Desmond's profile

Desmond Beach is an artist and educator. He earned his MFA from the Rinehart School of Sculpture at the Maryland institute College of Art (MiCA) and his BFA from MiCA. He has been a visiting lecturer/artist at institutions such as Coppin State University and Emerson College. Beach is currently the 2021-2022 Bayard Rustin Residency Fellow in New York. He has been a fellow at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown and Skidmore College as well as an artist-in-residence at the Women Housing Coalition in Baltimore, and Pyramid Atlantic Art Center in Silver Spring, to name a few. 

The middle son of three boys born in Baltimore, Maryland, his artistic focus is Black men in America. He is an interdisciplinary project artist, and his work takes its point of departure from specific problems or tragedies experienced by Black people or those of African heritage. The African tradition of storytelling is a common thread that is stitched throughout Beach’s work. Honoring his immediate ancestors and those of the African Diaspora is an important focus. Performance art aids him in creating sacred spaces in which the ancestors' spirits may rest. He has made it his business to take the horrors of the transatlantic slave trade and Jim Crow America and transform it into fully living, breathing human Black life. Beach’s work is based on current and historical events surrounding the African-American experience. 


Desmond's Curated Collection

View Desmond's favorite works from other Baker Artists