a one way trip to Italy.” Figuring that it could be her 

last vacation for a while, Chanae was determined to make the 

most of it while making firm decisions about her next step. 

When she returned, she made the transition into full time production 

design. 

Chanae’s guest room looks like a space styled for one of 

her shoots. The explosion of plants covers the room from end 

to end, and where there aren’t plants, there’s plant-themed 

wallpaper to make the point even clearer. But this room isn’t 

staged for a commercial, and it’s not just a guest room. It’s 

home for the one element of home decor that escapes Chanae’s 

refined, minimalist style. 

“So, I'm that girl on the plane with plants in her bag,” she 

giggles. “There’s some in that room that I brought back from 

a trip to California, a philodendron I brought back up as carry 

on from a trip to South Carolina to see my grandmother and a 

whole banana plant.” The list doesn’t end there. Other plants 

hail from DC or New York. “And a fiddle leaf fig from one of 

46 aphrochic


48 aphrochic


my girls that I took from her because she was 

gonna kill it,” she laughs. 

Chanae’s new career in her old city was 

going strong. But then something changed. 

“I love my place in New York,” she confesses, 

“But there’s something different about coming 

home to a place you own.” Despite its bumpy 

start and long periods of absence, owning 

her own home always had a special meaning 

for her. “I'm one of the first individuals in my 

family to buy a house,” she explains. “So it 

means a lot to have this in my life.” 

One of eight siblings, Chanae grew up 

in apartments until her parents purchased 

a home in her first year of high school. “That 

was the first time anyone in my whole family 

ever bought a house,” she says. “And I became 

the next person to have one. So it's more than 

a dream.” 

The same year that Chanae left her job, 

her last tenant moved out of the house. And 

while the loss of income wasn’t welcome, it did 

provide her with a new opportunity. “When 

that tenant moved out the plan was to just to 

renovate it and rent it to someone else,” she 

recalls. “But in that process, I started to realize 

how beautiful it was. I started feeling the bones 

and feeling the neighborhood. And it dawned 

on me that I really like it here.” 

If the first floor of Chanae‘s home is a 

lesson in refined minimalism, the upstairs 

is where she starts to have some fun. Where 

the guest room is a study in plant design, her 

master bedroom is full of color and life, from 

the jewel toned walls to the vibrantly patterned 

rug. Just past the foot of the bed a massive 

fiddle leaf fig sits next to an x-bench piled high 

with fuchsia pillows. And against the far wall, a 

solitary chair is outlined against a feature wall 

highlighted by an active floral wallpaper and 

the triangle arch at its top. It provides a completely 

different aesthetic from the rest of the 

house while keeping with the overall feel of a 

spacious vacation home in the city. 

Since starting her life as a designer 

and restarting her life as a Philadelphian, 

Chanae has found herself becoming more at 

home with her new path. Along the way she’s 

forged new alliances, finding community 

in her chosen industry. “It took a while,” she 

admits, “but I've managed to connect with 

other designers who look like me and sound 

like me, who do their own thing.” She’s also 

fallen deeper in love with Germantown, a 

historic neighborhood that has been predominantly 

Black since the height of the Great 

Migration. She’s also become an important 

part of the Philadelphia business community. 

As the Managing Director of the Philadelphia 

Housing Authority’s Entrepreneurial 

Resource Center, Chanae leads a team 

of innovators working to provide business 

resources and entrepreneurial support specifically 

to those living in Philadelphia’s public 

housing. 

For Chanae Richards, life after collegestarted 

with buying a house. And though she 

didn’t realize it at the time, it started her on a 

path that led from the life she’d planned for 

to something she’d never imagined. It wasn’t 

easy at first. “I left this six figure job to figure 

out something else where I had no experience. 

I won't lie and say, it’s been all peaches 

and cream,” she says. “I have cried. But I’ve also 

learned." AC 

50 aphrochic

Culture 

The 

Creator’s 

Dinner 

Creatives Gathered at The Gallery 

Bar at Neuehouse in New York City 

to Celebrate Designer Mark Grattan 

As New York City re-emerges from the pandemic, 

events and gatherings are being held again. It’s 

a time of rebirth for one of the world’s cultural 

centers, and a time to celebrate those who are 

pushing culture forward. 

Words by Jeanine Hays 

Photographs by Leandro Justen, courtesy of Neuehouse Madison Square 


Culture 

Designer Mark Grattan is one of those people. The designer is at 

the forefront of modern furniture design. Together, with his partner 

Adam Caplowe, the two have developed VIDIVIXI, a brand that creates 

coveted bespoke objects in their studio in Mexico City — from their 

HermanX Auxilliary Table with an interlocking square base structure, 

to their On Second Thought Club Chair where panels of leather run to 

create a unique curved form. 

Grattan recently won Ellen’s Next Designer and is now part of 

Saint Heron's group of multi-disciplinary creatives to lead product 

development. This summer a group of New York City’s design and 

community gathered to celebrate Grattan’s many accomplishments. 

Hosted by Tiana Webb Evans of ESP Group and Yard Concept, 

Grattan was feted by friends and colleagues including, architect 

Felix Burrichter, curator Alexandra Cunningham Cameron, lighting 

designer Gabriel Hendifar, music artist Solange Knowles, artist 

Fernando Mastrangelo, interior designer Chloe Pollack-Robbins, 

author Doreen St. Felix, curator Danny Dunson, Ryan Towns, and the 

editor-in-chief of Elle Decor, Asad Syrkett. 

Held at Neuehouse Madison Square the evening could not have 

been more perfect, held inside the social club’s new space, The Gallery 

Bar. Recently opened in September, The Gallery Bar was designed to 

be a day-to-night environment supporting creativity, innovation, 

collaboration and connection through food and drink. Over beautifully 

veined marble tables, guests sat together on intimate banquette 

seating, toasting over a curated menu of speciality cocktails and global 

and sustainable food. 

"Tonight's dinner is an elegant and exciting first look preview of our 

new Gallery Bar at NeueHouse NYC," said Josh Wyatt, CEO of NeueHouse, 

"We are so passionate about bringing special people together, which is 

now more important than ever. As a members club and community for 

creators, innovators and thought-leaders, we've envisioned the ideal 

work and social space to recharge, celebrate, and connect." 

The perfect toast to the career of a designer who is making great 

strides in moving the culture forward. AC 

Designer Mark Grattan 


Culture 

Interior designer Chloe Pollack-Robbins 

and artist Fernanco Mastrangelo 

Tiana Webb Evans of ESP Group and 

curator Danny Dunson 

Guests gathered at The Gallery 

Bar to celebrate designer 

Mark Grattan 


Food 

Alkebulan 

Chef Alexander Smalls Curates as Taste of 

Africa’s Cultural Revolution for the World 

Food does so much more than just nourish our 

bodies. It brings us together. Not just as families, 

but as people. And because we’re all different, 

there are countless ways to prepare it, serve it and 

take it in. Each one is attached to a culture — to 

a particular way of being human. Like cultures, 

food overlaps, weaving a fantastic tapestry of 

influences that shows where we are, where we’ve 

come from and who we’ve met along the way. If 

you listen, food will tell you a story. Few people 

know that as well as Chef Alexander Smalls. 


Photos from Alkebulan 

62 aphrochic

Food 

The culinary mind behind 

some of New York’s most celebrated 

restaurants including 

its first Afro-Asian fusion 

spot, The Cecil, Chef Smalls 

is the author of several books 

exploring the history hidden in 

the food of the African Diaspora. 

This year he’s breaking new 

ground again as the curator of 

the first ever African Dining 

Hall fittingly titled, Alkebulan, 

being presented as part of Expo 

2020 Dubai. This 6-month-long 

world’s fair-style exhibition, 

which began in October and will 

run until March 2022, brings 

together the best the world has to 

offer in business, science, technology, 

art, and food with the 

concept of Connecting Minds, 

Creating the Future, and built 

around the mantra Opportunity, 

Mobility and Sustainability. 

