Njideka Akunyili Crosby

Akunyili Crosby in 2014

Njideka Akunyili Crosby (born 1983) is a Nigerian-born visual artist working in Los Angeles, California. Through her art, Akunyili Crosby "negotiates the cultural terrain between her adopted home in America and her native Nigeria, creating collage and photo transfer-based paintings that expose the challenges of occupying these two worlds". In 2017, Akunyili Crosby was awarded the prestigious Genius Grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

Quotes

• My art addresses my internal tension between my deep love for Nigeria, my country of birth, and my strong appreciation for Western culture, which has profoundly influenced both my life and my art.

• You don't exist if you aren't represented... i felt a need to claim my own social existence by making the representation happen.

• When you do what you love, it would never feel like work

• When I have kids, I think it will be okay  for me to question the choices they make, especially if they aren’t part of my world, or things I have no idea about

• When parents  challenge, it comes from a place of love

• How do we maintain our identity as proud Nigerians and also integrate into the new society we find ourselves in,to create this new hybrid identity?

• Some people did not teach their children the native language because they thought it made you stupid! There was an inferiority complex associated with things too Nigerian

• In my generation there is that feeling of, We have to hang on because traditions are vanishing.

• There’s excitement about being Nigerian and a pride that didn’t exist when I was younger.

• I always make sure the woman is in a position of power—where her agency is not questioned and where she is an active participant.

• I grew up with strong women, so it’s important for me to maintain that in my work.

• The universe depicted in my work is neither Nigeria nor America, but some other space, the space that every immigrant occupies.

• My work is about that space where things overlap, where things are not easily defined, and where you are navigating multiple worlds at the same time.

• I’m trying to create a language that speaks to a global community, but is rooted very specific to where I’m from.