STATEMENTS
2022
Ayana Zaire Cotton (she/they) is an anti-disciplinary artist and cultural worker from Prince George’s County, Maryland. They are currently based in Dawn, Virginia — tucked in between the ancestral lands of the Mattaponi and Youghtanund — answering the call to steward land that has been in their family for four generations. Braiding code, performance, and abstraction Ayana speculates and worldbuilds alongside science and technology. Sankofa is a word and symbol of the Akan Twi and Fante languages of Ghana which translates to, "go back and get". Centering a sankofa sensibility, they build databases as vessels holding seed data and experiment with shuffling algorithms to spin non-linear narratives. Ayana calls this methodology “Cykofa Narration”, generating new worlds using the digital and social detritus of our existing world — resulting in a storytelling aesthetic that embodies circular time and troubles human authorship. Through engaging with language, technology, and ecology, Ayana is cultivating a practice of remembering and imagining alternative modes of being and interspecies belonging.


EDUCATION
2021
School for Poetic Computation, Reading, Writing, and Compiling
New York, NY

Forested, Permaculture Design Certification
Bowie, MD

2018
Flatiron School, Software Engineering Intensive
Washington, D.C.
2012 — 2015
University of Maryland, Innovation, Design and Society Major (BA)
College Park, MD

2011 — 2012
LIM College, Business Management Major
New York, NY


SELECTED PROJECTS
2022
IN PROGRESS: Seeda School

Seeda Press, Cykofa: The Seeda Origin Story


2017 — 2018
Zaire Studio, POWEROTICA Collection
2016
DISTRIKT Magazine, Art x Politics Issue
2015
DISTRIKT Magazine, The Underground Issue



WRITING


EXHIBITIONS

2022
Kickin’ The Can, Group Exhibition
curated by Anisa Olufemi and R. Treshawn Williamson
ACRE Projects @ Drama Club
Chicago , IL
2022
Rituals Here, Group Exhibition
visioned by Lukaza Branfman-Verissimo
Site Specific Activations in
Richmond, VA

2020
E:17 Zines , Group Exhibition
Transformer
Washington, D.C.

2018
We Got Next: Young Contemporaries, Group Exhbition Curated by Deirdre Darden
CAH Gallery
Washington, D.C.
2016
Ward 12, Group Exhibition
Halcyon House
Washington, D.C.


RESIDENCIES AND FELLOWSHIPS
2022
Annual Artist Residency
Visual Arts Center of Richmond
Richmond, VA

Wherewithal Project Grant
Washington Project for the Arts and Andy Warhol Foundation For The Visual Arts
Washington, D.C.
2021
Ginkgo Creative Residency
Ginkgo Bioworks and Faber Futures
Boston, MA

Make Work Residency
Studio Two Three
Richmond, VA

Summer ‘21 Cohort
Recurse Center
New York, NY

Seed Summer Residency
Exodus School of Expression
Richmond, VA
2020
Wherewithal Research Grant
Washington Project for the Arts and Andy Warhol Foundation For The Visual Arts
Washington, D.C.

Xenogenesis Salons
Institute for Contemporary Art
Richmond, VA

E:17 Zines
Transformer
Washington, D.C.
2016
Social Impact Artist in Residence Halcyon House
Washington, D.C.


SPEAKING


2015
Transcending Limitations, TEDxUMD


SELECTED MEDIA AND PRESS


2019
Zaire Studio Wire Arm Cuffs featured in When I Get Home Film, directed by Solange Knowles 

2017
Free Style — The Best Looks at Afropunk Marched to Their Own Beat (featuring the Zaire Studio jumpsuit worn and customized by Anthony Prince), Vogue, By Rachel Hahn, Video by Mika Altskan and Matvey Fiks



EXTENDED CV BY REQUEST
LAST UPDATED OCT 2022




Mark

Daily Seed

2021

Daily Seed was a monthly zine series, featuring algorithmically generated non-linear narratives, for each day of the month, using the seed data from the Black Feminist World Database. Daily Seed featured a risograph printed cover with images of Black feminists embedded into the quilts of Gee’s Bend as an experiment in polycultural and abolitionist aesthetics. Through collaborating with the computer to sculpt nonlinear narrative one can remember the history of Black feminist worldbuilding work and use seed data as source material to play with language, inspire alternative forms, and imagine new worlds. Daily Seed takes its name from Seeda Press and Daily Bread (a monthly devotional publication), supporting multiple functions this project can be used for learning, meditations, and ceremonies of reverence and remembrance.

Daily Seed was printed during a community printmaking residency at Studio Two Three in Richmond, Virginia.




In the October issue of Daily Seed, readers embarked on a reading experience that asked them to assess text as form as improvisation as shape. The formations of the text blocks were a callback to the abstract Gee’s Bend quilts that graced the covers. This design experiment asked, “If all language is form, how might language help us shape new worlds?”