E. Jane, also known by their performance name MHYSA, is an American interdisciplinary new media artist and musician.

Early life and education

Jane was born in

Bethesda, Maryland Bethesda () is an unincorporated, census-designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland. It is located just northwest of Washington, D.C. It takes its name from a local church, the Bethesda Meeting House (1820, rebuilt 1849), which in ...

in 1990. Jane graduated from Marymount Manhattan College in 2012 with a Bachelor of Arts in art history. In 2016, they graduated with a Master of Fine Arts in interdisciplinary art from the University of Pennsylvania School of Design.

Career

They have participated in various exhibitions and festivals internationally, including ''Wandering/WILDING: Blackness on the Internet'' at IMT Gallery in London in 2016, Post-Cyber Feminist International in 2017, and

Glasgow International Glasgow International (GI) is a biennial visual arts festival that takes place in Glasgow, Scotland. While Glasgow has a thriving contemporary art scene of its own, GI offers a platform to artists from other countries as well, showcasing the bes ...

in 2018. Jane was a 2019–2020 Artist-in-Residence at

The Studio Museum in Harlem The Studio Museum in Harlem is an American art museum devoted to the work of artists of African descent. The museum's galleries are currently closed in preparation for a building project that will replace the current building, located at 144 W ...

, and they are based in

Brooklyn, New York Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

MHYSA

Jane performs under the musical alter ego name, "MHYSA." MHYSA is also a part of the music duo SCRAAATCH, along with collaborator "lawd knows" (who also goes by "chukwumaa"). In 2017, MHYSA released their debut album, '. In February 2020, they released the album ''NEVAEH'' for Hyperdub.

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

has said MHYSA's work contains a "wobbly, dreamy club sound." Others have noted the performance as referencing or being connected to 1990s R&B music. MHYSA has described themselves as "an underground pop star for the cyber resistance."

Selected works

''Lavendra'' (2015–)

''Lavendra'' is a multimedia installation. It was displayed in exhibitions at the PennDesign MFA Program in 2015 and 2016, and as a solo exhibition at the Brooklyn gallery American Medium in 2017 and the Glasgow International in Scotland in 2018. The installation includes references to 1990s R&B (rhythm and blues) divas, such as portrait collages of 1990s black female musicians and songs selected from the time. Digital performances by MHYSA were shown on monitors, and the room was covered in purple light.

''Alive #NotYetDead'' (2015)

Alive was started in 2015 in response to the death of

Sandra Bland Sandra Annette Bland was a 28-year-old African-American woman who was found hanged in a jail cell in Waller County, Texas, on , 2015, three days after being arrested during a traffic stop. Her death was ruled a suicide. It was followed by protest ...

. Bland was found hanged in a cell after a traffic arrest in 2015. Jane created a photobooth background with the word "ALIVE" for black women to take pictures with and share on social media using the hashtag #notyetdead. These selfies were uploaded to a website and also displayed in an installation.

Personal life

Jane uses they and them pronouns.

Awards and honors

In 2016, they received the

Wynn Newhouse Award The Wynn Newhouse Award is an annual prize given to disabled artists in recognition of their artistic merit. History The Samuel I. Newhouse Foundation, a charitable organization founded by newspaper entrepreneur Samuel Irving Newhouse, Sr., inaugur ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jane, E. 1990 births Living people American non-binary artists American non-binary musicians American new media artists 21st-century American artists 21st-century American musicians Musicians from Maryland Artists from Maryland People from Bethesda, Maryland African-American musicians Womanists Afrofuturists Marymount Manhattan College alumni University of Pennsylvania School of Design alumni African-American contemporary artists African-American women musicians 21st-century African-American artists 21st-century African-American women 21st-century American LGBT people African-American LGBT people LGBT people from Maryland