Chanell Stone is an artist born in Los Angeles and is currently living and working in Oakland, California. Her practice explores Blackness as both subject and medium, weaving together personal histories within collective narratives of the diaspora. Working in self-portraiture, film, and poetry, she examines the body’s manifold relationship to the natural world. Guided by familial memory, Stone’s work extends across the Mississippi Delta and urban centers, retracing echoes of migration and ancestral presence within the American landscape.
Stone earned her BFA in Photography from the California College of the Arts in 2019 and her MFA in Visual Arts from the University of California San Diego in 2024. Her work has been exhibited widely, both nationally and internationally. Her solo exhibition Natura Negra was presented at the Museum of the African Diaspora in San Francisco in 2020. More recently, her work has been displayed at the Carnegie Museum of Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Pier 24 Photography, Esker Foundation in Alberta, Canada, and Museo Cabanas in Guadalajara. Stone’s practice has been featured in The New York Times, NPR, FOAM, British Journal of Photography, and Aperture.com among others. Her work is held in multiple public and private collections including, the Carnegie Museum of Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Diego Museum of Art, KADIST Foundation and Center for Photography at Woodstock.
Chanell Stone is as an Adjunct Professor of Photography in the Department of Art at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Full CV - Available upon request
Current / Upcoming Exhibitions
2026 Undulation of a Rupture, San Diego Museum of Art, San Diego, CA (forthcoming) (solo)
2025 Viewing Room: Works by Chanell Stone, Southern Exposure, San Francisco, CA (forthcoming) (solo)
2025 A Petal’s Edge, Casemore Gallery, San Francisco, CA (current)
Selected Recent Exhibitions
2025 Widening the Lens: Photography, Ecology and the Contemporary Landscape, Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, AZ curated by Emilia Mickevicius
2024 Widening the Lens: Photography, Ecology and the Contemporary Landscape, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA curated by Dan Leers
2024 Undulation of a Rupture, Main Gallery, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA (solo)
2024 Constellations, Esker Foundation, Alberta, CA by Su-Ying Lee
2024 NextGen 2024, Institute of Contemporary Art San Diego, San Diego, CA by Jordan Karney Chaim
2023 Affective Resistance, University Art Gallery, Irvine, CA curated by Liz Glynn
2023 Oscura, Taller Nodo, Guadalajara, MX, curated by Taller F (solo)
2022 Sightlines, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA curated by Shana Lopes and Erin O’Toole
2022 Looking Forward: Ten Years of Pier 24 Photography, Pier 24 Photography, San Francisco, CA curated by Allie Haeusslein
2022 Image Gardeners, McEvoy Foundation for the Arts, San Francisco, CA curated by Sara Wessen Chang
2021 Bury Your Feet in the Landscape, Museo Cabañas, Guadalajara, MX curated by Lorena Peña Brito and KADIST
2021 Mom, I am a Rich Man, Galerie im Rathaus Johannisthal, Berlin, DE curated by Milena Mercer and Femxphotographers.org
News
2025 Press — New York Times: “In Development: Chanell Stone”, by Tenzin Tsagong (print only)
2025 Award — Daylight Photo Award Juror Pick, Daylight Books, Hillsborough, NC selected by Asha Iman Veal
2025 Panel — Widening the Lens Artist Panel with Victoria Sambunaris and Melissa Catanese, Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, AZ
2024 Award — Honorable Mention, Hariban Award by Benrido, Kyoto, JP
2024 Residency — Artist-in-Residence, Salmon Creek, Mendicino, CA
2023 Residency — Artist-in-Residence, Taller F, Guadalajara, MX