Brittany is a self taught photographer, poet, and budding writer who once felt voiceless and unsure. Through words and the lens, she began to see the world and her body differently. Today, she is embracing her identity as an artist, colorfully creating and laughing deeply.
I have always felt different.
As a child, crayons gave me freedom to color outside the lines, make a mess, and feel the open space. Crayon Spill is a return to that—where what stains and pours out becomes part of the work.
— Crayon Spill
Woman Behind the Smile
Growing up in Cleveland, Ohio, I learned to quiet parts of myself, to soften my voice and contain what felt too big. Still, I always had words. In black and white composition notebooks, I wrote what I could not speak out loud. Those pages became my first place of safety—my first sanctuary.
At predominantly white institutions, poetry became my playdough, a place to work through racism, relationships, my roots, and the road into adulthood.
In 2021, I picked up a camera, and in 2022, I opened Bradicoal Portraits. Since then, the work has become about more than me—holding space for others to be seen with care, especially in the places that once felt uncomfortable or hidden. As a graduate of the Josie R. Johnson Leadership Academy, I found myself speaking words I had only ever written in notebooks, naming a desire I could no longer ignore—to host an art show.
Scribbling in the world
I now live and work in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where I am preparing for my first exhibition. I look at the world through a lens shaped by race, mental health, identity, and my ongoing relationship with the body—my own and the bodies of others. Much of my work lives in that tension. Sharing it is still a fear of mine, but also a practice of trust.
I love yellow. It feels like joy. I am drawn to big hair and to spaces like museums and libraries where stories live and breathe. It all feels a little like a candy shop to me.
I am an ambivert, living in the both and, drawn to community and to quiet. AJ Ghent is a current muse, and I am learning the electric guitar. I am a seminarian and now write on Substack, where I continue to wrestle with faith, mystery, and God.
Thankful for young people, they remind us adults how to live free.