Yelaine Rodriguez (b. 1990) is an Afro-Dominican artist and scholar currently based in the United States. She specializes in wearable art and sculptures, documenting her work through photography and video performance. Her artistic exploration focuses on Afro-spiritual practices and the concepts of architectural and ancestral memory, examining the connections between the Caribbean and the United States. Rodriguez earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) in Fashion Design from Parsons, The New School, in 2013, and her Master of Arts (MA) in Latin American and Caribbean Studies with a concentration in Museum Studies from New York University (NYU) in 2021. She is currently pursuing a PhD in Performance Studies at Northwestern University.

Rodriguez's curatorial projects include "Radical Elegance" at Longwood Art Gallery at Hostos (2021), "Afro Syncretic" at NYU (2019-2020), "Resistance, Roots, & Truth" at the Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute (2018), and "(under)REPRESENT(ed)" at Parsons School of Design | The New School (2017). From 2015 to 2018, she founded La Lucha: Dominican Republic and Haiti, One Island, an art collective focused on exploring Dominican-Haitian relations through exhibitions, artist panels, and interactive conferences.

Rodriguez has participated in several residencies, including the Innovative Cultural Advocacy Fellowship from the Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute (2017), the Wave Hill Van Lier Fellowship (2018), the Latinx Project Curatorial Fellowship at NYU (2019), and the Bronx Museum AIM Program (2020). Her artwork has been exhibited internationally at venues such as ESTAMOS BIEN: LA TRIENAL 20/21 at El Museo del Barrio (NY), the UNTITLED Art Fair, Photoville, and the American Museum of Natural History in the United States. She has also showcased her work at the Centro León Biennial XXVII in the Dominican Republic, SurGallery and Critical Distance Centre for Curators in Canada, Wereldmuseum in The Netherlands, Documenta 15 in Germany, and Santa Monica in Barcelona, Spain. Rodriguez's work has been featured in prominent publications such as CNN, Artsy, EnFoco, Hyperallergic, Vogue, Aperture, and Elle Magazine. Her writing has appeared in ARTnews and academic journals like Latin American & Latinx Visual Culture. 

Photography by: Elia Alba, La Joya (Yelaine Rodriguez), 2019Contact Yelaine for more info

Photography by: Elia Alba, La Joya (Yelaine Rodriguez), 2019

Contact Yelaine for more info

My Caribbean magical realism portraits underscore my academic research and artistic language. In my practice, I integrate colonial archival materials with Afro syncretic religions and Black narratives during slavery via a critical fabulation approach that reassesses our viewpoint on the representation of Afro-derived beliefs within history. I construct intricate costume garments, crowns, masks, and sculptural objects that I document through photography and video in detailed staged portraits that provide new meaning to Afro syncretic religions in the Caribbean and the United States. My works engage with historical significance sites, reimagining the past through elaborate garments against the backdrops of Caribbean architectural ruins that generated trauma and violence during slavery.

As an Afro-Dominican United Statesian artist and part of the African Diaspora, themes of displacement and identity formation often circulate in my artistic practice. My work also lives as multi-media site-specific installations named Digital Thrones. These are composed of CRT-TVs projecting photos or videos concerning the deity or loa in honor. My art is also syncretic, remixing and recontextualizing history, like coupling Haitian Vodou with Afro-Puerto Rican Bomba or photographing a Haitian loa in a Cuban landscape. While transporting Shango onto a preserved Siwanoy trail in The Bronx speaks to the displacement of BIPOC peoples and becomes a contemporary intervention that inspires alternative futures. These works highlight the Caribbean and the United States' shared history. They memorialize African diasporic roots, rejecting the negative stereotypes and challenging dominant beauty standards while bringing forth the knowledge that was suppressed or lost by colonization.

(2023) National Association of Latino Arts & Cultures (NALAC) Funds for the Arts,

(2023) Kahn | Mason SIP Fellowship | efa Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop, NYC.

(2022) Brandywine Workshop & Archives, Artists-In-Residency Program, Philadelphia, PA.

(2022) TEDx AUCollege, I Am A Living Archive, Amsterdam, Netherlands,

(2020) Bronx Museum Artist In the Market Program (AIM)

(2019) The Latinx Project Curatorial Fellow at NYU

(2018) New York Community Trust Van Lier Fellow, Wave Hill

(2017) Innovative Cultural Advocacy Fellowship, Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute

 

EDUCATION

The Graduate School - Northwestern University, PhD in The Department of Performance Studies, Evanston, IL. Fall 2024 - Present

New York University, Graduate School of Arts and Science, New York, NY  | Master’s Program, Latin American & Caribbean Studies / Museum Studies, Fall 2021

Parsons the New School for Design, New York, NY | Bachelor in Fine Arts, Fashion Design, 2013

