ABOUT

N. Masani Landfair’s interdisciplinary practice is rooted in exploring the complexities of identity, memory, and nonlinear narratives, as well as investigating the ways different kinds of histories—personal, sacred, collective—intersect. She intends for her work to be a vehicle for dialogue, whether internal (within herself) or external (with audience). 

The world around her is a primary source of inspiration, and her work often responds to current events, environmental concerns, and personal experiences. Landfair’s creative process usually starts with an emotional or conceptual fragment—a feeling, a thought, or an image—that she is instinctively compelled to explore. She relies on both studio time and on-site observations to gather materials and ideas, refining her practice moving between these spaces. Research in the form of meditating, reading, storytelling, and conversations with other creatives and community members deepens understanding of the world she aims to  represent.

N. Masani Landfair tends to work across multiple mediums simultaneously, using collage, photography, installation, poetry, film, and drawing, she communicates intricate layers of experience and enables the resulting work to develop organically. She takes care to let intuition lead the way, but also maintains a structured process to ensure she stays committed to specific ideas and goals. The interdisciplinary foundation of this approach ultimately allows for rich, complex expressions of the ongoing negotiations between nature, identity, reflection, and self-empowerment. As her nonlinear creative techniques constantly evolve, she continues to seek new ways to connect and communicate truths about these themes. 

N. Masani Landfair was born Chicago, IL, lives and works in Georgia. She is an interdisciplinary installation-based practitioner interested in illuminating and meditating material culture as a means of rousing its spatial and temporal roots. Exhibitions include The Museum of Science Industry’s Black Creativity, Zhou B. Art Center, South Side Community Art Center, Prizm Art Fair, Miyako Yoshinaga, Third Coast Disrupted: Artists + Scientists on Climate at The Glass Curtain Gallery Columbia College, Cindy Rucker Gallery, Sikkema Jenkins & Co., A.I.M. Biennial, Project Row Houses. Public collections  include, Illinois State Museum, Mosquera Family Collection, Patric McCoy Collection, Bridge Red Studios Collection.

Email: masaniarts@gmail.com

N. Masani Landfair (b. 1970, US) 

Residencies

2024  Atlantic Arts Center Smyrna Beach, FL 

2014  Resident of the Bronzeville Artist Lofts Chicago, Il.

2013-2014 Artist in Residence, Sacred Keepers Sustainability Lab, NFP, Chicago, Il.

Exhibitions

2025 “Sign O the Times or Buck-in-Hamm Palace” LeRoy Neiman Center for Print Studies, Columbia University New York, N.Y.

2025 “con[text]ual” The Pollinator Art Space Atlanta, GA

2025- 2026 “Here, There: New Perspectives from the Collection” Illinois State Museum Springfield, Il

2025 “Layers: The Art of Contemporary Collage” Maryland Institute College of Art Baltimore, MD

2025 “Reimagining Black Identity, Strength and Vulnerability” Zhou B Art Center Chicago,Il 

2024  “The Octagon: Textiles and Tenets” Under The Bridge Art Space North Miami Beach, Florida

2024  Project Row Houses Round 56: “Post Hip Hop? Or Return of the Boom Bap!” Houston, Tx

2023   A.I.M. Biennial 2023 Miami, Florida

2023 “Small town Small works” The Reeves House Visual Arts Center Woodstock, GA

2023 “All the Fixings” The Reeves House Visual Arts Center Woodstock, GA

2023 “post hip hop? or return of the boom bap!” Sikkema Jenkins & Co. New York, New York

2022 “Vernacular A La Mode” Prizm Art Fair Miami, Florida

2022 “and/or/existence” Cindy Rucker Gallery New York, New York

2022 “stand up next 2 a mountain: portals y paisajes” Emerson Dorsch Miami, Florida

2022 “This Too Shall Pass” Ralph Arnold Gallery Chicago, Illinois

2021  “Points of Contact” Prizm Art Fair, Miami, Florida

2021  “Allegories, Renditions, and a Small Nation of Women” Yale Divinity School New Haven, CT 

2021  Kinship: Belonging to a world of Relations” Center for Humans and Nature, NFP Online Exhibition

2021  “Third Coast Disrupted: Artist & Scientists on Climate”, Brushwood Center Riverwoods, IL

2021 Greenwood Art Project Poster Project Tulsa,Oklahoma

2020  A.I.M. Biennial  Miami, Florida.

2020  NOIR NOIR: Meditations on African Cinema and its influence on Visual art. Prizm Art Fair, Miami, Florida.

2020 “Third Coast Disrupted: Artist and Scientists on Climate, The Ex.Change Project, Glass Curtin Gallery of Columbia College Chicago, IL.

2020  “Isolation” Fermata 3 by 3 at Miyako Yoshinaga Online exhibition New York, NewYork. 2019 “Love in the Time of Hysteria” Prizm Art Fair, Miami, Florida.

2019-2020 “Third Coast Disrupted: Artist and Scientists on Climate, The Ex.Change Project, Chicago, IL.

2019 “All Together Now” Inaugural Group Exhibition, Atlanta, GA

2019   “GAP VII” Global Art Project, Group Exhibition, Dakar, Senegal

2018   “Transceivers” Prizm Art Fair, Miami, Florida.

2018  “8×8” Self Portrait Exhibition, 33 Contemporary Gallery, Chicago, Il.

