Basie Allen

b. New York, NY, 1989

Basie Allen is a poet and painter who mines his experiences living in urban and rural spaces as inspiration for his work. Through a process of layering text, paint, collage, and transfer, Allen seeks to mimic the dimensional chaos of a city or natural landscape. Allen paints his gestural abstractions onto camping tarps before transferring the image onto muslin and linen. 

Allen completed his BA at Evergreen State College, where he studied Prison Reform, and his MA in Poetry at Columbia University, New York, NY. Allen’s work has been exhibited at Massimo de carlo, V1, Marlborough Contemporary, MoMA PS1, and Olympia. His debut collection of poetry “Palm-Lined with Potience” was nominated for the National Book Award in 2023. He has participated in residencies at Modern Ancient Brown, in Detroit, and the Mount Lebanon Residency at the Shaker Museum, New Lebanon, NY.