Jahniah Kum (b. 1997, Albany, NY) is a Baltimore-based artist whose work explores grief as an ongoing process of reconstruction. Rooted in the loss of her mother, Kum’s practice examines how absence reshapes identity, memory, and the body. Through self-portraiture and multi-panel compositions, she navigates the question: What does it mean to be whole when something vital is missing? Drawing from bell hooks’ concept of "re-membering," her work seeks to reclaim and reassemble the fragmented self while engaging with the cultural narratives of her maternal lineage and Caribbean upbringing.
Kum’s visual language reflects the weight of memory—using color, scale, and materiality to evoke both the emotional and historical resonance of loss. Her recent work is informed by the autonomy of self, a concept she draws from Audre Lorde’s essay "The Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power," which frames the erotic as a source of deep, embodied knowledge and personal agency. Architectural symbols from her childhood, Caribbean folklore, oral histories, and familial legacies further shape her practice, providing a framework to examine and expand the conversation around mourning and remembrance.
Kum earned an A.S. in Fine Arts from Hudson Valley Community College (2020), a B.A. in Studio Art from the University at Albany (2023) and a MFA in Painting from the Maryland Institute College of Art. Her work has been exhibited in a range of group exhibitions, including the Annual Mohawk Hudson Regional Show, a solo exhibition at the Spare Room Gallery in Baltimore and the Peale Museum of Art.