Charmaine Minniefield

Firmly rooted in womanist social theory and ancestral veneration, the work of Charmaine Minniefield draws from indigenous traditions as seen throughout Africa and the Diaspora to explore African and African-American history, memory, and ritual as an intentional pushback against erasure. Her creative practice is community-based as her research and resulting bodies of work often draw from public archives. Minniefield presented her work Remembrance as Resistance: Preserving Black Narratives in Atlanta’s historically segregated cemetery to honor the over 800 unmarked graves discovered in the African-American burial grounds in 2021.

She founded the Praise House Project Inc. 501c3 and was awarded the prestigious National Endowment for the Arts Our Town Grant to present the work at three additional locations in the metro Atlanta area to celebrate the African-American history of each community. Her exhibition titled, “Indigo Prayers: A Creation Story” was presented by the Michael C. Carlos Museum in 2022. 

Minniefield currently serves as an inaugural Constellations Fellow with the Center for Cultural Power. She splits her time in residence between Atlanta, the Gullah Geechee Corridor, and The Gambia, where she continues to study the origins of her own cultural identity and indigenous traditions by tracing the Ring Shout.

• @BlackAngelATL @PraiseHouseProject