Fresh Paint: Akea Brionne

Based in metro Detroit, Akea Brionne (b. 1996) is an interdisciplinary research-driven artist working at the intersection of lens and fiber-based media. Her practice explores the relationship between colonial and imperialist histories and their reverberations into cultural storytelling, identity politics, and assimilation. Through observations focusing on the African Diaspora with a particular interest in Afro-Creole culture, Brionne utilizes emerging technologies like artificial intelligence and digital weaving to translate surreal compositions into multidimensional tapestries adorned with glitter, sequins, and rhinestones.  

Situated in Cranbrook Art Museum’s North Gallery, Brionne will display recent and new bodies of work engaging with installation and sculptural elements in conversation with the museum’s built architectural environment, experimental craft, and mid-century design legacy. Foregrounding Brionne’s background in photography, Fresh Paint: Akea Brionne invites visitors to consider intersecting narratives of agency, subjecthood, and interiority.  

Brionne is a 2023 graduate of the Photography Department at Cranbrook Academy of Art, and Fresh Paint: Akea Brionne is the artist’s first solo museum exhibition and the fourth installment of Cranbrook Art Museum’s Fresh Paint series, which highlights recent work from Detroit-area contemporary artists.