“When you find yourself flooded with emotions or completely numb, create art.”

Yanna Marie Orcel is an African American collage artist, painter, sculptor, performer, writer, activist, and community organizer whose work focuses on representations of the Black community. Her background in art therapy informs her practice-based research and her approach to creating. Her work plays on the juxtaposition of being both triggering and healing; aggressive and caring; vibrant and dark. The artist currently resides in London where she just concluded a Masters of Research from Royal College of Art. Her research focused on the impact of creatively caring for people of the African diaspora through Black art history, group meditation, wellness-centered art making, and listening.