last updated Oct 2023
My name is Zainab “Zai” Aliyu and I'm a nigerian-american artist and cultural worker living in Lenapehoking (Brooklyn, NY). My work contextualizes the cybernetic and temporal entanglement embedded within societal dynamics to understand how all sociotechnological systems of control are interconnected, and how we are all materially implicated through time. I draw upon my body as a corporeal archive and site of ancestral memory to craft counter-narratives through sculpture, video, installation, built virtual environments, printed matter, archives, and community-participatory (un)learning. more... more...
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[Fellowship] Digital/Electronic Arts Fellow at NYSCA/NYFA
Sep 2023 — Sep 2024 · New York, NY

[Residency] Pocoapoco
Sep 2023 — Oct 2023 · Oaxaca, Mexico

[Work] Directing design and creating archives for moving image and time-based media for the African Film Festival at the Film at Lincoln Center
since Feb 2020 · New York, NY

[Work] Co-directing an experimental school supporting interdisciplinary study in art, code, hardware and critical theory called the School for Poetic Computation
since Jan 2020 · New York, NY

formerly filter: all presenting speaking teaching publishing practicing

[Panel] American Artist, Zainab Aliyu, Taylor Levy and Che-Wei Wang Explore The Black Gooey Universe presented by The Kitchen, In collaboration with Montez Press Radio
Sep 2023 · New York, NY

[Exhibition] Electronic Café for Poetic Computation at Recess Arts, In collaboration with the School for Poetic Computation
Jul 2023 — Aug 2023 · Brooklyn, NY

[Fellowship] Processing Foundation
Jun 2023 — Sep 2023 · New York, NY

[Residency] Session Artist Residency at Recess Arts
Jun 2023 — Aug 2023 · Brooklyn, NY

[Publication] "From the Sasha into the Zamani: Death as a Moment of Radical Continuity" published by Logic(s) Magazine (Columbia University), Edited by J. Khadijah Abdurahman and Xiaowei R. Wang
May 2023 · internet · print

[Exhibition] Solo presentation* From red dust to Black clay at Film at Lincoln Center, Curated by Dara Ojugbele, Mahen Bonetti and Farima Kone Kito
May 2023 · New York, NY

[Lecture-performance] “A morte como momento de continuidade radical / Death as a Moment of Radical Continuity” at at Center for Arts, Design, and Social Research
Apr 2023 · São Paulo, Brazil

[Residency] Conscientizações Críticas Tecnológicas (Technologies of Critical Conscientization) at the Center for Arts, Design, and Social Research, Invited by Dalida María Benfield, Ph.D.
Apr 2023 — May 2023 · São Paulo, Brazil

[Artist Talk] p5.js Community Salon at NYU Tisch School of the Arts, Invited by Qianqian Ye and Sonia Choi
Mar 2023 · New York, NY

[Residency] Aktuelle Architektur der KulturImages (AADK Spain)
Mar 2023 · Murcia, Spain

[Exhibition] Linguagem Manual / Manual Language at Buinho Institute, Curated by Carlos Alcobia and Mónica Reis
Feb 2023 · Messejana, Portugal

[Residency] Buinho Institute
Feb 2023 · Messejana, Portugal

[Screening] "google my memories" at Microscope Gallery, Curated by Yiran Xu
Nov 2022 · New York, NY

[Residency] Advisor for the L.A.B. Residency at The Kitchen
Nov 2022 — Sep 2023 · New York, NY

[Interview] On how we might interact with data in more liberatory ways that divest from the monopoly of big data in Friends of Friends , With Hester Underhill
Oct 2022 · Berlin, Germany

[Exhibition] Solo presentation* freedom is a durational practice at the Film at Lincoln Center, Curated by Dara Ojugbele, Mahen Bonetti and Farima Kone Kito
May 2022 · New York, NY

[Artist Talk] p5.js Access Day, Invited by Dorothy Santos and Qianqian Ye
May 2022 · internet

[Class] Dark Matters: On Blackness, Surveillance and the Whiteness of the Screen at the School for Poetic Computation, In collaboration with American Artist
Mar 2022 — May 2022 · internet

[Exhibition] Assembly, Alchemy, Ascension at Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Gallery, Curated by JAZSALYN, Shameekia Shantel Johnson, and Yvonne Mpwo
Feb 2022 — Mar 2022 · New York, NY

[Artist Talk] WordHack at Babycastles, Invited by Todd Anderson
Feb 2022 · internet

[Fellowship] Fellow at the Future Imagination Collaboratory at NYU Tisch School of the Arts
Jan 2022 — Jun 2023 · New York, NY

[Panel] AncestryandMe: DNA Processing Kit on Montez Press Radio, In collaboration with American Artist
Nov 2021 · internet

[Lecture-performance] "Death as a Moment of Radical Continuity" during Digital Networks, Aesthetics and Black Death at Black Portraitures: Absent/ed Presence, Invited by Safia Siad
Oct 2021 · Toronto, Canada

[Program] COCOON at the School for Poetic Computation
Jul 2021 — Aug 2021 · New York, NY

