A B O U T

simiya sudduth

Transdisciplinary Artist + Educator

pronouns: she/her + they/them

simiya sudduth is a Black + Indigenous mother, and transdisciplinary artist and educator based in St. Louis, Missouri. Her expansive practice moves across murals, digital illustration, sound performance, spiritual care work, and socially engaged projects. Grounded in healing, ecology, and collective liberation, simiya’s work draws from ancestral knowledge, hip hop, and ritual to create spaces of joy, resistance, rest, and remembrance.

Blending years of experience as a sound healer, Reiki master, and yoga and meditation teacher, simiya weaves somatic and spiritual care into her creative practice. She is the creator of The Confluence Tarot, a decolonial tarot deck inspired by the Mississippi River Valley that reimagines traditional archetypes through a Black, Indigenous, and queer framework. The project integrates illustration, music, and spiritual guidance, and reflects years of independent research, visual storytelling, and cultural reclamation.

Her public art practice is deeply rooted in St. Louis, where her work can be found on walls throughout the city. Nationally, her murals and installations have appeared in Portland, St. Paul, and across Illinois, expanding a vision of healing and resistance beyond the region. She has completed public commissions for the City of St. Louis, the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, Great Rivers Greenway, St. Louis Lambert International Airport, and Black Futures Farm. Her work in the 2023 Counterpublic triennial was featured in The New York Times.

She has performed sound healing and experimental music with arts organizations and institutions including the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, the Saint Louis Art Museum, and Franconia Sculpture Park. She has participated in several artist residencies, including ACRE and the Wassaic Project. simiya is currently completing her MFA in Visual Studies at Pacific Northwest College of Art (August 2025). Her work honors the sacred in daily life and affirms art as a powerful tool for resistance, healing, and the imagining of more liberated futures.

Links to New York Times Article and PBS Newshour Segment:

Counterpublic in St. Louis Pushes the Public Art Envelope

Citywide art project hopes to reveal forgotten history of St. Louis