INVERSE Lab | Lunchtime Conversation with Tsedaye Makonnen

INVERSE Lab, a monthly series at the Momentary, presents artists working in various methodologies of Performance Art. Situated in material, movement, and time-based practices, this series works with artists to demonstrate the vastness of the form. Join us for a virtual lunchtime conversation with multidisciplinary artist Tsedaye Makonnen, as we consider process, performance in the digital landscape and object making alongside activism, community and motherhood.

Sponsored by Whitney Kroenke

About Tsedaye Makonnen

Tsedaye Makonnen is a multidisciplinary artist whose studio, curatorial, and research-based practice threads together her identity as a daughter of Ethiopian immigrants, a Black American woman, doula and a mother. Makonnen primarily focuses on migration and intersectional feminism and is the recipient of a Smithsonian Artist Research Fellowship, DC Public Library Maker Residency and the Savage-Lewis Artist Residency on Martha’s Vineyard. Makonnen performed at the Venice Biennale, Art Basel Miami, Art on the Vine (Martha’s Vineyard), Chale Wote Street Art Festival (Ghana), El Museo del Barrio, Fendika Cultural Center (Ethiopia), Festival International d’Art Performance (Martinique), Queens Museum, the Smithsonian’s, and more. In 2018, Makonnen studied sculpture with El Anatsui at his studio in Nsukka, Nigeria. Her light monuments have been exhibited at the August Wilson Cultural Center and National Gallery of Art in DC. In 2019, she was on the front cover of the Washington City Paper’s People Issue. Since the start of 2020, she has been in multiple exhibitions: a large-scale performance art two-person show with collaborator Ayana Evans at the August Wilson Cultural Center curated by Kilolo Luckett and featured in BOMB Magazine, a group show at MICA’s Meyerhoff Gallery curated by Deborah Willis, a group show at Latchkey Gallery in NYC, a durational performance at The Africa Center in NYC, a group show curated by Seph Rodney with Art at a Time Like This and more. Makonnen recently curated a virtual group exhibition with Washington Project for the Arts in DC titled ‘Black Women as/and the Living Archive’ based on Alisha Wormsley’s film ‘Children of NAN’ and is currently working on an exhibition book. Most recently, she debuted a virtual reality solo show of her light installation and textile works at UNTITLED Art Fair with her gallery Addis Fine Art. Makonnen also took part in creating a new textile piece and performance video for Park Avenue Armory’s ‘100 Years, 100 Women’, commissioned by NYU and organized by Deborah Willis. This October, Makonnen will exhibit in a group show at 1:54 Contemporary African Art Fair in London with her gallery. Currently Tsedaye Makonnen lives in Washington, DC with her 9 year-old son.