Kamau Ware

About Kamau Ware

Kamau Ware is a multidimensional creative blending complementary yet disparate disciplines as an Artist / Historian. Ware retells and expands history with scholarship and visual storytelling to fuse creativity and learning into one experience. He is best known for his flagship storytelling project, Black Gotham Experience (BGX), which is an immersive multimedia project founded in 2010 that reimagines the African Diaspora as one unified epic through a series of experiences including walks, talks, media, and events. Kamau Ware is the author of a forthcoming graphic novel series based on the five core historic walks of the Black Gotham Experience. Ware has become a sought-after voice to fill the visual abyss of Black New York history, illustrating powerful stories that exist outside of public consciousness. Recent engagements include the American Association for State and Local History Annual Meeting in Austin, TX (2017); the New Museum IdeasCity in New York, NY.(2017), SXSWedu & SXSW Interactive in Austin, Texas (2018), and the 2018 Origin Stories speaking tour that included stops at Yale University, Johns Hopkins University, Brown University, California Library Association (Santa Clara), la colonie (Paris), and the African American Museum of Philadelphia. This past fall 2018, Kamau became a visiting fellow for the New School co-teaching a course titled “Blind Spots: A Walk Through New York City’s Black Past” that will return in the spring of 2020.

Experience

1. Founder & Lead Creative

   Black Gotham Experience

   Aug 2010 — Present · New York, NY, US

   Black Gotham Experience (BGX) is an immersive visual storytelling project that celebrates the impact of the African Diaspora on New York City. The aim of this project is to use art and research to develop an expansive public experience that gives the uncelebrated histories of the African Diaspora a place in the public consciousness of New York City and beyond. The heart of this experience are three stories that illustrate Black life on the island of Manhattan between 1624 to 1890. These stories are \"Other Side of Wall Street\",\"Caesar’s Rebellion\", and \"Citizen Hope\". Founder and Lead Creative Kamau Ware works with design teams to develop these three stories as both walking tours and corresponding graphic novels. Each graphic novel will blend photography, drawings, and fashion to illustrate the story, innovating how forgotten moments of the past can be brought to light.

Skills

• Fine Art
• Teaching
• Event Management
• Photography
• Post Production
• Community Outreach
• Social Media
• Portrait Photography
• Cms
• Guided Tours
• Nonprofits
• Final Cut Pro
• Management
• Fashion
• Image Editing
• Event Planning
• Museums
• Darkroom
• Film
• Lightroom
• Mac
• 35mm
• Public Speaking
• Video
• Photoshop
• Curating
• Art
• Digital Photography
• Adobe Photoshop