Amaza Lee Meredith at CAAM

Amaza Lee Meredith at Azurest South. Virginia State University Special Collections and Archives

The California African American Museum has two shows built around creative Black women. One concerns science-fiction writer Octavia E. Butler, who's seemingly everywhere lately. The other, larger exhibition foregrounds a pioneering architect who is not so well known: Amaza Lee Meredith (1895–1984). "Dear Mazie," a traveling show organized by the Institute for Contemporary Art at Virginia Commonwealth University, displays the work of 11 artists, some better known than Meredith herself, responding to the architect's life and legacy. 

Meredith is described as the first Black (mixed race) and queer woman to work as an architect in the U.S. She was a generation younger than Julia Morgan (who was white, came from money, and "never married"). Meredith, who had no formal training as an architect, lived openly with her partner, Dr. Edna Meade Colson, and built a Virginia home for the couple called Azurest South. It's a Streamline Moderne-inspired structure that wouldn't have been out of place in the Hollywood Hills.

There's an Azurest North too, in Sag Harbor. Meredith and her sister developed that Hamptons-adjacent enclave as a summer place for middle-class Blacks.

Amaza Lee Meredith's Azurest South. Courtesy of Saint Heron

Solange Knowles, Beyoncé's sister, recently published a book on Meredith. Between that and the exhibition, Amaza is trending. But in view of the likelihood that she will be unknown to most museum visitors, a more systematic presentation of her biography and work would be welcome. I would have liked to see more documentary photographs of Meredith's buildings and a selection of her paintings, which look interesting in reproduction.

Amaza Lee Meredith, Unknown, about 1973. Gillfield Baptist Church, Petersburg, Virginia

Cauleen Smith, I Need to Speak About Living Room (After June Jordan), 2024. Courtesy the artist

Cauleen Smith's video installation is an immersive two-channel video incorporating video from Sag Harbor and live feeds from objects on a table. The mineral specimens include the blue stone azurite, and the braids were inspired by the hairstyle of the architect in a photo, lounging on the beach. For Meredith Azurest was a place where "the deep blue sky of hope meets the space of comfort."

Tschabalala Self, Heroine inspired by Amaza Lee Meredith, 2024. Courtesy of the artist and Galerie Eva Presenhuber, Zurich/Vienna

Tschabalala Self created an cartoon avatar of Meredith via 3D printing. The houndstooth-trimmed outfit is based on a 1973 photograph of the architect and Edna Colson. 

Lukaza Branfman-Verissimo, five works on Together (mural), all 2024. Courtesy the artist

Meredith founded Virginia State University's art department. Lukaza Branfman-Verissimo draws on Meredith's rarely-seen paintings. The installation has five framed works by Branfman-Verissimo hung on a blown-up mural detail of a painting by Meredith.

"Dear Maisie," runs through March 1, 2026. 

Kapwani Kiwanga, Register, 2025. Studio Kapwani Kiwanga

Abigail Lucien, For Companions' Sake, 2024. Courtesy the artist and DEKI Gallery, New York