[Class] AncestryandMe: On critical approaches to DNA analysis and biometric surveillance at the School for Poetic Computation, In collaboration with American Artist
Jul 2021 — Aug 2021 · internet

[Exhibition] Black Beyond: Origins, Curated by JAZSALYN and Shameekia Shantel Johnson
Jun 2021 — Nov 2021 · internet

[Commission] Conceptual consultation for "Shaper of God" commissioned by Kadist, Invited by American Artist
Apr 2021 · internet

[Lecture-performance] "Death as a Moment of Radical Continuity” during Interweaving Poetic Code at CHAT (Centre for Heritage, Arts and Textile), Invited by Takahashi Mizuki and Bruce Li
Apr 2021 · Hong Kong, China

[Publication] “Constellation self-portrait” featured in Code as Creative Medium: A Handbook for Computational Art and Design published by The MIT Press, By Golan Levin and Tega Brain
Feb 2021 · print

[Panel] Public reading of the Dictionary of Dark Matters on Montez Press Radio, In collaboration with American Artist
Jan 2021 · New York, NY

[Publication] "Affirmations for my Existence" published by Reading Machines, Curated by Tiger Dingsun
Jan 2021 · internet

[Publication] “Limitlessness and Limitations: Defining Dark Matters” for Are.na Annual: On Tending published by Are.na, Edited by Meg Miller
Dec 2020 · internet · print

[Guest Critic] "_____ in residence" Residency at Babycastles
Dec 2020 · New York, NY

[Publication] Dictionary of Dark Matters published by School for Poetic Computation, In collaboration with American Artist
Oct 2020 · internet · print

[Publication] Revolution & Us: A Pocket Guide to Direct Action available at Printed Matter, Supported by BUFU By Us For Us and Wendy’s Subway
Jun 2020 · New York, NY · print

[Guest Critic] Major Studio, MFA Design & Technology at Parsons, The New School, Invited by Fei Liu
May 2020 · New York, NY

[Class] Dark Matters: On Blackness, Surveillance and the Whiteness of the ScreenSchool for Poetic Computation, In collaboration with American Artist
May 2020 — Jul 2020 · internet

[Workshop] Dark Spirals: Schematics for Collective Sense-Making, Learning and Dreaming (001: FESTAC'77) at the The Africa Center, In collaboration with Tsige Tafasse
Feb 2020 · New York, NY

[Work] Directing design and creating archives for moving image and time-based media for the African Film Festival at the Film at Lincoln Center
Feb 2020 · New York, NY

[Exhibition] Curator* Seven Years of Poetic Computation (Code and Power) at the Westbeth Gallery, Curated by Dan Gorelick, Nabil Hassein, Nitcha Tothong, Sebastian Morales, Tiri Kananuruk and Zainab Aliyu
Jan 2020 · New York, NY

[Work] Co-directing an experimental school supporting interdisciplinary study in art, code, hardware and critical theory called the School for Poetic Computation
Jan 2020 · New York, NY

[Publication] Dark Matters Zine, 3rd Edition archived at the Museum of Modern Art Library, In collaboration with the School for Poetic Computation
Dec 2019 · New York, NY · print

꩜ full cv available upon request







imagining generative possibilities for holding and being beholden to each other From red dust to Black clay

exploring privacy as intimacy through print ephemera, refigured colonial sculptures, and a web-based decryption tool Pretty Good Privacy Postcards

interrogating the cultural value systems that are encoded into the objects that we build Death as a Moment of Radical Continuity

traversing borders to fabricate an infinite, pan-African chorus of shared somatic vibrations Freedom is a Durational Practice

challenging established relationships between reader, text, and authorship Affirmations for my Existence

situating technology within a diasporic imaginary, to explore the ways in which machines can mediate the affects of displacement, human mobility and (re)settlement Google My Memories

self-publishing an assemblage of knowledge on surveillance, racial capitalism and technology, established within mutual histories Dark Matters Dictionary

supporting interdisciplinary study in art, code, hardware and critical theory School for Poetic Computation

questioning the memorabilia of capitalist labor — residue from the xerox office regime that is reminiscent of the technologies that dictate the conditions of our world Dark Matters Zine 3.0

learning about ancestral history within the context of biometric surveillance/DNA tracing technology AncestryandMe: DNA Processing Kit

sharing care, strategies, wisdom, sweetness, resources, and love to support everyone affected by the coronavirus pandemic Cloud9

responding urgently against ongoing state violence, in the form of a toolkit on digital self-defense, anti-surveillance and direct action care Revolution & Us

foregrounding film as a conduit for diaspora reconnection with radical potential African Film Festival

unpacking the notion of creeping normality to reflect upon perennial social and environmental degradation Erode: On Creeping Normality

critiquing the corrosive cycle of consumption and rejecting the affordances of friction-free exchange Vestige

leveraging spatial storytelling to examine the effects of systemic loss on the identity of a community Hazelwood Memorial

analyzing notions of identity and presentation of self in physical realms and virtual contexts Dog Cat Fish