Draft:Nya Lewis

Nya Lewis, also known as Nanyamka Lewis or Nya Williams or Nya Lewis Williams, is a Canadian independent curator, writer, and artist of Trinidadian descent based in the unceded territories of the Squamish, Musqueam, and Tsleiel Watuth First Nations, known as Vancouver, British-Columbia, Canada.

Education
Lewis earned a Master of Fine Arts from the OCAD University, and as a graduate student, Lewis worked on the research team for the Centre for the Study of Black Canadian Diaspora.

Artistic Career
Lewis’ artistic practice is the “culmination of centuries of African resistance, love, questions, actions, study and embrace rooted in the theorization of the conditions of Black cultural production.” Lewis' work captures the multivocality of Black diasporic experience and aims to reimagine and reclaim community.

Lewis has made a number of contributions to the arts sector in Canada, and specifically in Toronto and Vancouver, including as founder of Ref. Gallery of African Descent (formerly BlackArt Gastown), a “nonprofit organization that facilitates opportunities between Black artists and public institutions—providing artist mentorship.”

Lewis was contracted as the first Black curator at the Vancouver Art Gallery to mount the exhibition Where do we go from here?. They have also worked in curatorial or programming positions with the Vancouver Queer Film Festival, the Vancouver Public Library, the UBC Museum of Anthropology, Grunt Gallery, and the Libby Leshgold Gallery, among other institutions.

Lewis is currently the Director and Curator of Artspeak Gallery and a Curator in Residence at the Vancouver Art Gallery, where they will be conducting research towards the publication of a major work on Black cultural production in British Columbia.

Lewis is also a board member of the Black Arts Centre and Co-Director AfroQueer Vancouver.