Alkebulan is one of the 

ancient names of the African 

continent, perhaps the only 

surviving term to be indigenous 

to the land and its people. Alternately 

translated as “Mother of 

Mankind” or “Garden of Eden,” 

it’s unclear if other terms may 

have existed among the continent’s 

many languages. However, 

Alkebulan was widely used in the 

north and has been connected to 

the Ethiopians, Moors (Almoravids 

/ Almohades) Nubians and 

Carthaginians, among others. In 

its current iteration, Alkebulan 

is a dining hall the likes of which 

has never been seen, pulling 

from many of the continent’s 

major food traditions as seen 

through the eyes of those who 

are leading its culinary renaissance. 

“It’s really about raising 

the profile, and bringing into 

the light of day, the gifts of 

African food,” Smalls says of the 

endeavor. “I brought in some 

of the top chefs who are really 

making a name for themselves, 

but also leading the conversation 

around the evolution / revolution 

of the new Africa table.” 

The result is 22,000 square 

feet of unimaginable culinary 

delights. Among the leaders 

of this exciting new school are 

Joburg-based Congolese chef, 

Coco Reinartz, Senegalese 

pastry chef Mame Sow, Kenyan 

celebrity chef, Kiran Jethwa and 

French-Congolese, Afro-Vegan 

chef Glory Kabe. The complete 

hall boasts 10 original concepts, 

3 of which were created by Chef 

Smalls himself. The fortuitous 

outcome of some skillful pivoting 

after a collection of misfortunes 

brought on by the COVID-19 

pandemic, the Alkebulan dining 

hall is that rarest of happenings: 

the right thing in the right place 

at the right time — an unprecedented 

opportunity to showcase 

Africa’s culinary culture on a 

world stage. For Chef Smalls, it’s 

the next step in a journey that he 

started a long time ago. 

“After my first restaurant 

I understood that, more 

than a chef / restaurateur, I 

was an activist,” he reflects. 

“The point was elevating and 

expanding the narrative of 

the art and food of the African 

Diaspora.” In bringing together 

so many parts of the continent 

and the new visions that are 

putting them back in conversation 

with food culture in the 

rest of the world, Chef Smalls is 

continuing the story he began 

with his book, Between Harlem 

and Heaven — that not only did 

Africa never leave these conversations, 

it’s been there from 

the start. “Through slavery,” 

he says. “Africa is the foundation 

of cooking and hospitality 

on five continents. Since then, 

institutional racism has really 

oppressed us, our products and 

our value.” The stories told in the 

concept and menus of Alkebulan 

are an important step towards 

correcting that narrative. 

Food isn’t the only way to 

tell our story, so the experience of 

Alkebulan doesn’t stop at the table. 

Accompanying it’s food offerings 

are the art of Nigerian textile 

designer Nike Davies-Okundaye, 

Ghanaian sculptor and 


Food 

Chef Alexander Smalls 

68 aphrochic

weaving artists, Theresah Ankkomah and 

Rufai Zakaris, a Ghanaian artist whose figurative 

works are made from single-use plastics 

found on the street. Completing the ambience 

is music from a variety of artists and DJs, 

including R&B singer, Khandice, DJ Patchoulee, 

and steel pannist Justin Homer. 

For world travelers, fans of Diaspora 

culture, and everyone who loves to eat, 

Alkebulan is an amazing opportunity to get a 

taste of the continent, past, present and a very 

bright future. As events like this become more 

common, more parts of the Diaspora will have 

a chance to share their part of the story and 

new perspectives on where Africa fits in our 

global food story will be formed, creating the 

possibility for something even greater. For 

Alexander Smalls, it’s likely that he sees it all 

already and he’s just waiting for us to catch 

up. In the meantime, he’s just taking it all as 

it comes, one step at a time. “It's just gifts,” he 

muses. “The universe worked it out for me to 

be able to do something like this with people 

who I have such respect for. It’s truly tremendous.” 

AC 

issue eight 71

Food 

72 aphrochic

Travel 

A Place To Gather 

More Than a Hotel, Philadelphia’s The Deacon 

Is a Space for Community 

Philadelphia is a city of neighborhoods. Each block is distinct, 

with its own special vibe. It’s the birthplace of our democracy and 

is home to some of the nation’s oldest architecture. On any given 

street, you can run into a historical site, and that’s exactly what 

happened when developer Everett Abitbol found an about-to-be 

demolished building that he would transform into one of the city’s 

most exciting new boutique hotels. 


Images by Jillian Guyette 

issue eight 75

Travel

Travel 

The former First African Baptist Church, originally built in 

1906, had a wall that was falling into the street when Abitbol discovered 

it. The church had been a place of refuge for South Philadelphia’s 

prominent Black community in the early 1900s. The same community 

that W.E.B. DuBois studied and wrote about in The Philadelphia Negro. 

After the church closed its doors, moving the congregation into a 

bigger space, the historic building had fallen into disrepair. Knowing of 

the rich community history of the First African Baptist Church, Abitbol 

decided he wanted to restore the building as a “community asset.” 

He turned to Philadelphia native Shannon Maldonado, hiring her 

as the creative director for what would become a hotel and community 

space in the Graduate Hospital neighborhood of the city. Maldonado, 

the owner of popular Philly boutique, YOWIE, is known for her love of 

color, eye for artisanship, and her signature minimalist aesthetic. And 

The Deacon offers all of that and more, with a Bauhaus design aesthetic. 

In beautifully appointed rooms, guests can interact with history, 

as the original stain glass from the church remains part of the architecture. 

Or they can gather in the common areas where Maldonado 

used color to create an enveloping and cozy experience. 

Beyond the rooms, the hotel was designed to honor its roots, and 

remain a place for the community to gather. On any given day, guests 

and neighborhood residents can find an interesting event to attend. 

From self-care slumber parties led by Freedom Apothecary to an 

evening of Latin dance, where guests are led through lessons of basic 

steps of Salsa by AfroTaino, every month there’s a host of unique gatherings 

to take part in. 

A place to gather, relax, and enjoy, The Deacon is a unique space 

designed for one-of-a-kind experiences and is now the new heart of 

Philadelphia’s Graduate Hospital neighborhood. AC 

You can book your stay and/or experience at thedeaconphl.com. 

78 aphrochic

Travel 


Wellness 

Back to Life 

Returning to the World After Long-Haul COVID 

It’s been more than a year since COVID-19 came and changed the world. After 

19 months of suffering, death and fear, rising vaccination rates and a declining 

number of daily cases has many of us ready to take our first steps back into 

real life — not life as it was before, but better, safer and with a new understanding 

of what’s really important. 


Photos by Bryan Mason and Jeanine Hays 

82 aphrochic

Wellness 

Jeanine and Bryan head into the 

mountains for a hike with their Nike 

Therma-FIT Golf Jackets 

84 aphrochic

Wellness 

The First Months of the Pandemic 

Our COVID journey started in February 2020. Bryan wasn’t 

feeling well. He had a deep pain in his back and could barely move. 

The day before he’d been fine and then suddenly we were close to 

going to the emergency room. Instead we opted to wait and see our 

doctor the next day. In the morning, it was hard for him to walk and I 

had to help him put his shoes on. In more than 20 years together, I had 

never seen him so ill. 

When we got to the doctor’s office. I had to help him into the 

building. The doctor sent us for a chest x-ray. It was a sunny day and 

the x-ray facility was just a few blocks away, so we walked. 

The test didn’t take long. Instead of the results, we got an urgent 

call from the doctor. Bryan had a severe double pneumonia. The 

technicians were surprised he was even standing. One lung was so 

full of fluid that it was pushing the other lung to the side. 

