Bio: Malene (ma-lay-nee) Djenaba (jen-na-ba) Barnett is an award-winning multidisciplinary artist, textile surface designer, and community builder. She holds an MFA in Ceramics from the Tyler School of Art & Architecture, undergraduate degrees in Fashion Illustration and Textile Surface Design from the Fashion Institute of Technology, and was awarded a Fulbright Award in 2022 to research African Jamaican ceramic traditions, as a visiting artist at Edna Manley College in Kingston, Jamaica.
In her work, Malene explores both her Caribbean heritage and surface pattern design found in African and diasporic architecture, textiles and objects. From art and design to research, writing and public speaking, Malene works to empower and unite Black artists and designers through community building.
Malene has participated in residencies at Anderson Ranch, Watershed, Greenwich House Pottery, Judson Studios, and Haystack. In 2024, she was the Nellie Mae Rowe Distinguished Fellow at the Hambidge Center in Georgia.
Traveling regularly to Africa, Europe, Asia and the Caribbean for her research on the origins of Black diasporic aesthetics, Malene is based in Brooklyn, NY.