Melanie Stevens: Graphic Interventions

March 15 - May 24, 2019

Graphic Interventions is a collection of excerpts of pages from the comics and stories of Melanie Stevens. Stevens uses sequential art to investigate narrative as a site of reflection or reinforcement of societal power structures and over determined norms, specifically the manner in which stories (both real and fictional) supposedly centering people of the African diaspora have a long history of appropriation and erasure. The exhibition features works by Stevens and an interview with the Student Curatorial Committee.

Melanie Stevens is an artist, illustrator and writer. She is the creator of the graphic novel series, WaterShed, and the co-founder and editor of Miss Anthology, an organization that supports and publishes racially and economically diverse young comic artists who identify as female or LGBTQIA+. She is also the co-curator of Nat Turner Project, a migratory gallery space that grants artists of color the freedom to create or express their own language within and without the parameters of racial commodification or designation. She received her Bachelor of Arts degree for Political Science from Yale University and her Master’s of Fine Arts degree for Visual Studies at Pacific Northwest College of Art, where she currently teaches.

The Student Curatorial Committee is a group of students from MLK Jr School who conduct research about local and non-local artists to inform their work as curators of KSMoCA's MLK Jr Gallery. As part of this research, they meet with curators, gallerists, and educators to discuss curatorial topics, study books about contemporary artists, and conduct studio visits with local artists. In 2018, this group established a student-run gallery within the museum to display work by their peers in addition to work by local artists in Portland, OR. For this exhibition, the committee reviewed the work of selected local artists and selected and invited Stevens to exhibit her work for this exhibition cycle.