The next two months were a blur. COVID quickly went from 

being a rumor to a reality to a nightmare. Lockdowns were happening 

all over the country, but we were already inside. Bryan was confined 

to the couch while I cooked and tended to him and worked to keep our 

business running. Over that period of caring for him, there were a few 

days where I felt sick. Just some stomach cramps, nothing serious. I 

thought it must have been a stomach bug. It was gone in a few days 

and I never really thought about it. 

We made our way to Mount Sinai for a COVID test on the same 

day that New York City announced the lockdown. It came back 

negative (they were only 70% effective then), so they treated his 

pneumonia. The pain eventually subsided but his recovery was slow. 

It took two months for him to stop sleeping on the couch and longer 

for him to sleep through the night. Our doctor wasn’t convinced 

that his illness wasn’t COVID so she researched along with us to get 

caught up on the quickly moving science around the virus. 

By May he was better, and for a few weeks things were good. 

Then one day it felt like my skin was on fire. I broke out in hives all 

over my body. The doctor suggested hydrocortisone cream and 

lotion. It worked. A couple of weeks later, my feet were covered in 

a red rash. Then sometimes when I’d eat, my throat would begin to 

swell. It was strange, but none of it sounded like COVID. 

In June our doctor suggested that we get an antibodies test. By 

then the technicians could come directly to your home to draw blood. 

A couple of weeks later we learned that we both had COVID-19 antibodies. 

We had both had COVID. 

It was upsetting to hear that. People were dying in New York 

City from this awful virus. The former governor was giving us daily 

updates. The JAVITS Center was a triage center. But Bryan was better 

and my current symptoms didn’t match anything that was being said 

about COVID. We didn’t start hearing about the long-haulers until 

later. 

The Summer of 2020 

June and July were ok. Like everyone else in New York, we 

spent our days looking out the window of our apartment like fish in 

a bowl. We offered the magazine free online and started a series of 

live podcasts. We had just finished lunch after a live podcast in August 

when my throat began to swell. But this time it felt like I was choking, 

dying. I couldn’t breathe. I almost blacked out. I screamed for Bryan 

to give me an EpiPen shot. We had never used one before — never 

needed one, but the doctor had suggested getting one since I was 

having these weird allergy attacks. Thankfully it had just arrived that 

week. My throat opened back up and we headed to the ER. 

I was observed by the hospital staff for about an hour and then 

sent home with another EpiPen and some prednisone. The next day 

it happened again. I needed another shot of epinephrine to breathe. I 

was terrified. What was happening? 

For two weeks I deteriorated. I couldn’t eat things I normally ate 

any longer. Bryan researched anti-inflammatory foods and created 

a vegan diet for me with vegetables that helped deal with inflammation 

in the body. I had to wear a mask all day inside our apartment 

because everything was making me sick. I could no longer sleep in 

our bedroom. We bought an air purifier because there was something 

in the air causing me to feel worse. 

We’d decided over the summer that we were going to leave the 

city and were waiting to close on a house. But we needed to leave the 

apartment sooner. Bryan packed up all he could and we left Brooklyn 

in early September to stay at a friend’s place in Manhattan while she 

was upstate. I never saw our apartment again. 

It was hard for me to walk. I needed constant air conditioning 

because humidity would cause my throat to swell. My diet was 

extremely limited — only about 7 different fruits and vegetables - and 

I was on 10 medications just to breathe. We looked for help. I tried to 

get into COVID care clinics at Johns Hopkins and the Mayo Clinic but 

was rejected. When our doctor heard that the Mount Sinai Center for 

Post-COVID Care had opened we called, but they had a six-month 

waiting list. I couldn’t go until March 2021. So Bryan started building 

our own care team. 

I saw a rheumatologist and a series of allergists. None were very 

familiar with COVID, but we were able to rule out rheumatological 

issues. One of my allergists was completely uninterested in hearing 

about my experience. Whether it was because I’m Black, a woman, or 

both, I don’t know, but she remained convinced that I had a long-term 

undiagnosed case of herpes. So we found a different allergist. 

What was supposed to be a few weeks of staying in our friend’s 

apartment turned into months moving around Manhattan as our 

closing date got pushed back again and again due to various issues 

with the pandemic and the process itself. Finally, in mid-November 

we closed and moved into our new home. For a couple of weeks life 

86 aphrochic

Wellness 

Jeanine and Bryan lace up for a run in the park. Bryan is wearing Nike Air Force 1 Luxe shoes and Jeanine is wearing Nike React 

Infinity Run shoes. 

felt absolutely perfect — then it all got much, much worse. 

It started when a plant we received as a housewarming gift triggered 

an extreme reaction. I broke out in hives, my throat began to close, I needed 

two EpiPens and an ambulance. The EMTs were so kind. One had heard of 

post-COVID syndrome and seemed quite interested in all that had been 

happening to me. They said they would remember us if well called again. 

They wanted to be sure to arrive quickly if I had another attack. 

More prednisone followed, my second large dose in less than a year. 

It weakened my immune system, and an infection quickly spread from 

my mouth to my throat to my entire body. I couldn’t talk. I didn’t want to 

eat. Everything hurt. I could only communicate through grunts and tears, 

which made things hard for Bryan. I laid in bed day after day getting worse 

and worse, weaker and weaker. We saw an ear nose and throat specialist 

and then an infectious disease specialist. I needed to be weaned off the 

prednisone, but it had to be extremely slow because my body would react 

badly to fast tapering. 

Care For The Long Haul 

For two months I went through something called decompensation. 

I wasn’t eating so I lost too much weight. I couldn’t walk or talk and slept 

most of the day. It felt like dying. All I was holding on to was that I didn’t want 

my husband to be left all alone. I tried to gather strength for him. I wanted 

to live. 

He took care of me. Blending my food into smoothies, making 

homemade apple sauce. Anything that I could keep down. I refused most 

of it, but he knew that if I could make it to March, to the post-COVID center, 

Jeanine gets into her morning exercise 

routine, wearing a Nike Swoosh Luxe Bra 

and Nike Sportswear Tech Pack Pants. 


Wellness 

that I could get better. He never stopped 

believing. And he was right. 

In March 2021, we borrowed a 

neighbor’s car (we bought one but it was 

stuck in Texas, buried under snow) and 

drove down to the city. My clothes were 

hanging off my body. I talked slowly. I had 

brain fog caused by COVID, and Bryan 

needed to speak for me most times, 

reading through a diary of symptoms 

that we had been keeping since the last 

spring. I was re-learning how to talk, 

walk, even go to the bathroom again. The 

doctor was attentive. She listened. Then 

she said something I’ll never forget — 

“Everyone who comes here gets better.” 

Those were the words what I 

needed to hear. I knew that God had 

brought us to the right place. They 

said that what I was going through 

wasn’t new. They’d seen hundreds of 

similar cases. While the Post-COVID 

Care Center had been started for the 

most critical COVID-19 cases, those 

who had been hospitalized and needed 

oxygen, they found that thousands of 

New Yorkers were dealing with “longhaul 

COVID.” Long-haulers usually 

started with very mild symptoms, like 

my stomach bug, but COVID triggered 

something in the body, and months later 

they developed a variety of symptoms. 

They told Bryan that he had done 

an incredible job taking care of me and 

building my care team, and that now I 

needed physical therapy, a pulmonary 

specialist, and a neurologist. Within 

weeks I had new diagnoses of a blood 

pressure issue called POTS that was 

common in post-COVID patients, and 

peripheral neuropathy which caused 

extreme nerve pain, making it hard to 

walk. Where there was once no light at 

the end of the tunnel, they told me that I 

would be much better within six months. 

I really couldn’t imagine it. I had 

such a long way to go. But we worked 

hard. The physical therapy center had a 

special post-COVID regimen that had 

been developed by the Care Center. 

