Past Artists @ Ula
Support the talents that have graced our walls
Colgan B. Johnson
Colgan Johnson is an educator and award-winning photographer and videographer from Dorchester, MA. Since graduating from Amherst College in 2003, he has spent most of his time learning, educating, and creating within the Greater Boston educational and artistic communities. A Certified Boston Artist, and alumni of Greater Boston Arts and Business Council’s Creative Entrepreneur Fellowship, his passion is empowering and bringing authentic representation to the people and communities he is blessed to work with. He truly believes great visuals and storytelling have the power to inspire community, help create understanding, and maybe even bring social change for the better. His greatest joy is helping to provide amazing voice and visuals to visually under or misrepresented communities in the educational, artistic, and political spheres.
Zahirah Nur Truth
A multifaceted artist with an art practice that is varied via paintings, murals, jewelry, and performance. Striving to create art that invokes joy, representation, empowerment, and thought. Known as a facilitator, innovator, and motivator. She found her true love of the arts in 2005 after taking on the artful journey of motherhood. There something was sparked in her and she began painting and claimed her throne as an artist.
The Artist ZNT, as she is lovingly known, teaches art practices from the youngest to the oldest artist at heart. Integrating social justice, cultural awareness, and a trauma-informed educational approach into her curriculum. She earned an AS in Early Childhood Education, with an Arts Program focus from Bunker Hill Community College, and holds a BFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts/Tufts University, Boston.
She has collaborated with the community to develop engaging learning opportunities with arts organizations and others to focus on workshops and art curation that are inclusive to all, and so much more. She has developed community partnerships with The Eliot School of Fine and Applied Arts, Boston Public Library, Institute for Contemporary Art, Boston Food Forest Coalition, The Urban Farming Institute, The Food Project, A FAR CRY, Fenway Health Center, Wheelock Family Theater at Boston University and Little Uprising.
When she’s not painting or practicing some mode of artmaking, she is a self-proclaimed vegan chef. She gains insight, joy, wisdom and laughter from her two sons who are artist creations in their own right Diligent Shallah and Divyne Anwar.
She believes there are no mistakes in art.
Tammi Jean Fedestin
Thamar “Tammi” Jean Fedestin is a Boston-born arts administrator and artist with over a decade of experience in the non-profit sector. Tammi is a queer Haitian woman with a fascination for all things nerdy and creepily cute. She currently holds a BA in Arts Management from the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams, MA. Tammi has worked in a variety of settings, which allowed her to grow her skills as an administrator, graphic designer, and, sometimes, emergency seamstress. Her favorite thing in the world is to see someone being their most authentic selves. Seeing people embracing all aspects of themselves brings Tammi immense joy. Currently, she helps run an art collective called Creatives of Color Boston and offers administrative support to the dance company, Jean Appolon Expressions. She also runs a virtual art gallery on her website, Cosmic Zo.
Rachel Domond
Rachel Domond is a self-taught Haitian artist and organizer based in Roxbury, MA. Her art explores themes of land, sovereignty and pride in home, drawing from the revolutionary and traditional cultural motives of peoples’ movements both in the U.S. and abroad, past and present. She most often refers to the relationship between Black - namely, Haitian and Caribbean women - and the working of the land, while drawing on the power of coumbite, a traditional Haitian practice of the collective. She seeks to make art that speaks to working peoples’ realities under the global systems that keep us disenfranchised and disempowered, while highlighting the beauty, pride and power of the roots from which we’ve grown as peoples’ movements past and present. She hopes to continue to make art for the people through the creation of accessible, public materials.
Ryan Horton
Ryan Horton is an artist from Lilburn, GA based in Boston, MA driven by curiosity of expression. As a black man living in America, Ryan has always been taught to conform to survive in environments that were never meant for him. Because of this, throughout Ryan’s professional career he strives to push the boundaries of acceptance and expectations.
With his Master's in Architecture from Northeastern University and a Bachelor's of Fine Arts from Savannah College of Art & Design, Ryan has been exposed to a number of creative methods and mediums that have pushed his passion to not only create but breathe purpose into his works. Utilizing his structured architectural foundation and the raw understanding of aesthetic purity, he has been able to explore multiple industries including architecture, experiential design, and graphic design. He now focuses on fine-tuning his expertise to accommodate his art career. Ryan’s work has been on display in a number of exhibitions such as the African American Museum of Dallas, Boston City Hall, MIT’s Koch Institute Public Gallery, and many more. He has also been featured in art publications including Artist Talk, New Visionary Magazine, and Create! Magazine.
As his art career continues to unfold, Ryan’s focuses on furthering his exploration of self through the freedom of artistic expression via mix media. If you’re interested in acquiring some of his art you can find him around the city vending at markets such as Brighton Bazaar and The Greenway. He’s also designed the 2024 limited edition mug for ULA Cafe.
You can find all available pieces on his website, www.hortoniconicdesigns.com/id-shop-1. Don’t forget to give him a follow on social media @iconic.dsgns.