We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Nia Alexander Campbell a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Nia, thanks for joining us today. We’d love to hear the backstory behind a risk you’ve taken – whether big or small, walk us through what it was like and how it ultimately turned out.

A risk that I have taken that I am most grateful for was my decision to study abroad in Doha, Qatar in 2018. I was in my third year of university studying Painting & Printmaking and Art History at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU). My university has a sister university in Qatar (VCUQ) exclusively for their arts program, so as an arts major I was eligible for the exchange. I had only ever been out of the country once (I went to Morocco for 10 days with my university in 2017) and the idea of traveling somewhere even farther away for a four-month period was a lot to wrap my mind around. I also received concerns from people who had only been exposed to negative depictions of the Middle East and criticisms expressing that they didn’t “understand how traveling to Qatar helped with my career goals.” But the reality was that I was a 21-year-old college Junior who knew she wanted to do art for the rest of her life, but didn’t know what exactly that looked like. To add, the funding for studying in Qatar was there (because my American scholarships carried over) and I had friends and professors from the 2017 Morocco trip that lived in Qatar and had attended or worked at VCUQ. I figured that studying abroad in Qatar offered far more pros than cons when it came to my growth as a person and a creative professional.

While studying abroad in Qatar from January-May 2018, I also got to travel to Athens, Greece and Istanbul, Turkey. I met one of my best friends and I was introduced to their MFA in Design Program. Seeing the diverse creations that the MFA graduates presented as their theses inspired me to apply to the program myself. I was accepted in 2019 and the program completely changed the way I approach my creative practice. I learned skills I had never considered before, met professors who continue to support and inspire me, and figured out exactly what I am passionate about when it comes to art, writing, design, and social justice. Being in the program also brought me back to Morocco and introduced me to a friend who I now consider a sister. Living in Qatar post-grad allowed me to freelance from a place of comfort, gain teaching experience, earn grants to revisit and professionalize class projects I did while pursing my degrees, travel to Pakistan for a week for my friend’s wedding, and receive consistent and affordable mental healthcare.

Now, as I begin to fill out applications for international PhD programs, I know that it is because of the risk I took in 2018. My creative portfolio, my desire to earn another degree, my openness to living outside the U.S., my personal and professional support network, my experiences in seven different countries, my ability to be independent, and my commitment to becoming the best version of myself I can be — It’s all because I took that risk.

Nia, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I was born into a very openly creative environment. My father has a passion for music (he writes songs and plays the saxophone); my mother studied illustration at VCU (she is a book illustrator currently studying art therapy); I grew up doing craft projects with my grandmother (she has been an elementary school teacher for over thirty years); my grandfather is an architect (he designs churches and designed the slave memorial at Mt. Vernon), and another grandmother has been designing with textiles since before I was born (fashion design, crochet, yarn spinning, jewelry design, and more recently 3D printing, laser cutting, and glass & brick engraving).

All this in mind, it was very natural for me to fall into pursuing art as more than a hobby. I was accepted into the visual arts program at Henrico High School Center for the Arts, then I earned my Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting & Printmaking with a minor in Art History from VCU in Richmond. Three years later I earned a Master of Fine Arts in Design from VCUarts Qatar. My MFA thesis was a modular board game called “Reclamancipation” that explored and celebrated African American women’s collective identities. The development of this project really laid the foundation for what I want to do creatively and professionally. My next big creative research project was “Threadtales,” a collection of story cubes, videos, a tapestry, and a research text about my family history and the larger relationship between African Americans and Native Americans in Virginia throughout history. Currently, I am working on a collection of paper doll books that show off the diverse ways African Americans of different ages can look and express themselves.