And I did my part. Where the schedule 

suggested physical therapy 2-3 times a 

week, I wanted to work out daily. I also 

had to start eating full meals again. It was 

work. Hard work. But in a few months, 

my appetite was back, and I could even 

eat meat again. My body was sorely in 

need of protein. 

Bryan was my nutritionist, physical 

therapist and mental wellness counselor. 

There were so many days I wanted to give 

up. Days I just felt bad for myself, days 

I was just mad at the world — why did 

COVID even exist? But every day he encouraged 

me to work hard, getting my 

mind and body fit, and now, six months 

later, I’m sitting here writing this article, 

able to walk again, and enjoy life again. 

Return to Life 

My COVID journey isn’t over. The 

virus has left me with chronic idiopathic 

urticaria — a condition where your 

body can randomly have severe allergic 

reactions, from hives to anaphylaxis — 

POTS, peripheral neuropathy, alopecia 

and textile dermatitis. We have to be 

so careful that sometimes I feel like a 

woman in a bubble. I take an air purifier 

with me when visiting family to make 

sure that the air around me is clean. And 

I don’t go to restaurants, because I need 

to avoid ingesting anything that might 

cause my skin to break out or my throat 

to close. So my husband has turned our 

kitchen into the best restaurant in New 

York, and he makes all of my meals to be 

sure they’re safe. We don’t have plants 

anymore. Just faux branches around 

the house. The doctors don’t know if I’ll 

always have these issues or if one day 

they’ll just disappear. There’s still a lot 

more to figure about post-COVID and 

how it impacts the body long term. 

But that’s not what’s important. 

What matters is that, for the first time in 

more than a year, my husband and I are 

both healthy again. Every morning we 

wake up and exercise. My body moves 

again, my mind is clear again, I spend 

every day eating amazing food and going 

up and down the stairs like I used to — 

even better actually, since I lost about 

100 pounds in the last year. I always 

used to walk a lot, but now I love to walk 

because I know what it’s like to not be 

able to. I love to drive with Bryan to the 

lookout on the mountains near our 

home and look out over as much of the 

world as I can see. 

Finally, it feels like we’ve reached 

a turning point. Fully vaccinated, ready 

to get our boosters, we are starting to 

enjoy life again. In our new home, we’re 

designing a wellness room. We’re in there 

every morning doing my physical therapy. 

Soon it will be a room that supports meditation 

and yoga practice as well. With 

gear from Nike to help us with our daily 

workouts, we’re building our physical 

and mental wellbeing as we continue to 

recover from this virus and its impact on 

our lives. It took a lot of steps to get here, 

and there might still be some stumbles 

ahead, but I’m looking forward to every 

step we take from here. AC 

See the MOOD section for the capsule 

collection Jeanine and Bryan curated with 

Nike to get back to life. 


Wellness 

COVID Resources 

Centers for Disease Control: cdc.gov 

World Health Organization: covid19.who.int 

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health: publichealth.jhu.edu 

Mount Sinai Center for Post-COVID Care: mountsinai.org/about/covid19/center-post-covid-care 

I N T E R I O R S 

N E W Y O R K 

A P H R O C H I C . C O M 


Reference 

The Structure 

of Diaspora 

This series on the African Diaspora began by listing some 

of the many questions that surround the African Diaspora, 

and diasporas as a whole. Without doubt the most persistent 

of these is simply, “What is it?” Ultimately, it’s a question 

of structure: “What is it that makes a diaspora?” But like 

many simple questions, this one is made up of a seemingly 

endless stream of other questions, making the process of 

answering it incredibly complex. 



Reference 

Search the term online and you’ll find a lot 

of answers and any number of definitions, most 

of which will likely differ only in the smallest 

details. But studying diasporas is a game of 

inches and those small differences in definition 

can mean big differences in how the concept is 

actually applied and which groups it is applied 

to. And so, this simple question has plagued 

the study of diasporas for years. For the African 

Diaspora, it may have been a question from the 

beginning, but that depends on when you think 

the beginning actually was. 

When do we start? And how? 

Since his 1966 introduction of the term, 

Joseph E. Harris was instrumental in shaping 

the discourse of modern African Diaspora 

theory. His Introduction to the African Diaspora 

marked a seismic shift in the way in which Africa-descended 

peoples from around the globe 

considered and addressed their collective circumstances. 

In another introduction — one 

that was appended to the 1993 second edition 

of Global Dimensions of Diaspora — Harris gives 

a brief definition of his concept of diaspora. 

According to Harris, “the African Diaspora 

concept subsumes the following: the global dispersion 

(voluntary and involuntary) of Africans 

throughout history; the emergence of a cultural 

identity abroad based on origin and social 

condition; and the psychological or physical 

return to the homeland, Africa.” 

By conceiving of the African Diaspora in 

this way, beginning with the voluntary — as 

well as involuntary — movements of Africans 

in antiquity, Harris expands the concept in 

time and space, looking beyond the temporal 

boundaries of the trans-Atlantic slave trade 

and the geographic borders of the Black Atlantic 

to the long periods of African movement that 

pre-date both. Prior to the dispersion of the 

16th-19th centuries, Africans moved about the 

world in a variety of capacities, both free and 

enslaved. Their presence and efforts bolstered 

the spread of both Christianity and Islam as 

world religions, and aided the development of 

the ancient and medieval worlds in many places 

including Greece, Rome and Spain. The effect 

of this expansion, for Harris, is to preserve the 

African Diaspora from being confined exclusively 

to a legacy of new world slavery. This 

larger historical purview enables Diaspora to be 

read as a story of African achievement abroad 

in addition to the more usual tales of subjugation 

and woe. It also brings up some important 

points to consider. 

The first point to consider in Harris’ construction 

of Diaspora, at this point in the conversation, 

is how it changes the relationship 

between the Diaspora and Pan-Africanism. In 

situating the origins of the African Diaspora 

in the voluntary movements of Africans in 

antiquity, Harris removes the trans-Atlantic 

Slave trade as the direct catalyst for the Diaspora 

and by extension, Pan-Africanism as the direct 

predecessor of the African Diaspora. Conversely, 

British historian, George Shepperson, who 

also introduced the African Diaspora concept 

in 1966, describes the Diaspora as,“a series of 

reactions to the imposition of the economic and 

political rule of alien peoples in Africa, to slavery 

and imperialism.” As scholar Carlton Wilson 

would reflect, though Shepperson too called for 

an expansion of the diaspora concept, he nevertheless, 

“saw the slave trade, slavery, the period 

of imperialism, and the partition of Africa as 

being the focus of the African Diaspora.” 

The difference between Harris’ and Shepperson’s 

constructions of the African Diaspora 

brings about an interesting paradox. On the 

one hand, it is both desirable and necessary to 

tell a story of Diaspora that is not confined to 

the ramifications of the trans-Atlantic slave 

trade. However, a function-based approach to 

the African Diaspora will necessarily fall closer 

to Shepperson’s view, as it was not the needs 

of Africans in antiquity but in the modern age 

of slavery, colonization, and imperialism that 

led to the emergence of the African Diaspora 

concept. And it is the needs of the world in 

the aftermath of these events that the African 

Diaspora concept must serve. 

Forced Movement or Just Movement? 

At stake within this small distinction is the 

question of how diasporas begin and specifically 

the looming issue of forced migration - whether 

the condition of diaspora can only exist when 

migrants are forced into movement by war, exile 

or in the case of the African Diaspora, centuries 

of capture and trade across deserts and seas. 

While traditionally, the first dispersed communities 

discussed as diaspora, beginning with 

the Jewish, all had forced movement as their 

starting point, increasingly in recent years the 

cause of the movement has been considered 

far less important if not completely immaterial. 

This is particularly true in the study of internal 

diasporas, comprised of people born in a particular 

country who have simply moved to another 

part of the same country. 