2018  “Visual Strategies Exhibition : Global Art Project, ClearWater Artist Studios Concord N.C.

2018  “Imagining Post Capitalism” ProArts Oakland. Oakland, Ca.

2018  “the past is more infinite than the future” Under the Bridge Art Space Miami, Florida.

2017  “Chicago 9” Prizm Art Fair, Miami, Florida.

2017  “Post 11/9. The New Now” Group Show. Connect Gallery. Chicago, Il.

2017  “Sketch Book” Group Exhibition, 33 Contemporary Gallery, Chicago, Il.

2017  “Layered” Group Exhibition Tracing How Art is Made. 33 Contemporary Gallery, Chicago, Il.

2016  “100 year anniversary of DADA” Global Art Project, San Francisco International Arts Festival. Ca.         

2015  “GAP III” GLOBAL ART PROJECT: ( workshops and exhibitions) Group show Lecce, Italy

2015  “Aesthetics of Wellness” Woman Made Gallery Chicago, Il.

2015  “Art from Excess” Miller Beach Arts & Creative District Miller Beach, In,

2015  “Museum of Science and Industry’s Black Creativity Juried Exhibition Chicago, Il.

2014  “Herradura Tequila Barrel Art Collection” Group show Finalist Chicago, Il.

2014  “Curator’s Choice: 10th Annual National Self Portrait Exhibition”, Zhou B Art Center Chicago, Il.

2014   Bronzeville Artist Lofts Incubator Group Show, Chicago, Il.

2014   Samantha Hill’s “Sweat Tea Party” Featured Artist, Part of “RISK”. Chicago, Il.

2013  “Boundless Shores” South Shore Cultural Center, Chicago,Il.

2013  “End of Plastic” Solo Show  Shacks and Shanties, Chicago, Il.

2013  “copy.right? The art of appropriation” 33 Contemporary Gallery Chicago, Il.

2012-2014 “KneeJerk” Global Art Project Collage postcard exchange, San Francisco, CA.                      

2012  “100 canvases for things that matter” SilverRoom Chicago, Il.

2012  “facemask” 8th National Self-Portrait Exhibition Zhou B Art Center Chicago, Il.

2012  “Chicago 12 at the Garfield Park Conservatory” Garfield Park Conservatory Chicago, Il.                                            

2012  “Chicago 12” 12 artist mobilizing the Earth, Zhou B Art Center, Chicago, Il.                        

2011  “Surfacing” Solo Show South Side Community Art Center, Chicago, Il.  

2005   “Women of the African Diaspora” Group Exhibition. Woman Made Gallery Chicago,Il.        

2001    Museum of Science and Industry Black Creativity Juried Art Exhibition Chicago,IL.

2000    Amtrak Union Station, Solo Exhibition for Gwendolyn Brooks Reading. Chicago, Il.                          

Teaching

2021 Live from the studio virtual Collage Workshop w/ North Carolina Museum of Art

2013 – 2015 Youth Art Classes at Sacred Keepers Sustainability Lab

2012  After School Sustainable Art Programs, Wisewaters Arts.

2006  Walk Wireless Growing the Youth of Englewood Art Classes.

2005  Apostolic Church of God Young Sisters for Christ Girl Scouts Art Classes

1998  ARCHI-TREASURES, Art Supervisor Chicago,Il.                          

Bibliography

2021

The Black Collagists: The Book (Winter 2021)

Abstractions Magazine Issue 001 (Spring 2021) pgs 161, 167, & 171

Pop Up Magazine “Field Guide” Issue Summer 2021, Commissioned work

Anarchist Review of Books Summer 2021 Cover and  Pg 8

2020 

Glass Curtain Catalog “Third Coast Disrupted: Artist & Scientists on Climate” Pg 34-39

The Anarchist Review of Books.  “catch 22 II” 2020 featured pg 6

2017

Gomez, Sergio “LAYERED” An Interactive Exhibition Tracing How Art Is Made. Jan 11, 2017 pg. 2

2012

Gomez, Sergio: FACEMASK. 8th Annual Self Portrait Exhibition Exploring the Other Behind Our Social Media Face  Jul 11, 2012 pg. 55

Gomez, Sergio: Chicago’s Twelve 12 Artists Mobilizing the Earth May 3, 2012 pgs. 42-49

Hillegas, Laura Brooke: Art Centered, “Certified Organic and/or Artificially Flavored – Chicago’s Twelve: 12 Artists Mobilizing The Earth”, Published by Zhou B Art Center, pgs. 6-11, June 15, 2012.

2004

Stevens, Mike Hyde Park Herald “Black artist featured in new MSI exhibit, January 21, 2004

2001

Reed-Scott, Beverly Chicago Defender “Going North”,  Jan. 25, 2001

Collections

Illinois State Museum, Springfield, IL

Works held in private collections in Canada, the United States, and Europe

Curatorial projects

2018   “AL(L)TER CURRENTS” Group Exhibition. Alena Museum, Oakland, CA.

2013  “No Away To Throw To” Shacks and Shanties at Sacred Keepers, Chicago, Il.

2013  Shacks & Shanties co-curator with Faheem Majeed at Sacred Keepers, Chicago, Il.

Awards

2020  The Judith Alexander Foundation Relief Fund for Georgia Visual Artist

2004  First Place Winner Museum of Science and Industry Black Creativity Juried Art Exhibition. Chicago,Il.