Afua Richardson is an African-Native American artist. She did covers for five issues of Marvel's World of Wakanda and art for a short story backup in the first issue.[1][2] Her comic, Genius, with writers Marc Bernardin and Adam Freeman[3] won Top Cow's 2008 Pilot Season.[4][5][6][7] She illustrated a Langston Hughes poem in 2014 for NPR's Black History Month,[8]
Richardson was raised in New York City.[13] From a family of scientists,[14] she studied classical flute from age nine.[13] As a flautist, she performed with ensembles at Carnegie Hall and on Soul Train.[13] She also performed with Sheila E. and Parliament-Funkadelic.[14]
She was a backup singer, a beatboxer, a background dancer on MTV Jams and appeared in an off-Broadway show with Melvin Van Peebles.[13][15] She is part of the musical collective Future Soul Society, and recorded with Alexa Edmonds Lima under the name 'Afua & Alexa'.[16][17][18]
Richardson is a self-trained artist.[13] She was a member of the now defunct Ormes Society, which promoted African-American women in the comics industry.[19][20]
For the comic book series, Genius (2007), she worked with writers Marc Bernardin and Adam Freeman to tell the story through the voice of a black woman, Destiny Ajaye.[21] Richardson's experience of being a minority in the United States influenced her work.[4] In Genius, she draws violent acts in a way that is both "matter-of-fact and highly stylized," according to ComicsAlliance.[22] She portrays Ajaye's thought processes and David Brothers called it "instantly understandable and worthy of poring over."[22]
In 2011, Richardson received the Nina Simone Award for Artistic Achievement as one of the few African-American women comic book artists to work for the leading publishers in the field.[23][24][17]