The online resource WorldAtlas lists the 

4 million Americans who moved from their 

home states to other American states in 2010 

and the millions more who have moved from the 

interior of China to the nation’s coastal cities as 

examples of internal diasporas. So not only are 

we lacking consensus on whether it’s important 

to consider why communities were dispersed 

before terming them diasporas, it’s not even 

clear how far they have to go before the term can 

be applied. Because of the lack of clarity on basic 

points, attempting to understand the makeup of 

the African Diaspora — and diasporas as a whole 

— can easily become a process of going in rhetorical 

circles. Case in point: this question of 

forced migrations brings us back to a question 

that this series has already posed. If forced 

dispersion is not a necessary prerequisite to 

diaspora, then any movement by a group of 

people from one place to others — regardless of 

distance — will logically result in a diaspora. And 

if that’s the case, then why study diasporas at all? 

Worst Things First 

For as long as there have been people, 

there has been movement. Diaspora exists as 

a separate category to migration specifically 

because forced movement is the anomaly. 

Without it, none of the other factors thought 

to be defining aspects of diasporas fit. Harris’ 

ideas on common cultural identity, common 

economic condition and the dream of return 

— all standard components in most definitions 

of diaspora — are far less certain realities for a 

group of people who voluntarily left a particular 

place than for people exiled or forcibly removed. 

Africans who left the continent to travel the 

world in antiquity did so in a number of different 

socio-economic states and with a wide variety of 

cultural identities. Those who left the continent 

during the trans-Atlantic slave trade did so 

under nearly identical circumstances and for 

the most part were all delivered into similar 

conditions of enslavement. 

Forced migration also suggests a common 

reason for dispersal for most if not all of those 

thought to be in diaspora. Voluntary migration 

on the other hand, can occur for any number of 


Reference 

reasons which may or may not provide the basis 

for a sense of community. If, for example, two 

members of China’s “internal diaspora” were to 

leave the same hometown only to meet in one 

of the coastal cities, but one left reluctantly to 

find work and the other left enthusiastically to 

escape some personal tragedy, it’s quite possible 

that they do not share a dream of return. 

The Law of Logical Conclusions 

One final way to test the question of 

whether forced migration is needed to create 

a diaspora is to push the idea that it isn’t to its 

logical conclusion. Our world today is a highly 

globalized space. Nearly every nation on earth 

supports a mix of communities from other 

nations. Therefore without the anomaly of 

forced migration — though it has become more 

common in recent years — just about everywhere 

on earth is actively a part of the diaspora 

of just about everywhere else. That would make 

being part of a diaspora community about as 

meaningful a distinction among human beings 

as needing water or breathing air. 

Because it begins with dispersal by an 

external force, the traditional idea of diaspora 

can be seen, on some level, as a resistance to the 

condition of being dispersed. This is shown in 

the constant reference to return, whether real 

or imagined, to the original homeland. This resistance 

is far less likely to exist among the 

dispersed community if it had been their idea — 

whether individually or as a group — to move in 

the first place. Conversely those dispersed by an 

external force like war, exile or enslavement are 

far more likely to harbor the desire to undo their 

migration. While distant from each other, African 

migrants in antiquity were not — as a whole— 

dispersed and therefore they were not a diaspora. 

Whether forced migration is ever ratified 

as the starting point of all diaspora, it clearly 

plays an important role the beginning of ours 

— or at least the start of our understanding 

of ourselves as a diaspora. The issue we face is 

how to situate that fact in the wider history of 

the African continent from which our ancestors 

were dispersed. Do we begin with the first 

Africans to migrate, the point at which we were 

dispersed, or the moment we decided that we 

were a diaspora? As usual, we have some options 

and each one leads to some specific outcomes. 

Moving Beyond The Paradox 

There are two possible solutions to the 

Harris/Shepperson paradox that we’ll consider 

here: the first is to make a distinction between 

the “African Diaspora Phenomenon,” and the 

“African Diaspora Concept.” The spreading 

of Africans across the world can certainly be 

said to begin with the voluntary and involuntary 

movements of people in antiquity. 

However the concept of the African Diaspora, 

as addressed in earlier segments, is a direct 

outgrowth of the needs of those who were 

dispersed by the trans-Atlantic trade and those 

who were later despised for being the descendants 

of the enslaved. While it is not at all points 

the most elegant solution, it succeeds in countenancing 

the competing facts that Africans 

moved throughout the world prior to the global 

slave trade and that the fallout from that trade, 

including the colonization of Africa, is the reason 

why anyone ever imagined an African Diaspora at 

all. The distinction preserves the functional idea 

that while the history of the African Diaspora is 

not the whole history of the African Continent, 

the trans-Atlantic slave trade and the world that 

it built has not succeeded in cutting the African 

Diaspora off from that larger history. 

The second possibility is to acknowledge 

that while Africans like so many others, have 

moved freely around the world throughout 

history — and continue to today it was not until 

that movement was forced upon our ancestors 

en masse that migration became dispersion 

and scattered communities became a diaspora. 

The effect of this perspective is to look at the 

emergence of diaspora as a specific occurrence 

within the continuity of African history 

— and the point of genesis for a number of new 

cultures, rather than as a process spanning 

the entirety of it. Seen in this way the African 

Diaspora is an outgrowth, an expansion, of 

African history. It is a perspective that countenances 

all of the Diaspora’s deep connections 

to the long histories of Africa’s many nations, 

kingdoms and civilizations, but without the 

need for diaspora to be read backwards into 

those histories. It also preserves the historical 

and theoretical place of Pan-Africanism as a 

precursor, contextualizing the fact that we were 

a diaspora long before we ever thought to call 

ourselves one. Because forced migration is not 

acknowledged generally as a necessary starting 

point for diaspora, this series has made consistent 

use of the first solution, but acknowledges 

that the second may actually provide a more 

accurate description of the course of events 

and a more promising starting point for understanding 

the complex relationships that make 

up the diaspora today. 

Conclusion 

Why we moved, how we became a diaspora 

is an important question, but it’s only the 

beginning. To say Diaspora is easy. To understand 

what we mean when we say it and what 

we mean to each other as mutual parts of it is far 

more complicated. It’s not just a recollection of 

all the places we come from and the years that 

have passed since were dispersed, it’s a consideration 

of where and who and what we are now, 

and the places that we call “home.” AC 

98 aphrochic

Sounds 

Jennah Bell 

The Work of Pen and Guitar 

When you put good vibes out, good things happen. Case in point: A 

chance post on Instagram featuring music from one of our favorite 

artists garnered a response from someone who was a friend of the 

artist’s sister. A few DMs later, we had an interview, a clear choice 

for this issue’s cover story and best of all, a great conversation with 

Jennah Bell. 

Interview by Bryan Mason and Jeanine Hays 

Photos by Mallory Talty 

issue eight 101

Sounds 

Jennah Bell is an intriguing multiplicity of 

musical influences. Equal parts country, folk, 

R&B and musical theater, her sound is instantly 

familiar, yet all her own. We sat down with 

Jennah to talk about her own musical history, 

the path to becoming a singer and the value of 

having space to dream. 

AC: When did music first become a part of 

your life? And when did you know it would be 

your career? 

JB: Music has always been a part of my life. 

I grew up in a very musical household. My mom 

studied music and my father was a songwriter. 

For me the start of it was between seeing Annie 

the musical and hearing Stevie Wonder's Superwoman 

for the first time. I guess Superwoman is 

kind of like a musical — the epicness of it. 

As for the career path, I think that I knew 

that I wanted to do it because I kept choosing 

it. I attended the Berkelee School of Music in 

Boston, but I didn’t necessarily apply with the 

idea to become a professional musician. I don't 

think it was that direct. But I think after getting 

there, and having that experience, I was more 

certain that I wanted to pursue it. But I don't 

think it was ever a hard line decision, per se. 

AC: Tell us a little bit about Oakland. Living 

in LA now, how does Oakland feel when you 

remember it? How has it changed? And where do 

you hear it in your music? 

