Rhea Beckett is an interdisciplinary artist, curator, and founder of Black Artist Research Space (BARS). BARS began as her 2014 thesis (Black Space) at MICA, offering an opportunity to study the role of the curator at the intersection of artistic production, collaboration, and community engagement. Since then, BARS has evolved into a platform for artists and has functioned as an extension of Rhea’s creative practice.

Rhea’s primary instrument is her voice. Her practice moves across sound, performance, composition, painting, photography, and curatorial work, with sound increasingly serving as central to her practice.Through BARS, she has worked as an organizer, researcher, and collaborator, supporting hundreds of emerging and mid-career artists while creating space for experimentation, dialogue, and collective inquiry.

Beckett received her BS in Art from Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, and her MFA in Curatorial Practice from MICA. She is a classically trained singer and performed as a soprano with the Grammy Award-winning Fisk Jubilee Singers from 2009–2013. The ensemble received the National Medal of Arts in 2008. Beckett sings in four languages and has more than twenty years of experience as a performing artist.

After eight years as a professor of art, Beckett recently relocated from Baltimore to Chicago, where she is continuing to develop her creative practice with a focus on sound, performance, and interdisciplinary approaches to art making.

Her current project Sonic Cartographies can be explored here.