Yvonne Buchanan

Yvonne Buchanan was born in Manhattan, NY. She holds an MFA from the Milton Avery Graduate School at Bard College and a BFA in Illustration from Parsons School of Design. Buchanan uses video, animation, photographs, illustrations and drawings to create narratives of survival strategies. Buchanan’s work has been exhibited nationally and internationally at Syracuse International Film Festival, Studio Museum in Harlem, Site: Santa Fe, Slamdance International Film Festival, Hammer Museum/UCLA, Aspex Gallery, 57th Venice Biennale, Society of Illustrators,  Everson Museum of Art, Munson Williams Proctor Museum of Art, Urban Video Projects, Rochester Contemporary Art Center, Recontres International Paris/Berlin among others. With Dorene Quinn, Buchanan co-founded Buckwheat Space 2019-2020, an artist residency in the Mojave Desert. 

She recently retired from Syracuse University and lives in  Morongo Valley, California.

Artist Statement

In Buchanan's work, she use micro-narratives and fragments of histories; individual, family or community experiences of “otherness”. Her focus is often the black body as object, symbol and story, an embodiment of curiosity, and a “dark” and weighty presence. She is interested in the coping strategies employed by Black communities to endure, including cultural expressions such as music and dance, athletic performance and other normative activities, including religiosity and belief in an afterlife. The fragmented forms that she employs to shape these stories reflect the aggression that alters and constricts lives.