Desmond Beach is an artist and educator living in New York City whose work digs deep into the marrow of Black life in America, pulling out the truths that have been buried beneath centuries of violence and exploitation. His art does not flinch from the painful legacies of the transatlantic slave trade and the cruelty of the Jim Crow South. These are not just histories to be mourned but to be confronted, transformed, and transmuted. In Beach's hands, the anguish of these pasts becomes an act of defiance, a living testament to the resilience, beauty, and fullness of Black life—a life that refuses to be erased, diminished, or silenced.

As an educator, Beach's vocation reaches far beyond the mere transmission of knowledge; it is a radical engagement with the world. In his roles as a Visiting Artist at Coppin State University, Emerson College, and Morgan State University, as well as a Teaching Fellow at the College of the Atlantic, and now as an Assistant Professor at Lincoln University, Beach challenges his students to place themselves within the struggle for justice. He empowers them to embrace storytelling as a transformative tool for liberation.

His time as a fellow and artist-in-residence at institutions such as MASS MoCA, the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, and Skidmore College has provided him with the opportunity to create spaces dedicated to truth-telling, where art functions as a conduit for healing, disruption, and confrontation. Through these residencies, Beach has cultivated new bodies of work that reflect his unwavering commitment to social change and invite others to join in the ongoing process of collective transformation.

Beach's BFA and MFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) are not mere academic credentials. They mark a journey of self-discovery, where he honed his craft, learned the deep calling of art, and understood that art is not only to be made—it must be lived. His work is not a passive expression but an invocation: a prayer, a ritual, a call to ancestors that says, "We remember you. We carry you. We are still here."

In Beach's performance art, the boundaries between the living and the dead dissolve. His work becomes a ritualized space for the ancestors to find rest, to speak, and to be honored. His art does not allow their struggles to fade; it insists that their triumphs and losses continue to shape the present. Exhibited at The Phillips Collection, The Contemporary in Baltimore, and the Neuberger Museum of Art, Beach's work is a confrontation with history—an insistent, unrelenting voice that refuses to let the past be forgotten. It is a powerful expression of rage, love, and the unyielding desire for freedom.