BIOGRAPHY

Gabrielle Tesfaye is an interdisciplinary artist versed in painting, animation, film, and design. Her work is rooted in responding to cultural heritage preservation through the intersections of art, tech, traditional craft and storytelling. Her multicultural roots of Jamaica, India and Tigray echoes itself in her mixed media approach to art making and cross-cultural content. Outside of exhibiting painting works, she uses her art in the animation studio, creating personal and cultural narrative films.

Tesfaye’s background in film started at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City, and continued at Mahidol University International College in Bangkok, Thailand. Tesfaye obtained her Bachelor of Fine Art (BFA) from the Peck School of the Arts at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She completed her graduate studies in Design (MFA) at Virginia Commonwealth University, in Doha, Qatar.

Tesfaye has been recognized in publications such as BBC, Vogue, AFROPUNK, and Majestic Disorder Magazine (print, UK), and has screened and exhibited internationally including London, New York, Ethiopia, Kenya, Zanzibar, India and Sweden. She is the recipient of a series of scholarships and awards, including the Milwaukee Film Brico Forward Fund, and Mary Nohl Suitcase Export Fund. She directed the highly acclaimed film, The Water Will Carry Us Home, was an official selection of Black Star Film Festival, and won best experimental film at Reel Sisters of the Diaspora (NYC).