  • Altos de Chavon, La Romana, Dominican Republic, Summer 2012

  • Central St, Martins, London, England; Fashion Design, Spring 2011

  • Parsons Paris, Photography, Summer 2010

TEACHING EXPERIENCE Adjunct Professor

  • Rutgers University Department of Latino & Caribbean Studies, 2023

  • Tisch School of the Arts at New York University, The Department of Photography and Imaging (DPI), 2020

  • Parsons The New School for Design, MFA Textile, New York, NY, 2022

  • Parsons The New School for Design, New York, NY, 2017

  • Parsons Pre-College Academy, New York, NY, 2013

  • Altos De Chavón, La Romana, Dominican Republic, Summer 2013

CURATORIAL PROJECTS

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

SELECTED SCREENINGS

ART FAIR

  • Laguna Art Fair, Mexico City. 2024

  • Clavo Art Fair, Mexico City. 2024

  • Shango | Digital Throne, UNTITLED Art Fair, Miami, Florida. 2022

  • The Price of Memory, CAFA Barbados Fair, Barbados, 2018

  • Works On Paper, New York, NY, 2017

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

Upcoming

  • Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University | Ithaca, New York | September 6 – December 7, 2025

  • Clark Atlanta University Galleries Atlanta, Georgia | September 19 – December 12, 2024

2024

2023

2022

  • So Far And Yet So Close, Edge Zones Art Center, Miami, Florida. 2022

  • Free As They Want To Be: Artists Committed To Memory, FotoFocus: National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, Cincinnati, OH. September 2022

  • Hair Power, Wereldmuseum, Rotterdam, NL. July 2022 - 2023

 2021

 2020

2019

  • Bronx Latin American Art Triennial, Boricua College Art Gallery, Bronx, NY. 2019

  • The Repeating Island, Bard College. 2019

  • Herritual, The Goat Farm Art Center, Atlanta, GA. 2019

  • Spring 2019 Invitational Exhibition, JVS Project Space, New York, NY. 2019

  • Ezili Dantor, Freedom & the African Diaspora: An Immersive Installation and Performance, AFH, Bronx, NY. 2019

  • Waiting For The Garden Of Eden, White Box Harlem, New York, NY. 2019

2018

2017

  • Yemaya (One Step Beyond), American Museum Of Natural History, NY, 2017

  • Vibras NYC: Afrofuturo, Starr, Brooklyn, NY, 2017

2016

  • kNOWing: Recent Works From Coronado Print Studio (2016)

  • Borimix: Borinqueya: An Evolving Travesty, Clemente Soto Velez Cultural & Educational Center, LES, 2016

  • Bronx Latin American Art Biennial, Loisaida Inc. Center Gallery, LES, 2016

  • Living In My Skin, Rio Gallery III, Sugar Hill, NY, 2016

  • Caribbean Carnival: Tradition Of Artistry, Visions Of Change, Wheaton Arts & Cultural Center, Folklife Galleries, New Jersey, 2016

  • Sankofa: Reflections On Cultural Heritage & Shared Humanity, Wheaton Arts & Cultural Center Gallery Of Fine Craft, NJ. 2016

  • Between Worlds – In A World, Rowan College Gallery, New Jersey, 2016

  • Afrofuturism Conference 2016: #Black is Viral, Parsons School Of Design, Manhattan, NY, 2016

  • Boogie On The Boulevard, The Bronx Museum, Bronx, NY, 2016

  • Metamorphosis, [re]New Lots, Brooklyn, NY, 2016

  • BxNow, Temporary Storage, Brooklyn, NY, 2016

  • Rendezvous Art, The Well, Brooklyn, NY, 2016

2015

  • Harvest/Hærfest, Bronx River Art Center, Bronx, NY, 2015

  • Yeah, That’s What She Said, Baby Castle, Manhattan, NY, 2015

  • Bronx Fashion Week, Old Bronx Courthouse, 2015

  • 12" x 12", Gun Hill Brewery, Bronx, NY, 2015

  • Consequential Translation, Centro Cultural De Espana, Dominican Republic, 2015

  • Innuendos: The Voices of 10 Bronxite Women, Andrew Freedman Home, Bronx, NY, 2015

  • La Lucha: Quisqueya & Haiti, One Island, Rio Penthouse Gallery, Manhattan, NY, 2015

 FELLOWSHIPS / RESIDENCIES / GRANTS

 PANEL DISCUSSIONS / ARTIST TALK

  • Decolonizing Identity, Clemente Soto Velez Cultural & Educational Center, LES, 2019

  • Women on the Frontlines, NoMAA, 2018

  • Women of Global Reflections 2018: Spirit of Community, The Interchurch Center, 2018

  • Curating Hispañola Round Table, The Graduate Center, NY, 2018

  •  Intersecting Trajectories, Rush Art Gallery, NY, 2018

SELECTED TEXT / PRESS / MEDIA