I AM PHAEMonae.
Dreamer.
Curator | Costume Designer | Set Designer | Fashion Stylist | Performance Artist | Movement Engineer | Soundscape Artist | Sculpture Artist
CURRENT + PREVIOUS WORK.
Free Noir Papillon
Free Noir Paillon
I remember my mother tired too
A Song For Echo
Chrysos
UPCOMING WORKS
FORM.
Is Currently in the Dream stages but here is the plan, Stay tuned in the coming months and years for what is in store, and the potentials of community engagement.
This is a 5 part series happening over a course of 5 years. There will be multiple live installations existing in the same location, with each artist activating its own sense of space and time. The series works in durational scoring in non-conventional atmospheres creating a sensory experience that is socially charged and engaged work.
The artist will create environments with a team of collaborators in order to immerse the audience into specific ideas around transformation and transitioning. These ideas of transforming something or someone as newness takes FORM. The beautification process will be investigated through black hair, black fashion, and its innovations historically in retrospect to today's pop-culture.
There is an evolution and opportunity to amplify trans/non-binary humans, black humans, and queer folks in the expansion to create what is beautiful and meaningful. These evolutions have transcended through food, music, art, and political culture.
I want to explore these layers and their relationship to the black queer community keeping the essence of Community at its pulse. The goal is for each leg of the series to be a cast of evolving artists throughout each iteration.
PINK BOOTH CONFESSIONS.
Pink Booth Confessions is a work that was first approached as a live performance, with its first premiere in Austin Texas at The Vortex Theater. PhaeMonae has been on board as the creative HMUA and Costume Designer of Pink Booth Confessions since its conception pre-pandemic in 2019. This performance piece featured an original sound score, directed by Millie Heckler created in collaboration with movement artist Britt Ford and music producer Schivona Johnson. These 4 artist plus a film crew and team of set-Designers spent 5 days in Vermont the summer of 2022 to capture this work for film and its embodiment of parallel universes. These dream scenes strive to capture each character's different moods based on the complexities of existing as a sexual being. The voices of each character will bring to life their secrets around shame.
ARTIST BIO
I am a movement engineer originating from D.C. Currently living in Atlanta GA since 2015. I have been creating and working in multi-disciplinary art making like sculpture, painting, posturing, costuming, set-design, HMU, dance and vocal explorations. With a BFA in Dance from Georgian Court University, I am currently practicing the merge of dance and vocal manipulations in live performance and in film documentation.
My art is an excavation of the soul in retrospect to my life and the lives of others cultivating story-telling through personal narrative. Historically, my research has been to use art as a means of healing, understanding, and to find beauty and joy in tragedies. Throughout my time here in ATL I have worked with various choreographers and dance companies, like T.Lang dance, gloATL, Core Dance, Greg Catelier, Beacon Dance and Scrap performance company.
I have also produced work for platforms like Fieldwork, Ten tiny dances, Alternate roots, and Veracity. I have done costuming, set-design, and HMU for “Free Noir Papillon” in ATL 2020, “Birth of Pleasure” in ATL in 2018 , “Pink Booth confessions” in Austin Texas in 2019, “Wrighteous Poets” in Houston Texas in 2017, and “Walk” in Atl in 2016 just to name a few. Recently I was a fall resident artist at Fly on the Wall where I showcased a work in progress “Barbie in the Box”, at The Windmill Arts Center in 2021.
Throughout my career I have been transitioning into more wearble art and sculpture design. My first exhibition for a wearable art piece was displayed at The Hambidge Art Auction in 2023. My next adventure into wearable art will culminate in a Kinetic structure that bridges the lifespan of the cicada and hip-hop through fashion, sculpture, sound and design for the “Betline After Dark” Arts and Culture performance series alongside an incredible team of artist Magdalena, LaMia, and Cailan to bring this artwork to life fall of 2024. I have stumbled greatly into costume design over the years , facilitating the birth of my personal aesthetics and desires for the relationship between costumer and collaborating artist. My designs have been featured in many dance works for film and live stage performance. The works include Anicka Austins “Birth of Pleasure” , Millie Heckler’s “Pink Booth Confessions”, Beacon dance “A Piece: Through the Senses”, as well as Anicka Austin and Sierra King’s work “Untitled”. Some of my fashions will be moved through upcoming performances by Madison Lee for their thesis dance at Emory University titled “Underbelly”, and Meaghan Novoa’s work “In this house” presented by A&E and the Mayors office of Cultural Affairs.
I am currently working to curate a performance series that will happen in 5 iterations, entitled “FORM”. “FORM” was presented as a work in progress in February of 2022 where I practiced how to curate, perform, set-design, and make the costuming for one complete showcase, which activated several galleries occupied by Geroge Long, Maria McDowell, Priscilla Smith, and Carl Jane in The Underground ATL.
All of these platforms and organizations align with my duty to give back and uplift communities through engagement and the perseverance of artmaking as a tool for social change. I challenge world issues through art and I also make art for art's sake. The layers of an artist feel important to relish in and to keep some things for yourself without the need to produce a final product. I consider all my work to be a work in progress, because life and art making are ever shifting and evolving.