Qiana Mestrich
b. 1977, NYC
Founder/Blogger, Dodge & Burn: Decolonizing Photography History, est. 2007
EDUCATION
2013 M.F.A. ICP-Bard College (New York, NY)
1999 B.A. Sarah Lawrence College (Bronxville, NY)
AWARDS
2024 Baxter St Camera Club of NY Artist Residency
2022 Magnum Foundation Counter Histories Grant
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2016 Hard To Place, Booklyn Art Space (Brooklyn, NY)
2015 Inherited Patterns, New York Public Library (New York, NY)
2014 Trust Your Struggle, Sweet Lorraine Gallery (Brooklyn, NY)
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2023 Self Adjacent, Visual Arts Center (Richmond, VA)
2023 Entwined, Sundaram Tagore Gallery at Cromwell Place (London, UK)
2023 Here Now, Byrdcliffe Guild (Woodstock, NY)
2023 The Rose, Lumber Room (Portland, OR)
2023 Mother Nature/Human Nurture, Old Stone House (Brooklyn, NY)
2022 Picturing Black Girlhood, Rutgers University (Newark, NJ)
2021 I belong to this, Huxley Parlour (London, UK)
2021 IDEOLOGIES, RAY Triennial Fotografieprojekte (Frankfurt, Germany)
2020 Migration(s) and Meaning in Art, Meyerhoff Gallery at MICA (Baltimore, MD)
2019 Closets: Reimagining Identities While Embracing Memories, NYU Tisch (New York, NY)
2019 BRIC Biennial Volume III: South Brooklyn Edition, BRIC (Brooklyn, NY)
2018 Resolution is not the point., Photo50, London Art Fair (UK)
2015 On Being Black, Arnika Dawkins Gallery (Atlanta, GA)
CURATED EXHIBITIONS
2022 Of Objects and Shadows/De Objetos y Sombras, CPW (Kingston, NY)
2021 You are not wonderful just because you are a Mother., Artist/Mother (virtual)
2015 Women as Witness, co-curated with Zoraida Lopez-Diago, TI Art Studios, (Brooklyn, NY)
LECTURES & SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS
2022 THRALL and Other Works, Fotografie Forum Frankfurt (Germany)
2022 SECAC Conference (Baltimore, MD)
2021 Converation with Charlotte Cotton, Tasweer Photo Festival Qatar (virtual)
2021 Conversation with Jon Henry, CCCADI (Virtual)
2020 Women and Migrations: Redefining Resistance, NYU (virtual)
2019 i3: Images, Ideas, Inspiration Lecture Series, SVA (New York, NY)
2018 Reproducing Autonomy: Mothers and Daughters on Film, Another Gaze, (New York, NY)
2018 Photographing the Times: Identity, Migration and Displacement, London Art Fair (UK)
2017 Fast Forward 2: Women in Photography, Dillon+Lee Gallery, (New York, NY)
2016 Women in Photography and Filmmaking, ICP (New York, NY)
2015 Fast Forward: Women in Photography Conference, Tate Modern (London, UK)
2015 Qiana Mestrich, Susan Bright | An Artist Dialogue Series Event, NYPL (New York, NY)
2014 Curating Culture: Encouraging and Sharing Diverse Voices in Photography, Film Forum (NYC)
BIBLIOGRAPHY
2023 ReFraming: REFLECTIONS IN BLACK by Deborah Willis, Liveright/W.W. Norton & Co.
2022 Black Matrilineage, Photography and Representation (Leuven University Press)
2022 Viewfinder profile by Lovia Gyarkwe, APERTURE magazine 249, Winter 2022 issue
2022 “TOPSY TURVY”, Lensculture interview
2021 Portfolio with interview, European Photography, No. 109, vol. 42, issue 1
2021 Review: “You are not wonderful just because you are a Mother.”, Brooklyn Rail
2019 “At BRIC Biennial, Diversity is Not a Trend”, AfroPunk
2018 Ideas Series Interview, Photoworks
2016 “Gaining Identity Through The Archive”, Afterimage, Vol. 44, no 1 & 2
2016 Qiana Mestrich: Hard To Place, Lenscratch
2016 Mixed Roots Stories February Commons
2015 “How Do Artists Juggle Motherhood & Art?”, Mater Mea
2014 Qiana Mestrich’s “Inherited Patterns” at Mid-Manhattan Library, Library as Incubator
COMMISSIONED WRITING
2020 “A Photographic Frame Switching Between Cultures”, En Foco Dos Mundos exhibition catalog
2020 Essay on Cian Oba-Smith’s Syracuse Series, Light Work Annual 2020
2018 “Envisioning A Black Maternal Authority”, catalog essay for Mae Preta Exhibition Catalog (Brazil)
2018 “An Impossible Fecundity”, essay for Hernease Davis’ Solo Show at Visual Studies Workshop
2017 Guest Blogger, Baxter St/Camera Club of New York
2017 A Correspondence Between Marcia Michael and Qiana Mestrich, Contact Sheet 192, Light Work
2016 Rhizomes issue 29: Black Holes: Afro-Pessimism, blackness and the discourses of Modernity
2015 Commentary for Nueva Luz, Vol 19, No. 2, photo journal of En Foco
2013 Profile on Artist Alana Clarke, ARC Magazine, Issue 8
2012 Commentary for Nueva Luz, Vol. 16 No. 3, photo journal of En Foco
2012 Ayana V. Jackson interview, ZAM magazine (Amsterdam, NL)
2012 Interview with Lorna Simpson, Aliem magazine
2012 Profile on Marcia Michael, exposure journal, Society for Photographic Education (SPE)
2010 "Chester Higgins Jr. and Laylah Amatullah Barrayn in Conversation", exposure journal (SPE)
PHOTOBOOKS & ZINES
2022 Mind Over Matter (FemxPhotographers.org), Hatje Cantz, Berlin
2022 TOPSY TURVY, Stellazine
2020 THE BODY ISSUE (FemxPhotographersorg), Hatje Cantz, Berlin
2017 MFON: Women Photographers of the African Diaspora
2016 Hard To Place, Self Published, Printed by Conveyor Arts
2015 How We Do Both: Art and Motherhood, 2nd Edition, Secretary Press
2012 How We Do Both: Art and Motherhood, 1st Edition, Secretary Press
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
2022-Present Faculty, PhotoPhlo
2021 Practices, Strategies, and Techniques, (Virtual Workshop co-taught with Justine Kurland)
2019-2020 Guest Faculty, ICP-Bard Program in Advanced Photographic Studies (New York, NY)
2017-2020 Adjunct Faculty, Fashion Institute of Technology/SUNY (New York, NY),
2016-2019 Artist Professional Development Consultant, Joan Mitchell Foundation (New York, NY)
2014-2022 Host/Founder, Dodge & Burn Monthly Photography Critique (Virtual + Brooklyn, NY)
PRIZES JURIED
2023 Women Photograph Grants
2022 Center for Photography at Woodstock (CPW) AIR Program
2020 American Photography Open for AI AP
2018 #HundredHeroines for the The Royal Photographic Society, UK
2018 Light Work Grants in Photography
COLLECTIONS
Peggy Cooper Cafritz, Washington, DC