Cici Osais — CROWN HEIGHTS 

Cici’s Lakou NOU project will provide a community gathering space in Crown Heights that centers storytelling, communion, and cloth.

This space will be an outlet for members of the Haitian diaspora to learn quilting and other textile techniques, and a place where neighbors can get to know one another and share stories of their own.

Cici Osias (b. Baltimore, MD) is a textile artist and photographer based in Brooklyn, New York. Cici draws influence from Haitian, Black American, Congolese, and Nigerian motifs to make meaning of her identity and hold her people close. 

Within her textiles, Cici recognizes the role of cloth as a vessel for storytelling within African, Caribbean, and African American culture. Through this work, she traces shared origin and collective memory across the Black diaspora. Cici’s film photography embraces family as a verb and the earth as kin.

Most recently Cici has exhibited work in Brooklyn at the Old Stone House, Haiti Cultural Exchange, Textile Arts Center, and Weeksville Heritage Center.