Rhea
Beckett
Artist | Founder
Rhea Beckett is an interdisciplinary artist, curator, and founder of Black Artist Research Space (BARS). BARS began as her 2014 thesis project at MICA, when she stepped away from music performance to study the role of the curator and the intersection of artistic production, collaboration, and community engagement. Since then, BARS has evolved into a platform for artists and functions as an extension of her artistic practice.
Beckett works across sound, design, performance, painting, and photography, while BARS acts as organizer, researcher, and collaborator. Through this platform, Beckett develops projects to create space for experimentation, dialogue, and collective inquiry among artists and communities.
Rhea Beckett received her BS Art from Fisk University (Nashville, TN) in 2013 and MFA in Curatorial Practice from the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) in 2016.
Rhea is a classically trained singer and was a soprano in the Grammy Award winning Fisk Jubilee Singers from 2009-2013 (National Medal of Arts recipient, 2008). She sings in four languages and has over twenty years of on-stage performance experience.
Rhea currently creates from Baltimore, MD where she has been a professor of art for eight years.
cURRENT RESEARCH:
Plant Data Experiments: Sonic Cartographies
location: Tilly’s Escape [Baltimore, MD]
[Untitled] is a developing performance and installation that reimagines the story of Tilly, an enslaved woman who sought freedom by water in Baltimore in 1853, as a sonic meditation on freedom, ecology, and memory.
In this work, I gather plant data, field recordings, and video from landscapes connected to this history and translate these materials into a musical score, drawing on rhythms, textures, and patterns found within the surrounding environment.
The site of this escape has since been transformed into a tourist destination, where a pedestrian bridge now passes over the waters where Tilly and Harriet Tubman made their crossing. This tension between historical memory and contemporary redevelopment informs my approach. By translating ecological and environmental data into sound, I explore how landscapes hold traces of movement, resistance, and survival even as they are reshaped over time.
Through sound, performance, and installation, I approach the environment as a living archive that carries echoes of escape, resilience, and the enduring presence of Black life within the landscape.
Image 1: Untitled,Rhea Beckett, digital photography 2025
Image 2: Untitled,Rhea Beckett, digital photography 2025
Image 3: Untitled,Rhea Beckett, digital photography 2025
[Untitled] for Tilly
Composed from recordings generated through a willow tree’s signals and translated across eight digital instruments, these materials build an original score reflecting on movement, water, and the story of Tilly’s 1853 escape, shaping these sounds into a meditation on freedom and survival.
“The hills fill my heart with the sound of music. My heart wants to sing every song it hears”
Julie Andrews (The Sound of Music)
Pier IV & V: Recording plant data at the Baltimore Harbor.
Data from ginger root: Designating instruments and sequencing notes.
Reimagining “I Must Become a Menace to My Enemies” by June Jordan
Sampling through an MPC Key 61
Creating contrast and tension through notation.
Home test: Experimenting on a struggling vine plant running through Moog-32 Eurorack synth
Rehearsals at Peabody: My voice training began at 3 years old and has remained a part of my daily routine whether it is with a coach, breath work while walking down the street, or arpeggiating in random moments.
Creating the movement within the song. This first layer is important because it sets the tone and feeling.
Percussive accents.
