Adia Millett Los Angeles, b. 1975

Adia Millett is acclaimed for her deep exploration of basic configurations, diverse expressive practices, and experimentation with mediums. Trained in the fine arts, art history, and the postmodernist theories of cultural studies, Millett conveys her felt concerns in the discourses of the domestic, the public sphere, gender positions, and spirituality through the interdependent form and content of the abstract compositions of her works.

Millett received a BFA from the University of California at Berkeley, and an MFA from the California Institute of the Arts. In 2001, she moved to New York for the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program, followed by a residency at the Studio Museum in Harlem. She lived and worked in New York for a decade, exhibiting in several high-profile group exhibitions, including Freestyle at The Studio Museum in Harlem (2001); Living Units at Triple Candie, New York (2003); Black President at The New Museum (2003); Greater New York at MoMA PS1 (2005); Where is Here at the Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco (2017), and Black Refractions at The Studio Museum in Harlem (2019).

Selected solo exhibitions by Adia Millett include Wisdom Warriors at the Institute of Contemporary Art San Jose (2023–2024); You Will Be Remembered. at gdm Hong Kong (2022); A Force of Nature at di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art, Napa (2022); A Matter of Time at gdm Hong Kong (2020); Breaking Patterns at the California African American Museum, Los Angeles (2019); and The Privilege to Breathe at the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles, San Jose (2019). Millett has taught as an artist-in-residence at Columbia College Chicago, the University of California Santa Cruz, Cooper Union, and California College of the Arts. She currently lives and works in Oakland, California.

In 2025, Millett’s Warrior’s Portal was commissioned as part of the Homegrown series for the Chase Center Art Collection in San Francisco. In 2026, she was selected as a finalist for the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art’s (SFMOMA) biannual SECA Art Award.