Zora Djenohan
Zora Djenohan (they/she) is a New Orleans based multidisciplinary artist, their work lives mostly in the realm of functional ceramics. Zora was born in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire and raised in Seattle, Washington. Growing up Zora was denied access to the exclusively male woodworking tradition passed on from their grandfather to their father, which only tantalized their growing artistic curiosity. In defiance of that gendered exclusion, and in search of a deeper connection to their cultural heritage, Zora unearthed stories of women in their patrilineal line who were also potters. While none of those potters remain to pass on their knowledge, Zora creates functional ceramics as a means of tending to those ancestral ties, using clay to build a bridge between generations and across the diaspora. The sacredness and ritual imbued in everyday-lived-in-loved-on objects has always inspired them and guided their work. They continue to center functional ceramics in their practice, rejecting the distinction between craft and fine art as an outgrowth of Eurocentric standards and white supremacy.