I consider myself an interdisciplinary designer, writer, and artist. I feel the term “artivist” – artist and activist – also applies to the way I approach my creative practice and how I want it to impact an audience. I work to encourage discussions about wicked problems through designing colorful, artful toys and games. I don’t want the audience to feel overwhelmed by the subject matter; I want them to feel unintimidated and engaged as they work to learn about the very real problems that exist in our society and culture. I am still in the process of finding ways to sufficiently disseminate the toys and games I’ve created, so for now everything is housed online or occasionally displayed in galleries.

I have a creative background in oil painting, watercolor, collage, digital painting, prose writing, and academic writing (where I make a point to dismantle the way language has been colonized in western academia). With all that I create, my passion is storytelling. I believe that there is so much power in a story, be it fiction or nonfiction, be it from an individual or a community. I am passionate about highlighting the fact that marginalized communities are nuanced, that they are more than just the trauma narratives that make headlines. Our communities are full of joy, celebration, and resilience; it is important for us all to acknowledge both the pain and the joy that our communities embody. Storytelling is an amazing way to convey these complex identities and experiences to an audience.

Are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

While I am very content with and proud of my creative journey so far, I sometimes wonder what the journey would have looked like had I known earlier that I didn’t need to stay in America my whole life.

Compared to other countries across the Atlantic, the U.S. is very insular; we have a culture of not paying attention to what exists outside our own sphere. For two decades I didn’t hear much foreign music, see foreign films, learn foreign dances, meet non-Americans, hear other languages other than English, or learn about the people, politics, and cultures of non-American countries. My life experience was steeped in American exceptionalism and the normalization of systemic racism, student debt, xenophobia, gun violence, a flawed healthcare system, and restricted rights for women. I wonder what would have happened if I had been taught that options for education, employment, and self-discovery existed outside of my home country. If I had known that there were hundreds of countries that offered environments that were more affordable, less racist, less sexist, and safer than what I was willing to accept as normal in America.

A resource that introduces the idea of becoming an expatriate to young people could take the form of an entire organization or just one person willing to share their knowledge with others. Wanting a resource that showed what life abroad can look like is part of the reason why began the blog “Black Girls Abroad. Though it is still in its infancy, the ultimate goal is the share the stories of Black women who have worked, studied, or traveled abroad, establishing a library of experiences for people in our community to reference. It is my hope that “Black Girls Abroad” will grow to become something accessible to communities that don’t have any other resources telling them that there is more in the world than what America has to offer.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

The short of it is money, empathy, and privilege.

Money: Pay creatives adequately and on time for their work; invest in creative programs, organizations, and nonprofits; support small businesses that sell work done by local creatives. Money allows creatives to invest in themselves, their brand, and the quality of their work.

Empathy: Remember that artists and creatives are unique individuals with complex lives. They are experts in their craft deserving of the same respect, professionalism, and understanding you would offer to any other person or professional.

Privilege: Use your platform to promote the artists you support (this is different from “paying” an artist with exposure in exchange for their work). No amount of publicity is too small; post their art on your social media and tag them, feature them on your YouTube channel, share when they have made an accomplishment (like being featured in a gallery or article). If you see a creative opportunity, send it to an artist you think would benefit from it. If you know someone or an organization in need of a creative, give them the name of that artist you know. Little acts like this can open up doors for creatives that they may have never encountered otherwise.

All these things are especially important when it comes to supporting creatives of color, women creatives, and creatives in the LGBTQ+ community. These communities have historically been and continue to be underrepresented and underpaid compared to their cis-het male counterparts.

I also believe it is very important to pay it forward. If you are a creative who was in any way supported throughout your journey, do what you can to support other creatives. Teach that community class, offer to write a student’s recommendation for art school, give the kid next door the keyboard you no longer use. You never know how your kindness and humility will contribute to the life of a creative.

Contact Info:

• Website: niaalexanderart.com
• Instagram: @niaalexanderart
• Facebook: Nia Alexander Art
• Twitter: @niaalexanderart
• Email: niaalexanderart@gmail.com

Image Credits
Nia Alexander Campbell (self); Paulo Fugen; Hira Fatima; Kendall Campbell