Chanell Stone
Chanell Stone (b. 1992, Los Angeles) is an artist living and working in Oakland, California. Stone earned her BFA in photography from the California College of the Arts in 2019 and has exhibited in galleries in San Francisco and New York. Her solo exhibition Natura Negra appeared at the Museum of the African Diaspora in San Francisco in 2019-20, she was included in the 2019 Aperture Summer Open and has been the recipient of several photographic awards. Through self-portraiture, collage and poetry Stone focuses on challenging monolithic views of Blackness by expanding on narratives subject to Black erasure.
2021 YBCA 100 Honoree, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
2021 Artist-in-Residence, Black Space Residency, San Francisco
2020 Shortlisted Finalist Artadia San Francisco
2020 Shortlisted Finalist Women Photograph Grant
2020 Artwork Commission Recipient, Svane Family Foundation San Francisco
2021 Artist-in-Residence, Black Space Residency, San Francisco
2020 Shortlisted Finalist Artadia San Francisco
2020 Shortlisted Finalist Women Photograph Grant
2020 Artwork Commission Recipient, Svane Family Foundation San Francisco
My body is a conduit wherein I explore the depth and fluidity of my Black existence. I dive into existential questions of being and belonging by examining what it means to be alive in my skin. Self-portraiture has given me a way to fully meet myself and reckon with these findings. This introspection has also led me to see the external world around me in a new light; taking note of its active role in molding my identity. Each of these aspects coalesce into rich black and white photographs made entirely on film.
I was born in 1992 and in true millennial fashion I experienced the joy of polaroid film in my childhood and the rise of pocket-sized point-and-shoot digital cameras and flip phones in my adolescence. By age 13, I had my first social media profile on Myspace, a digital camera and blog to boast. The internet was a very different entity 15 years ago; it was an algorithm-free place for self-expression, pirating music and instant messenger. In my generation, the internet was a place for refuge, reprieve and inspiration -- not advertisements.
In these simpler times, photography reigned supreme and I instantly fell in love with it. I began making self-portraiture then and still continue to do so today. Having lived through the transition from analogue to digital, I find it only natural that I reverse migrated back to analogue photography in my adulthood. There is an unequivocal warmth, texture and nostalgia found in film that I cannot find anywhere else. My 90’s childhood has informed so much of my work, style and attitude toward life today. I appreciate the ways in which analogue photography forces me to slow down and stay present. I have also become vastly attracted to the tactility of physical photographs that exist outside of a screen. As an adult, I now embrace a hybridized art practice and lifestyle that marries both technologies together satisfying my desire for the “old” with our current “now.”
In these simpler times, photography reigned supreme and I instantly fell in love with it. I began making self-portraiture then and still continue to do so today. Having lived through the transition from analogue to digital, I find it only natural that I reverse migrated back to analogue photography in my adulthood. There is an unequivocal warmth, texture and nostalgia found in film that I cannot find anywhere else. My 90’s childhood has informed so much of my work, style and attitude toward life today. I appreciate the ways in which analogue photography forces me to slow down and stay present. I have also become vastly attracted to the tactility of physical photographs that exist outside of a screen. As an adult, I now embrace a hybridized art practice and lifestyle that marries both technologies together satisfying my desire for the “old” with our current “now.”
2021 NPR: Housing Projects And Empty Lots. How Chanell Stone is Reframing Nature Photography by Will Matsuda
2021 On Offsite Residency: Re-natured Chanell Stone’s Natura Negra Series by Lucia Olubunmi Momoh
2020 W Magazine: 8 Young Photographers to Follow in 2020 by Maridelis Morales Rosado
2020 W Magazine: Ming Smith on befriending Grace Jones, and a lifetime of Artistry by Michael Beckert
2021 On Offsite Residency: Re-natured Chanell Stone’s Natura Negra Series by Lucia Olubunmi Momoh
2020 W Magazine: 8 Young Photographers to Follow in 2020 by Maridelis Morales Rosado
2020 W Magazine: Ming Smith on befriending Grace Jones, and a lifetime of Artistry by Michael Beckert
Solo Exhibitions
2020 Natura Negra, Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco, CA
2019 Natura Negra, Isabelle Percy West Gallery, Oakland, CA
2018 Drafts & Assemblages, Test Strip, Oakland, CA
Selected Group Exhibitions
2021 Tracking Down Intimacy, Fotografiska, New York, NY
2021 An Active and Urgent Telling, Schaefer Art Gallery, Saint Peter, MN
2020 Offline, Casemore Kirkeby, San Francisco, CA
2020 Podium, 181 Fremont, San Francisco, CA
2020 The Right to Herself, Center for Fine Art Photography, Fort Collins, CO
2020 Experiments in the Field, Berkeley Art Center, Berkeley, CA
2020 Chain Reaction 13, San Francisco Arts Commission, San Francisco, CA
2019 Aperture Summer Open: Delirious Cities, Aperture Gallery, New York, NY
2019 Forecast 2019, SF Camerawork, San Francisco, CA
2020 Natura Negra, Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco, CA
2019 Natura Negra, Isabelle Percy West Gallery, Oakland, CA
2018 Drafts & Assemblages, Test Strip, Oakland, CA
Selected Group Exhibitions
2021 Tracking Down Intimacy, Fotografiska, New York, NY
2021 An Active and Urgent Telling, Schaefer Art Gallery, Saint Peter, MN
2020 Offline, Casemore Kirkeby, San Francisco, CA
2020 Podium, 181 Fremont, San Francisco, CA
2020 The Right to Herself, Center for Fine Art Photography, Fort Collins, CO
2020 Experiments in the Field, Berkeley Art Center, Berkeley, CA
2020 Chain Reaction 13, San Francisco Arts Commission, San Francisco, CA
2019 Aperture Summer Open: Delirious Cities, Aperture Gallery, New York, NY
2019 Forecast 2019, SF Camerawork, San Francisco, CA
2021 Matte Magazine Issue No. 56: Chanell Stone, Matte, 2021
2021 Apogee Journal: Issue 15, Apogee, 2021
2020 “Now’s the Time”, Art Journal, College Art Association, 2020
2020 “The Body Issue”, Female Photographers Org, Ed. Elisabeth Bondi, Hatje Cantz, 2020
2021 Apogee Journal: Issue 15, Apogee, 2021
2020 “Now’s the Time”, Art Journal, College Art Association, 2020
2020 “The Body Issue”, Female Photographers Org, Ed. Elisabeth Bondi, Hatje Cantz, 2020