JB: I left Oakland for Boston when I was 17. 

So the Oakland that I grew up with is drastically 

different than what it is now, especially because 

[of] the influx of tech to the Bay Area. But the 

Oakland I grew up with — I think it was like 

living on an island. Now that I've lived in other 

places — New York, Boston, LA now — Oakland 

is a very special place, with its own language, 

its own baseline for artistic endeavors. And I 

think that really influenced the way that I approached 

writing songs and just being aware 

of the language that I was using and what story 

I was trying to tell, especially because poetry 

was such a huge part of Oakland's art scene 

when I was growing up. I think that the mosaic 

of culture and art in Oakland leaves its own 

print on everybody. But it's not any one thing. I 

think that's why I often feel multiplicity in my 

expression, because I don't ever feel like one 

thing. 

AC: What do you mean when you say, 

“multiplicity in your expression?” Could you 

elaborate that on that more? 

JB: Sure. Oakland is on the smaller side 

for a city but it's really dense. So from block to 

block, you're somewhere else. So I had a lot of 

very impactful experiences that at the time just 

seemed like the norm, being from there. But 

then leaving the Bay Area, it became very clear 

that all of those things made in an imprint on 

my personality. So I use the term multiplicity, I 

guess, as a way to touch on the lack of singularity 

not only in my experience, but also my personality. 

It’s kind of all over the place. It’s all of the 

things I've ever experienced and is never really 

been streamlined to one thing. 

AC: What was your first experience with 

acoustic guitar? What about the instrument 

convinced you to make it your focus? 

JB: Well, my first experience with the 

acoustic guitar was not pleasant. I played piano 

and flute and had a brief stint with the drums 

before I started guitar. I'd started writing 

poetry and I’d started to think about songwriting 

and I thought that if I learned how to 

play guitar, it might change the expression of 

my writing. But when I picked it up, I felt like 

I was fighting with it the whole time. I didn't go 

through the usual teaching avenues with it and 

it was a very complicated instrument for me to 

try to learn intuitively. At the same time, I did 

develop a style pretty early on, because I didn't 

know what I was doing. 

My stepmom played a lot of James Taylor, 

so I was very conscious of finger picking and 

the more folk / country style. And I saw people 

with guitars — Tracy Chapman, Richie Havens 

— but there was no one artist I really saw and 

felt like, that's why I want to play the guitar. I just 

knew that pianos confused my brain. And that, 

even though guitar was difficult, it was about 

patterns. I think more in patterns than I do 

anything else, so the guitar felt like if I learned 

the patterns, I could just play them up and down 

the fret board. 

Over time, I started looking at guitar as 

its own way to write music, as opposed to the 

marriage between what I was writing over the 

music. So I never did the guitar in any kind of 

depth until after I left college. Then I was like, 

Wow, there's a lot more here that I haven't even 

begun to think about." 

AC: I feel like when we listen to your music, 

it's folk and there's country and there's a little 

R&B in there. It's very ethereal as well. Can you 

take us on the journey of how your sound came 

together? Was it all at school or did it start later? 

JB: I know, my parents would be very upset 

at me for saying this. But when I was attending 

Berkelee, I was at school — I was not in school. 

I think that, having left home and realizing how 

I learn and how I absorb, it was a much slower 

process for me than institutionalized learning 

gave room for, especially for something like 

music. So there were moments where I could 

grasp something. But processing it out, understanding 

it, actually took a lot longer. So being 

in a music school had its benefits, but also an 

extreme amount of intimidation for the speed at 

which I was absorbing things. My problem was 

articulating that I knew these things. A lot of my 

teachers were like, “You get it, but you can't tell 

me what it is that you get.” So I never really got 

into what Berkelee was for. 

What I took out of the experience, plus or 

minus a few teachers who just got where I was, 

and let me be, was my room. I was extremely 

shy — I still struggle with stage fright — so I 

was in my room, writing. I was the person who 

would leave in the middle of the party and go 

to a different room and start writing. It was 

writing more than anything. The performance 

didn't come until I moved to New York. But 

when I was in Boston, I was just in my room, 

learning. Learning how to record myself, 

what my voice sounded like in a microphone. 

Looking back, I probably wrote like 100 songs 

in my first year. It just felt natural. Singing 

wasn't really in the forefront of my mind. 

I didn't think of myself as a singer. I introduced 

myself as a songwriter. So yeah, I was 

in my room, recording, figuring out the whole 

guitar thing. 

102 aphrochic

Sounds 

AC: So it was in New York that you went more into the 

singing part of your your path? 

JB: It's funny, I was singing the songs, but I was still not 

thinking of myself as a singer. I grew up with a very specific idea 

of what a singer was. Etta James was a singer to me. Chaka Khan 

was a singer to me. But I didn't sing like that. So I wasn't thinking 

that I could sing at all. So I was still hyper-focused on the songwriting 

part of it. And while I was in New York I was introduced to 

this poetry community called The Strivers Row. I signed on with 

them, and started doing shows. And then it became more interesting 

for me — it's how people were responding to not only what 

I was saying, but what I was presenting musically. Now, thinking 

about my voice in terms of how it's changed over the years, just 

with getting older, the things I can and can't do; I think singing is 

much more of a study for me now, because I have to learn how to 

navigate a body and muscles and things that are going through 

their own natural process. So I can't approach them the way that 

I used to, and I have to think about what I eat, if I exercise. All of 

those things make me more of a singer now than I was if only 

because of that. 

AC: We know that folk and country all have roots in Black 

music, but they’re not seen as ours today. How do you see your 

music in continuity with the wider history of Black music? 

JB: Genre has always been a tricky thing for me. I think the 

folk / country classification is one of the trickiest because it has 

its own implications in terms of who can and who cannot. And 

that's always been something, I guess, that's drawn me to it, not 

just to sing it, but to really look at what that is. And it's storytelling. 

So I never felt an embargo on whether or not I was allowed to 

tell a story — that didn't seem so off-limits to me. I think what did 

is being called a country artist or being called a folk artist. That 

felt like people wanted to keep that away from how they heard my 

music. And it's interesting — there are so many Black country 

artists that were not classified as country. Ray Charles released 

an entire country album. So did Tina Turner. Charlie Pride is one 

of the highest-selling artists in the world in country music. 

So there were all these things that I was seeing that weren’t 

real, that are just a way to make sure there is a space that's 

untouched. And I never liked that idea. So in terms of the wider 

picture, for Black artists or Black music, there's nothing we've 

never touched, or created. And again, I think, part of growing up 

in Oakland put some things in terms of intention, and pursuing 

things, in perspective for me pretty early on. I think it made it 

possible to just focus, to just drown out the noise of what genre is, 

which at its worst is musical segregation. Like what you like, play 

what you like. That's it. 

I will — fortunately, and unfortunately — never experience 

my music the way that other people do. So I'm always surprised 

with what someone hears when they listen. Because I might 

be going for one thing and someone can hear something completely 

different. But for my sound, I think that being in love with 

musicals, really does sort of speak to some aspect of the ethereality 

you mentioned. As a kid, all of my favorite musicals books, and 

even movies were all fantasy, and escapist. Even as an adult, I'm 

learning I can very easily go into a world and completely detach, 

and be somewhere else without realizing until I come back. So 

I think, that ability actually makes it easier to not bring certain 

realities into the music so that it's a space where you're dreaming. 

Because dreaming is as much part of reality for me as anything else. 

