Erika Diamond

Erika Diamond is a textile-focused artist, curator, and educator based in Asheville, NC. Born in Germany to two ballet dancers, she grew up backstage and touring across Europe in her adolescence. This gave her early insight into the ephemeral nature of touch, the expressive qualities of the body, and the transformative capabilities of costume. In 2000, she earned a degree in Sculpture at RISD, experimenting with bronze, honey, performance, and chocolate. For the next 12 years she maintained a studio practice while working as a freelance artist assistant and art preparator in NYC, Los Angeles, and Charlotte. She was the sole proprietor of a specialty chocolate company from 2004-2010.

Diamond received her MFA in Fibers from the Craft/Material Studies department at VCU where she learned how to weave tapestry, commemorate her physical encounters through objects, and identified her preoccupation with mortality. Since then, she has lived nomadically, making her own work and teaching textile classes in Richmond, Milwaukee, Denver, NYC, and Penland. Several residencies and grants have facilitated her recent projects focusing on the politics of queer safety and visibility. Most recently, she has exhibited at Dinner Gallery, Form & Concept Gallery, Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art, and Contemporary Craft in Pittsburgh. She has been reviewed in Metalsmith Magazine, Glasstire, and Whitehot Magazine. In the summers, as Associate Director of Galleries at Chautauqua Institution, she curates and manages exhibitions that blur distinctions between the genres of art, design, and craft.