African Studies Program

Rachel Kabukala is a PhD candidate in the Department of Art History and African Studies Program at Indiana University who studies historical and contemporary arts of Africa and the African Diaspora. Her dissertation research focuses on the design evolution and production histories of Kuba women textile artists in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. She previously served as Curatorial Assistant for African Art at The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art and has worked on multiple exhibitions during her time as a graduate student. In 2020, Rachel curated Radical Revisionists: Contemporary African Artists Confronting Past & Present at the Moody Center for the Arts at Rice University. In 2022, she presented the first solo exhibition of the Kinshasa-based artist collective Kongo Astronauts titled Congo Gravitational Waves // A Metadigital & Tantalean Tale at the University of North Texas CVAD Galleries. Rachel is committed to engaging in collaborative curatorial practices, mutually beneficially community engagement, and synergistic scholarship as means towards mutual liberation and positive transformation for our shared futures.