And I think for most people, you know, life is complex 

and difficult at times. I need that dreaming place. So I guess, 

other people need it too. And that might be what they're 

hearing. So all of the influences, country, folk — I've never been 

someone who said no to any genre or avenue of music, because 

anything that isn't what I do is interesting to me and makes an 

impression. So when I sit down to write, those impressions 

come through. I try not to be too invested in that and just know 

that I'm the avenue by which the music comes. So whatever is 

meant to be in that pot, or the recipe that was meant for that pot 

is what’s there. I'm just doing the work of picking up the pen and 

the guitar. AC 

Listen to Jennah Bell's Anchors & Elephants on Spotify 


PINPOINT 

Artists & Artisans | Hot Topic | Who Are You

ARTISTS & ARTISANS 

Coloring Outside the Lines 

When Sotheby's launched a selling exhibition to celebrate the extraordinary skill, 

imagination, and craftsmanship of Black jewelry designers, Sheryl Jones was sure to be 

included. The Brilliant & Black: A Jewelry Renaissance exhibit is the first of its kind, just 

like Sheryl herself. She is one of the first and few women of color operating a jewelry 

store in New York City's famed Diamond District. Her seminal designs have been worn 

by iconic women around the world, including Cicely Tyson, H.E.R., Andra Day, Tamron 

Hall, Bevy Smith, Remy Ma, and more. And even at the exhibit she broke the rules, 

having a male model photographed wearing her Pink & Peridot necklace. The result, as 

always with Jones, offers the idea of a person who is not afraid to color outside the lines. 

Photo of Sheryl Jones by 

Hardy Klahold 

Words by Cheminne Taylor-Smith 



Sheryl began her career in fine jewelry 

in 1999, after working for a decade in the entertainment 

industry as a film and television 

publicist. “I have always been passionate 

about fine gemstones’ transformative power 

and beauty,” she explains, “And I dreamed of 

one day bringing music’s similar vitality to a 

jewelry collection of my own.” 

Sheryl's three fine-jewelry concepts 

for the Sotheby's exhibit are part of her 

Luminous Collection, which she conceived 

to honor Black women who have broken 

barriers and made history – much like 

Sheryl herself in the jewelry business. The 

one-of-a-kind colorful objects are imbued 

with symbolism and significance. These 

exquisite pieces manifest the strength and 

beauty of every woman who wears them. 

“I wanted to honor the tremendous 

accomplishments and contributions to 

society that Black women have made, in the 

past and in the present. I know how hard 

it is to be the only one or to have to break 

through a barrier,” Sheryl says. “It takes 

persistence, resilience, patience, and creativity. 

So I wanted to put the spotlight 

on Black women who have changed the 

world by breaking the rules and forging 

new paths. Each piece in the Luminous 

Collection isn’t just a pretty look – they 

are all crafted to represent strength and 

the ability to embrace what makes us 

different. 

“Black women are excelling in every 

industry from science, finance, entertainment, 

to fashion, sports and art,” Sheryl 

continues. “We are holding positions and 

achieving successes that women just one 

generation ago could only dream about. 

Women like my mother were often the first 

in their families to go to college and to 

achieve in ways their parents could never 

imagine, but they had very limited career 

paths and positions.” 

Sheryl is known for her work with 

colorful stones, and this collection is no 

different, featuring stones in a panoply of 

shapes and a tapestry of colors to reflect 

the vast array of interests and goals that 

make Black women unique, while highlighting 

the common values and qualities 

that bind and lift us all. 

“Each stone is weighted with meaning 

and symbolism,” Jones said. “They make 

a statement on their own and complement 

the strength and determination of the 

woman who would make them her own.” AC 

The Pink & Peridot Necklace, which can 

be worn in three ways, is comprised of 34 

perfectly matched Ascher cut peridot, set with 

multi-shape clusters of pink sapphires, rubies, 

tourmalines, kunzite and diamonds. The unique 

design includes a removable pendant set with 

peridot, purple-pink diamond and unheated 

purple sapphire, grape garnet, light and hot pink 

sapphires, tourmalines, and diamonds. 

“Peridot is associated with strength and 

confidence, so I wanted to design a necklace 

that would represent noble women who 

demonstrate courage in the face of adversity and 

act with quiet strength,” Sheryl Jones reveals. 

“With the peridot, there is a nod to wealth and 

independence, the ability for a woman to stand 

on her own. Add the pendant with its purple-pink 

diamond and sapphires, and the look becomes 

more soft, instinctive and passionate. I love that 

duality in women.” 



The Amulet Ring has a strong focal point with a 

pear shaped, pale pink, diamond. It underscores 

the contrast of the hardness of a diamond with 

the softness of a pastel color. Named for the 

magical essence inside all Black women, this ring 

is a reminder to each woman to let her light shine. 

“Some luminous women may not be as well 

known in the general public, but they are still 

shaking things up in their own arenas,” Sheryl 

Jones says. “This ring truly represents the 

combination of strength and beauty that all 

Black women—and all women — possess.” 

The Moxieful Ear Pendants are executed in a 

sweeping design that includes ovals, trillions, 

rounds, cushions, and pear shapes. Their color 

palette flows from light to dark with tourmalines, 

tsavorite garnets, sapphires, aquamarines, and 

white diamonds. “Aquamarine stones have long 

represented tranquility and clarity, symbols of 

a fearless woman,” Sheryl Jones says. “I wanted 

to use the colors of tranquil, cool waters to 

showcase the ability of a strong woman to remain 

calm at all times. At the same time, the design is 

bold and challenges the status quo.” The various 

shades, colors, and shapes in the pendants, 

weave together to create a tapestry of balance 

and continuity. 


HOT TOPIC 

The Obama Portraits: A New Vision of Black Power 

As Black people, there’s never any shortage of hot topics that are on our minds as we 

deal with the pileup of aggressions — macro and micro — that take up so much of our 

daily lives. But if Black Joy is built on any one thing, it’s the understanding that life 

isn’t all struggle. Sometimes the fact that we never stop fighting makes it hard for us 

to see how often we win. 

In a world where mental health maintenance 

and a commitment to naps legitimately 

stand side by side with marches and 

protests as revolutionary acts, it’s important 

for us to take the time, whenever it comes, 

to stop and smell the hard-won roses. And it 

just so happens that two of our biggest wins 

are traveling the country right now, and 

could be coming to a museum near you. 

Even before they were unveiled, 

everyone knew that the portraits of the 44th 

President and First Lady of the United States 

would be unique — if only for being the only 

such works to date to feature people of color. 

But perhaps just as important, they are as 

much fascinating and engaging works of 

modern art as they are symbols of the continuity 

of American power. And it is in both 

capacities that they are touring the country, 

giving all of us the chance to experience 

them up close. 

In late October, the portraits concluded 

the second leg of their five-museum tour 

which started in June 2021 and will end in 

May 2022. Arranged by the Smithsonian 

National Portrait Museum, the tour started 

in Chicago and will take the portraits to 

the Los Angeles County Museum of Art 

(LACMA), Atlanta’s High Museum of Art, 

and Houston’s Museum of Fine Arts. For the 

second stop, the tour came to the Brooklyn 

Museum, where they were the main attraction 

for nearly three months. 

Trusting the Process 

To create the images that would 

cement them as part of American history 

forever, Barack and Michelle Obama were 

presented with a short list of possible 

artists. Michelle chose Amy Sherald, a 

self-described American realist, known for 

creating ethereal images of Black subjects 

in shades of gray against mostly empty 

backdrops. For the former First Lady, it was 

imperative that she felt a connection with 

her artist. With Sherald, that connection 

was immediate and strong. “Within the first 

few sentences of our conversation, I knew 

she was the one for me,” Michelle reported 

to the Smithsonian. “There was an instant 

connection, that kind of sister-girl connection…and 

that was true all the way through 

the process.” 

For President Obama it was even more 

important to have an artist that understood 

not only his unique position in the history of 

America, but also how he saw himself in it. 

