Ebitenyefa Baralaye Joins Stamps Faculty
Detroit-based artist and educator Ebitenyefa Baralaye will join the Stamps School of Art & Design this fall as an art and design assistant professor.
Detroit-based artist and educator Ebitenyefa Baralaye will join the Stamps School of Art & Design this fall as an art and design assistant professor. Baralaye is a well-known ceramicist, sculptor, and designer whose creative work and research interests center around themes of culture, spirituality, and the African diaspora.
The connection Baralaye has to the Stamps School grew over the years into collaborative projects. Most recently, he worked with the University of Michigan Museum of Art (UMMA) and the Stamps Gallery as part of the UMMA exhibition Hear Me Now: The Black Potters of Old Edgefield, South Carolina, by conducting a series of hands-on ceramic workshops. “Having worked closely with UMMA and Stamps Gallery around the Hear Me Now series allowed me to see the investment the institution puts into research, ideas, and engagement,” said Baralaye.
Beyond Michigan, his work has been exhibited nationally and internationally at Friedman Benda Gallery, Shoshana Wayne Gallery, the Museum of the African Diaspora, and the Korea Ceramic Foundation. An example of Baralaye’s approach to his work can be found in the Akanza sculpture series dedicated to his late father.
Baralaye is excited about the prospects of conducting research at the University of Michigan. “Core things that ground my research are understandings of home, family, and heritage. There are many ways of thinking about visual languages of abstraction and how they draw their lineage back to the continent of Africa. I am invested in understanding histories of making and expression From traditions of language, vessel-making, and figuartion.
Baralaye received his BFA in Ceramics from the Rhode Island School of Design and earned his MFA in Ceramics at the Cranbrook Academy of Art. From there, he participated in the AICAD Teaching Fellowship program at the San Francisco Art Institute from 2016 – 2018. He has completed residencies at the Watershed Center for Ceramic Arts, the Hambidge Center, and the Elizabeth Foundation Studio Program. Before joining the Stamps faculty, Baralaye most recently served on the faculty at the College for Creative Studies, holding the title of Section Lead of Ceramics. He says that teaching makes him a better artist and designer.