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Stephanie Santana
Fractured self
Imagine yourself as a mosaic - each shard a memory, each fragment a story. Identity is fragmented, nonlinear, imperfect. Through collage, artists reassemble past and present into visual diaries, embracing the messiness of memory to reveal a self that is ever-evolving, resilient, and beautifully incomplete.
View SeriesStephanie Santana
Presenting Stephanie Santana, a textile and print artist who draws from African diasporic traditions, weaving together fragments of memory and history to challenge silences and rewrite forgotten stories.
Stephanie Santana’s textiles and prints are acts of quiet defiance—gathering memory, history, and myth into layered works that reclaim and reimagine. Rooted in African diasporic quiltmaking and inspired by artists like Betye Saar and Emma Amos, her practice honors Black women’s legacies of resistance and storytelling. Born in Los Angeles and based in Brooklyn, Santana builds her pieces from archival materials, paint, and print, creating tactile maps of identity and ancestral knowledge. Her art doesn’t just recall what’s been lost—it repairs, reclaims, and insists on new ways of knowing, where memory and selfhood remain alive, layered, and evolving.
Episode
Explore the artist's work, stories, and experiences tied to this episode's theme.
Safe Passage, 2024
"Safe Passage" weaves together printed images of jugs, archival portraits, and vibrant color blocks to create a quilt that feels both intimate and monumental. The repeated vessel motif evokes themes of care, containment, and survival, while the fragmented imagery of families suggests journeys—both physical and emotional. Santana continues to transform fabric into a map of resilience, offering a vision of how personal and collective histories are carried forward, piece by piece.
"I’ve always been fascinated with history, the passage of time, and ways to mark time. The first photographic print I made was of a photo that I love of my mom. Taking that small photo, scaling it up, and creating a very personal document feels like a way to preserve self and family. It feels far more permanent than the way many of us document our lives these days"
- Stephanie Santana, Blackcherry Mag