As the nation’s first Black president, Barack 

Obama is the culmination of a great many 

things that many people thought simply 

couldn’t happen. As his time in the Oval 

office passed, it would become the fodder of 

history, to be interpreted, contextualized, 

or simply forgotten as future academics 

saw fit. As part of the collection of Presidential 

Portraits, this image of Barack Obama 


Photo furnished by The Brooklyn Museum 


HOT TOPIC 

will be part of a visual record that will last 

long after his terms in office have faded 

into antiquity. As such, it will be one of the 

most lasting and personal statements on his 

presidency. For a president with an eye on 

history and a deep connection to contemporary 

art and culture, Kehinde Wiley was a 

clear choice. 

Like Amy Sherald, Kehinde Wiley 

is known for monumental works that 

challenge mainstream notions of race, 

culture and power. For Wiley, his habit of 

“street casting” people met by chance on the 

street to model for him speaks directly to his 

method of reinterpreting famous works of 

European portraiture to spotlight contemporary 

Black people. But Barack Obama was 

no chance meeting, and the difference was 

apparent to Wiley from the start. “Generally 

I’m painting the powerless,” Wiley says in 

a video interview available in the exhibit, 

noting by contrast that having the American 

President as your model means working 

with “arguably, the most powerful man in 

the world.” But for President Obama, that 

reversal was exactly the point. “I was always 

struck by the degree to which [Wiley’s 

portraits] challenged our conventional 

views of power and privilege,” Obama 

is quoted in the exhibit. The President 

lauds the artist’s “extraordinary care and 

precision and vision in recognizing the 

beauty and the grace and the dignity of 

people who are so often invisible…” 

Over the course of a year through a 

combination of photo shoots and in-person 

sittings, Wiley and Sherald completed their 

respective works, which were unveiled to 

the world in 2018. Seen individually, they 

are masterful works befitting the Obamas 

stature as both political figures and cultural 

icons. Taken together, it’s striking how very 

different the two images are. 

A Study in Distinction 

The portrait of Barack Obama explodes 

with color. From the billowing, floral 

backdrop to the tone of the president’s 

skin, everything in the image is vibrant and 

lively. Far from the formal stances that most 

presidents have adopted in their portraits, 

Obama in this image is conscientiously 

informal, with an unbuttoned shirt, no tie 

and absent any of the background regalia 

associated with his office. Rather than 

standing imperiously or sitting regally, the 

president is leaning forward as if engaged 

in conversation. His gaze is direct, and in 

that somewhat unsettling way that he often 

does, Kehinde Wiley succeeds in creating 

the lifelike impression that the man in this 

painting is very interested in what you’re 

about to say. In all, it’s a very colorful and 

engaging look at a person whose position 

typically sets them apart. 

Amy Sherald’s portrait of Michele 

Obama is an equally masterful work made 

all the more striking by its deep contrasts 

with Wiley’s portrait of Barack. Featuring 

Sherald’s typically subdued color palette 

and minimalist background, the image has 

the calm and regal quality often associated 

with classical portraiture. Contrasting 

Wiley’s nearly photorealistic approach to 

depicting features, the soft lines of Sherald’s 

portrait feels more like an impression of the 

First Lady — a feeling — than a direct translation 

of her likeness. And where Barack in 

his image is informal and engaging, Michelle 

in hers is sophisticated and somewhat aloof, 

with a look that could be as much appraising 

as inviting, and leaving us to guess which it 

might be. 

Between the Lines 

Presidential portraiture is always 

symbolic by nature and often its content 

is largely symbolic as well. In analyzing a 

famed portrait of George Washington, the 

exhibit lists seven symbolic inclusions in 

elements ranging from Washington’s stance 

to a small rainbow seen in the background. 

For Barack Obama, the flowering backdrop 

that surrounds him includes homages to 

several important places in his life’s journey. 

The African blue lilies are a tribute to his 

Kenyan father while the jasmine refers to 

Hawaii along with chrysanthemums, the 

official flowers of Chicago. 

For Michelle Obama, the colorfully 

modern geometric print of her dress bears 

a strong relationship to African American 

quilt-making traditions such as those 

which have survived in Gee’s Bend Alabama 

since before the Civil War. Also interesting 

is Sherald’s use of an empty backdrop 

for this portrait. While a frequent element 

in her work as a whole, it is also a common 

motif for the portraits of past presidents. 

John Adams, John Quincy Adams, Thomas 

Jefferson and William Henry Harrison all 


HOT TOPIC 

have portraits with such a background. But 

that’s only the beginning of the meaning 

layered in each of these images. True to 

form, both Wiley and Sherald found ways to 

place the first Black President and First Lady 

in direct conversation with the meta-narratives 

that surrounded them as Black people 

in American popular culture even while 

occupying the nation’s highest office. 

In his image, Barack Obama is a Black 

man — an African — in nature. For much of 

early African American history, the image of 

the African in nature was often used to dehumanize, 

depicting us as little more than 

primates, incapable of the levels of civilization 

evinced by those who enslaved us 

and grateful for having been brought into 

modernity. Yet in this image, Barack Obama, 

Black and President of the the United States, 

is surrounded by nature, but wrapped in the 

symbols of “civilization.” His suit, his watch, 

the chair he’s sitting on, and even wedding 

ring all mark him as a sophisticated man of 

the modern age, a stark contrast to those 

early images. Even the intelligent gaze and 

inviting demeanor depicted in the image 

go against common tropes of Black men as 

predatory and dangerous. 

Similarly, Michelle Obama’s portrait 

can be seen speaking to those tropes of 

common knowledge usually directed at 

Black women. The soft lines of the portrait 

depict a Black woman who is beautiful, 

soft, strong, sophisticated and feminine — 

a conspicuous absence in many museums 

and collections outside of those shows and 

events specifically devoted to such representations. 

In its presentment of Mrs. 

Obama, the painting takes away many of the 

usual points of attack for African American 

women. Her skin tone is more gray than 

brown. Her body, hidden beneath the 

flowing expanse of the dress is removed 

as a potential focus of attention. And to a 

society that’s expectation of “free access” 

to Black women — from their mannerisms 

and their hair to their joy and their “magic,” 

— is the subject of long and ongoing debate, 

Michelle’s posture of quiet reserve speaks 

volumes. 

Remember the Time 

We’ve come a long way in our fight in 

this country, and we’ve got a long way left to 

go. When we stop to count our wins, we win 

again and we get more of what we need to 

push a little bit further. To have had Barack 

and Michelle Obama leading this nation and 

some of its most important discourses was 

undoubtedly one of our biggest wins to date. 

Sandwiched between the tenures of George 

W. Bush and Donald Trump, the Obama 

Presidency was 8 years of relative calm and 

progressive thought built around reason, 

compromise and most of all, hope. 

And as we work to recover some sense 

of that state amid the tumult of everything 

that’s followed since the Obamas left the 

White House, seeing these portraits is more 

than a great excuse to go to a museum — it’s a 

chance to remember that feeling again and a 

chance to inspire something new, not just for 

us but for the next generation. As Michelle 

Obama said herself, “One visit, one performance, 

one touch, and who knows how you 

could spark a child’s imagination.” AC 


WHO ARE YOU 

Name: 

Micah James, age 11 

Based In: 

Pennsylvania 

Occupation: 

6th grade 

Currently: 

My mom introduced me to these two 

guys called Black Violin. And they play 

hip-hop and classical music together. 

And I just set that as an example of what 

I wanted to do. I'm in 6th grade in the 

Central PA Youth Orchestra, first chair. 

I play the violin. Right now I like to play 

video games, play violin, play basketball, 

ride my bike, run track, and do drawing 

videos on YouTube. I would like to run 

professional track when I grow up, but 

doing all of those things [I like] together 

would be really cool. 

Black Culture Is: 

Like a remix. Our culture, after being 

taken from Africa and incorporating 

that into our lives in America. 

Photograph by Michael 

T. Davis Photography 

(mtdphotography.com). 

Part of the photographer's 

More than a Hashtag series. 

120 aphrochic

AphroChic Magazine: Issue No. 8

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