Chinwe Okona
Musician, Actor, Visual Artist
chinweokona at gmail dot com
—
Residencies and Awards
2021 Camera Obscura Art Lab (COAL) Resident Artist, City of Santa Monica
2021 Counter Image Printing Grant, Los Angeles
Musical Performance & Projects
2025 Brooklyn Harmonics Twenty+ Vocal Ensemble, Brooklyn Conservatory of Music, NY
2025 Chinwe Gothic Live, Doris, Brooklyn, NY
2020 Chinwe Gothic Radio, Eastside Radio, Episodes 1-8, Los Angeles
2018 SOUNDBATH, The Ace Hotel, Los Angeles
Film/Theatre Performance
2025 “I Know Who Holds Tomorrow” by Cris Eli Blak, Mayah Lourdes Burke (Director), Epheverie Theatre Co., NYC
2025 “Fire in the Garden (hers),” Melina Valdez (Director/Writer), perfect10s, NYC
2020 “Izzy’s Demons,” Gregory Garay (Director/Writer), USC Cinematic Arts, Los Angeles
2019 “clarissa,” Shanrica Evans (Director/Writer), USC Cinematic Arts, Los Angeles
Solo Exhibitions
2018 seedling, Limited Space Gallery, Los Angeles
2013 black & gray, The Local, Oberlin, Ohio
Selected Group Shows
2023 Invoking Autonomy/Invocando Autonomia, Plaza De La Raza, Los Angeles
2020 Tracking Movement to Reinvent Narratives, GalleryPlatform.LA
2020 CALAFIA: El Fin del Paraíso, MexiCali Biennial, Steppling Art Gallery (SDSU, Imperial Valley Campus), Calexico, California
2019 CALAFIA: Manifesting the Terrestrial Paradise, MexiCali Biennial, The Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena, California
2019 Tell Me a Story and I’ll Sing You a Song, Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles
2019 The Second Head, Office & Gallery, Los Angeles
2018 CALAFIA: Manifesting the Terrestrial Paradise, MexiCali Biennial, RAFFMA, San Bernardino, California
2018 Plain Sight, Residency Art Gallery, Los Angeles
2018 Reaching Point Break, Guerrero Gallery, San Francisco
2018 Los Angeles Plays Itself, Malaspina Printmakers, Vancouver, British Columbia
2018 Radiant, Blue Roof Studios, Los Angeles
2018 RELAY 2, Slide Space 123, Oakland, California
2018 Emerging Visions: Creative Practice at the Nexus of Freedom and Justice, Eloise
Pickard Smith Gallery, Santa Cruz, California
2018 we make space, and space makes us, NAVEL, Los Angeles
2013 Geographies of Self, Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio
Curatorial
2023 “Tell Us Your Story,” Episodes 1-3, Levi Strauss & Co., NYC
2018 PALMSS Issue 3, Los Angeles2016 PALMSS Issue 2, Los Angeles
2015 PALMSS Issue 1, Los Angeles
Panels
2020 “Stories That Move” Artist Talk, Big City Forum, Los Angeles
2019 Tell Me a Story and I’ll Sing You a Song Panel Discussion, Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles
2019 To Freedom: Questioning and Queering the Undercommons, 2019 Sequels Symposium:
“Fugitive Futures: Graduate Students of Color Un-Settling the University,” The University of Texas, Austin
2019 Rip Roar: A Pechakucha Event for 11 Artist Books and Zines, Other Books LA, Los Angeles
2019 “I Am Somebody:” In Conversation, Now Instant Image Hall, Los Angeles
2018 The State of Black Popular Culture, University of Southern California, Los Angeles
2017 There’s Levels to This, University of California, Los Angeles
2017 Writing Herself, The Main Museum, Los Angeles
Bibliography
The Atlantic, “Birtherism and Trump,” May 2020
Texts
“Otherwise Noted: A Review of Tell Me a Story And I’ll Sing You a Song,” Curate LA, 2019
Education
• The Royal Conservatory, Vanessa Verstege (Piano), virtual, 2021-present
• Brooklyn Conservatory of Music, Shara Lunon (Voice), Brooklyn, New York, 2025
• The Art Students League of New York, NYC, 2024
• Grand Central Atelier, Ridgewood, New York, 2023-2024
• The New Art School Modality, “FESTAC ’77: Witnesses, Art Histories, and Document,”
Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, 2023
• Speiser/Sturges Acting Studio, Los Angeles, 2019-2020
Juries and Board Membership
• Scholastic Art and Writing Awards, 2025-present
• O, Miami Poetry Festival Board of Advisors, 2019-2021
• Candor Arts Reading Residency, 2018