Malaika Temba
(Born in 1996 in Washington, D.C. Lives and works in New York, NY)
Malaika Temba is a visual artist based in New York. Temba creates textile works that honor the lineage of the diaspora’s aunties and femmes, addressing the responsibility, time, attention and patience expected of these laborers, comforters, nurturers, and providers. She wields fabric—an oft-overlooked material conflated with gendered notions of softness—as a resilient and unbreakable format to confront labor standards and global trade. Having grown up across Saudi Arabia, Uganda, South Africa, Morocco, and the United States, her lens and creative processes embrace globalization and intercultural connection by shining light on all of its intricacies.
Temba graduated with a BFA in Textiles from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2018. In 2021, she was honored as the recipient of the YoungArts Jorge M. Pérez Award and since then, she has been selected for significant residencies: Art Omi (2023, NY), MASS MoCA (2023, MA), Bandung Residency, MoCADA + A4 Arts Alliance (2023, NY) and Silver Art Projects (2024, NY).
Her work has been collected by various public and private collections, including the collections of Jorge M. Pérez and Beth Rudin DeWoody.
