Born in Addis Abeba, Ethiopia, in 1997, Jermay Michael Gabriel is an Italian-Ethiopian-Eritrean trans-disciplinary artist and curator that lives and works in Milan. His work is based on an experimental, and often extreme, effort to resist the permanence and elusiveness of the Italian colonial archive through the subversion of its symbols of power.

Gabriel’s artistic practice embraces both sound and contemporary art. He starts from the assumption that spaces at the intersection of multiple forms of marginalisation, visibility or representation do not produce liberation. Colonial trauma does not have a linear trajectory, nor does memory. It sinks into the fibres without a temporal pattern and crosses generations, going back and forth between past, present and future. Gabriel’s process chronicles the multifaceted dimensions of these journeys, exorcising trauma through sound, installation and performance, embracing cultural legacies and collective memories as a form of healing.

Jermay Michael Gabriel is a member of the music duo Plethor X together with sound designer Giovanni Isgrò. He is also the co-founder of BHMM (Black History Month Milan) and the founder of Kirykou (Milan).

His most recent exhibitions and performances include: Stratificazioni, ArtNoble gallery (Milan, 2023);  E il clamore è divenuto voce, Teatro Nazionale Virgilio Sieni (Florence, 2023); Il Cono d’Ombra, curated by Marco Scotini, Maschio Angioino (Naples, 2022); Ceremony (Burial of an Undead World), Haus der Kulturen der Welt (Berlin, 2022); David and other feats, Villa Romana (Florence, 2022); Parade électronique, Teatro Arsenale (Milan, 2022); ll mondo visto da qui, Mudec (Milan, 2021); Plethor X, what you mean, man, Archive (Milan, 2021); Il Saracino (Milan, 2020); Rivoluzione, (Milan, 2020), Black (Jamaica, 2019); Still, La Casa Encendida (Madrid, 2018). As a curator, we are reminded of: Memory Effect, BHMF, Murat art district (Florence, 2023); Sammy Baloji, BHMF, (Florence, 2022); Immaginari - Habitat di resistenza, Centro Pecci (Prato, 2022) and BlacknEss festival (Milan, 2021).