NXTHVN is thrilled to announce our Cohort 08 Studio and Curatorial Fellows

Ana Cláudia Almeida, Sachiko Akiyama, Sejiro Avoseh, Kevin Hopkins, Inkpa Mani Lara-Ruiz, Will Maxen, Victor Olaoye, Lucemy Perez, and Thomas James

Founded by Titus Kaphar and Jason Price, NXTHVN offers one of the only Fellowships that unites curators and artists, furnishing them with the fundamentals to thrive in their practice. During the course of the program, Curatorial Fellows and Studio Fellows receive a $45,000 stipend for the Fellowship year, 24-hour access to dedicated work and/or studio space and on-site housing. The program culminates in a group exhibition at a prominent gallery.

In line with NXTHVN’s vision of providing intergenerational mentorship, each Fellow is paired with a New Haven public high school student to guide them in their artistic and/or curatorial ambitions. Since 2019, NXTHVN’s Fellowship program has served as a springboard for artist careers. Notable individuals who have completed the NXTHVN Fellowship include Felipe Baeza, Layo Bright, Alexandria Couch, Kenturah Davis, Fidelis Joseph, Ashanté Kindle, Kwamé Azure Gomez, Alexandria Smith, Vaughn Spann, Patrick Quarm, Vincent Valdez, and many more.

NXTHVN’s Cohort 08 welcomes Fellows from varying locations across the globe including Connecticut, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New York, South Carolina, Washington D.C., Brazil, Nigeria, and the United Kingdom. Artistic practices include drawing, sculpture, painting, mixed media, and public monuments.

ABOUT THE FELLOWS

ANA CLÁUDIA ALMEIDA
Ana Cláudia Almeida (b. 1993, Rio de Janeiro) is an artist living and working in New Haven, CT. She received her MFA in Painting and Printmaking from the Yale School of Art and holds a bachelor’s degree in Industrial Design from Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro. Her work has been presented at institutions including the Nevada Museum of Art, Instituto Inhotim, Museu de Arte do Rio, and Instituto Tomie Ohtake, and is included in the 2026 Panorama da Arte Brasileira at MAM São Paulo. She has participated in residencies including the Joyner/Giuffrida Residency Program, Sertão Negro, Ateliê Mondial, and Pivô Pesquisa, and has been recognized by New American Paintings, the Cultured Magazine Young Artists Prize, the PIPA Prize, and the EDP das Artes Prize. Her work is held in the collections of Instituto Inhotim, Museu de Arte do Rio, Nevada Museum of Art, and Sesc Rio de Janeiro.

SACHIKO AKIYAMA
Sachiko Akiyama is an artist and educator living and working in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Her proximity to the ocean, woods, and wildlife has deepened her connections to the natural themes prevalent in her work. She received her MFA from Boston University and attended the Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture. Her work has been presented in solo museum exhibitions at the Center for Maine Contemporary Art and the Brattleboro Museum & Art Center. Group exhibitions include Mrs. Gallery and a collaboration between Night Gallery and Dunes. Akiyama is a recipient of the Joan Mitchell Fellowship and Artist Resource Trust awards, and has participated in residencies including Millay Arts, Surf Point Foundation, and Ucross Foundation.

SEJIRO AVOSEH
Sejiro Avoseh (b. 1990, Lagos, Nigeria) is a multidisciplinary artist based in Essex, United Kingdom. He received a Master of Arts with distinction from the University for the Creative Arts, Canterbury, in 2022, having previously earned an HND in Painting from Lagos State Polytechnic in 2013. Working primarily in painting, Sejiro explores themes of migration, memory, identity, and displacement. Through fragmented figures, layered surfaces, and complex relationships between bodies and space, his work examines the psychological conditions of belonging and alienation, particularly as they relate to the immigrant experience. In 2025, Sejiro was invited by Tracey Emin to undertake a three-month residency at Victoria House in Margate, culminating in an exhibition at the Tracey Emin Foundation. Sejiro has exhibited at Kravets Wehby, New York; A Hug From the Art World, New York; Green Family Art Foundation, Dallas; Afikaris Gallery, Paris; and Rele Gallery, Lagos.

KEVIN HOPKINS
Kevin Hopkins (b. 2000, Beaufort, SC) is an artist whose practice explores themes of belonging, survival, and imagination, contextualized within the Black American experience. By weaving together his understanding of his Lowcountry upbringing and pop-cultural phenomena, Hopkins’ work contributes to a diasporic search for pathways to collectively embrace the multiplicity of Black expression, offering optimistic realities that are actively conjured through prophetic charms. Hopkins holds a BFA in Painting from the Kansas City Art Institute (2023) and an MFA in Painting and Printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University (2026). His work has been recognized with numerous honors, including the 2025 Cy Twombly Award from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, selection as a finalist for the 2025 Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition, and three grants from the Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation.

