Photo: Braided
Braided event
Braided event
Braided Magazine highlights BIPOC creatives through books, classes and events. Founded by Dasia Bryant, the publication empowers those who often feel limited by environments where not many others look like them. Originally conceptualized as an idea for an art show in Chicago, Braided Magazine began appearing at popups around the city before expanding to the Milwaukee area and beyond.
Bryant attended Chicago High School for the Arts. “It was a great experience, but I noticed something,” she recalls. “A lot of times when I’d go to events and show my work, it was hard for me to find others who would connect with it. I made a lot of work that was about me growing up as a Black girl on the west side of Chicago, and talking to my peers, they felt the same way.”
She received the John Walt Foundation Scholarship upon enrolling at Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design (MIAD), providing her the resources to create a space where she and fellow BIPOC creatives could feel seen and heard properly, conceptualizing what would ultimately become Braided Magazine.
On where the name came from, Bryant explains, “At first I didn’t want to make work in relation to my Blackness; I didn’t feel I was in a group of people who would allow me to do that. ‘Braided’ was my first piece where I decided to, and it was a wall of braids that talked about how I wanted to do my hair myself and the comfort I’d feel in braid shops. I felt really connected to that piece and felt that it was really the start of something for me. Braids are all about intertwining different pieces, and I like the idea of intertwining people together to make one big show.”
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Bryant started hosting events in early 2019, and her first magazine issue would come in July of that year. “It was mostly me finding friends to interview and taking submissions for art online,” Bryant said. “I put it all in one book and made it look cohesive.”
Open Criteria
When the pandemic hit, Bryant pivoted with Braided to focus mostly on it being a magazine. The curation process typically entails submissions via email. Her criteria are pretty open; artists just have to be BIPOC. “One of my problems in the art world was that there were always so many rules to my submissions,” she said. “Not everything has to have a meaning, so I really don’t care if someone has an artist statement on there or not (laughs).”
“What It Means to Be a Human,” Braided Magazine’s latest issue was released in January and features artists Jade Thompson, Tavi Unx, Ashley Rainge-Shields, Andrea Cayasso, Udochukwu Anidobu, Jasmine Marie, Bruno Vistas, Marcela Adeze Okeke, Destiny Brady, Belinda Andrade, Taeya Boi-Doku, Carolina Calata, Rafael Arturo and Saint Aubain.
“This was my first attempt at doing something more broad,” Bryant explains. “I wanted to give it a theme that wasn’t just a category. The concept is supposed to let people self-direct and take it wherever they go with it. All of our experiences are so different, and it was really fun for everything to come together and to have a bunch of perspectives next to each other.”
Braided has opened seed zines to the public, which are small zine libraries geared towards students and young artists; currently they are located at MIAD, the Milwaukee Art Museum, PEAK Initiative, NewLine Cafe and 5 Point Gallery. After quarantine lifted, they resumed hosting workshops and popups as well.
Bryant is finishing up school at MIAD and currently working on her senior thesis project “Bout That Life,” which touches on mental health from Black men and women’s perspectives. Braided Magazine has also partnered with Unplugged Health to work on a guidebook designed to help Black folks feel more comfortable in hospital settings and navigating the healthcare system. “Now that I’m about to be done with school, my plan is to really focus on Braided,” Bryant says about her plans. “My goal is to get to the point where I can start publishing other Black creatives and help them put their books together. I want it to be fun for me and useful for everyone else.”You can find Braided Magazine at Lion’s Tooth and Clover in Milwaukee as well as Space Oddities, BuddyChicago and Quimbly’s Bookstore in Chicago. Visit their website at braidedmag.square.site and Linktree at linktr.ee/BraidedMag for more info.
