Samantha Modder

I work figuratively in pen, collage, and digital media to portray larger-than-life Black, female characters taking up space in real and imagined worlds. In my most recent series, I present a subjective Black woman’s fairytale to process interlocking structures of oppression. Like a storybook made into a mural, the installations are made up of digitally manipulated ballpoint pen drawings that follow a Black woman in her nightdress and striped socks in a world of only her and her duplicates. I position this work within the speculative practice of the Black imaginary—a centering of Black dreams and fantasies to create alternate spaces of both comfort and confrontation. Black hair in particular serves as a powerful protagonist in my work pushing the narrative forward in soft curls and defiant shapes. The work is an allegory for our contemporary condition, confronting questions of power, exploitation, and resistance.