INKPA MANI LARA-RUIZ
Inkpa Mani (b. 1997) is an Indigenous Mexican-American artist from Minnesota and Chihuahua, Mexico, of Rarámuri, Canchos, and Masea Mexica (Nahua) descent. Drawing from the landscapes of his upbringing and the communities that surround him, he creates contemporary paintings, sculptures, and installations that blend modern approaches with Indigenous aesthetics, material traditions, and cultural memory. Working between painting and sculpture, Inkpa explores kinship, migration, memory, grief, and cultural continuity. Through the use of stone, clay, earth pigments, wood, and other culturally significant materials, his work investigates the relationships between people, land, and ancestral knowledge while celebrating the vitality of the contemporary Indigenous world. Mani received his MFA in Painting from the Yale School of Art. His work can be found nationally in public spaces, museums, and private collections. He has received public art commissions from Williams College, the State of North Dakota, the City of Minneapolis, the City of Sisseton, and Yale Divinity School.

WILL MAXEN
Will Maxen (b. 1993, Waterbury, CT) received his BA in Illustration from Central Connecticut State University (2015) and an MFA in Art Studio from the University of California, Davis (2023). Maxen has had solo exhibitions at Fridman Gallery, New York; Residency Art Gallery, LA (Felix Art Fair); and UTA Artist Space, New York; His work has been featured in group shows at Make Room Los Angeles; Welancora Gallery, Brooklyn; Fridman Gallery, New York; Marrow Gallery, San Francisco; and Chili Art Projects, London. In 2024, he was an artist-in-residence at Silver Art Projects and the New Jewish Culture Fellowship. His work is held in the collections of the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, the Beth Rudin DeWoody Collection, and the Art Galleries at Black Studies, University of Texas. He previously served as an Assistant Professor of Professional Practice at LSU.

VICTOR OLAOYE
Victor Olaoye is a Nigerian multidisciplinary artist whose practice explores transformation and metamorphosis through painting, fiber experimentation, and material innovation. Drawing from his upbringing on a banana farm in Abeokuta, Nigeria, and Yoruba Adire traditions, he creates richly layered works that examine the intersections of the human, botanical, and psychological. Olaoye holds an MFA in Painting and Drawing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. His work has been exhibited internationally at museums, galleries, and art fairs across Switzerland, France, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Nigeria, including the Musée Rath in Geneva. He is a recipient of the Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation Grant, the El Anatsui LIMCAF International Grant Award, the James Nelson Raymond Fellowship, the First Prize Award at Life in My City Art Festival, and a Studio Fellowship at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA).

LUCEMY PEREZ
Lucemy Perez is an Afro-Dominican curator, artist, and public historian from the Bronx, New York. Their practice is rooted in Black and Latine (Diasporic) histories, cultural identities, expressions, and production. They look at power, agency, and personhood in the Black Atlantic through Black Feminist frameworks. Working from the idea that “culture is life itself,” they put the past, present, and future in conversation to help water the seeds of individual power that exist inside us all. Perez earned Bachelor and Master of Arts Degrees in American Studies from Trinity College, where they were the recipient of the Samuel S. Fishzohn Award for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties and the Women’s Empowerment Activist Award. They have been recognized by FX Networks, the television show Pose, and the LGBT Center of New York for their work. Most recently, they curated Turning Tides: Little Liberia & the Black Atlantic for the Freeman Center in Bridgeport, CT.

THOMAS JAMES
Thomas James (b. Washington, DC, 1994) is a curator and cultural worker. Taking a critical- creative approach to exhibition-making, his practice has been described as one that blends the visionary with the quotidian. James focuses on translating expansive ideas through storytelling, cross-disciplinary collaboration, and embodied, participatory forms of cultural production. He holds an MA in Culture, Criticism, and Curation from Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London, and a BS in Business Administration from Frostburg State University, with additional training in curatorial studies at the Unschool of Curating (Cluj-Napoca, Romania) and in arts leadership at the New Art School Modual. James curated exhibitions at the Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Art Arlington, and The Phillips Collection. He has held leadership roles including Inaugural Executive Director of The Last Resort Artists Retreat, Director of Visual Arts at Creative Alliance (Baltimore, MD), and Chair of Exhibitions at the Eubie Blake Cultural Center.

ABOUT NXTHVN
NXTHVN, is an innovative national arts model that empowers artists and curators through education and access to a vibrant ecosystem. Supported by intergenerational mentorship, cross-sector collaboration and local engagement, NXTHVN accelerates the careers of the next generation and fosters retention of professional art talent while helping catalyze New Haven into a world-class, sustainable arts community.

SUPPORT
NXTHVN’s work is made possible through the generous support of our community of funders, partners, and champions.

We are proud to receive major support from the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development, the City of New Haven, the RISC Foundation, Inc., the State of Connecticut and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. We’re deeply grateful to the Arison Arts Foundation, Sean and Nancy Cotton, Suzanne McFayden, Kelly Williams, Bedari Foundation, Ellen Susman, Michi and Charles Jigarjian, Maverick Carter, and The Fletcher Foundation for their leadership and investment in NXTHVN’s vision.

We are also grateful for FY27 support from the Robert Lehman Foundation, New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA), The Ruth Foundation for the Arts, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, and the Pincus Family Foundation.

We are especially thankful to our Board of Directors for their unwavering leadership and support: Kelvin Lee Beachum Jr., Anita Blanchard, Bennet Grutman, Titus Kaphar, Sheila D. Lipsey, Suzanne McFayden, Jason Price, Alexandra Shor, Hassan Smith, Everette Taylor, Kelly Williams, and emeritus board member Ellen Susman.

We extend our sincere appreciation to the many other foundations and individual donors who support our work.