Updated Bio

Shingavi’s Bio 2205


K. Shingavi Rambert has been an artist for his entire life. His childhood artistic inclinations of drawing cartoons, led to his first art class at the Brooklyn Museum. Almost a teen, he made his first attempts at painting on denim. He was recruited to paint gang colors on a jean jacket. A more adventurous portion his adolescence was spent creating graffiti. He and friends tagged insides and did pieces on the outside of trains in the mid 70’s. A high school teacher saw his potential and became his mentor, landing his first commission, painting a window sign for "The Hero Baron" in Great Neck Long Island. He also took a graphics class where he learned screen printing, various types of etching and traditional printing techniques. As a senior he took a painting class where he learned oil, watercolor, and acrylic painting. His teachers also encouraged him to pursue college education and helped him to get into Pratt Institute.

While studying fulltime at Pratt, he tutored school children and created graphics and murals for the Crown Heights Youth Collective, a community organization in Brooklyn, NY. The most popular mural was the "Wall of Fame" on Bedford Avenue which featured portraits of legends of African descent, from Marcus Garvey to Stevie Wonder. As a senior he was commissioned to create portraits for a traveling exhibit featuring African American pioneers in science and medicine. This project was sponsored by the Science Skills Center and Consolidated Edison Utilities Corp. After graduation from Pratt he went on to teach art in the NYC public schools. He taught drawing, cartooning, painting, art history, drafting and advised art clubs. His philosophy was and still is, “Share the wealth of knowledge”

His work has been exhibited at many venues including the Jacob Javits Federal Building with the Association of Caribbean American Artists Inc., The Fulton Art Fair, The African Street Festival, Group Material's MASS at the New Museum, Kinapp's Boutique, African Poetry Theatre, Apple Restaurant NYC, Dojo's Restaurant NYC, Clinton Hill Simply Art Gallery, Dezyner Gallery in Philadelphia, Common Boundaries in New Jersey and several group shows with Studio Montclair. He created his own line of T shirts and accessory pins which were sold at the Apartment Store at Exit Art gallery NYC , New Heritage boutiques in NYC and Baltimore, MD and assorted other venues. Shingavi has illustrated independent African American history books, CD covers and created holiday gift-wrap designs sold nationally through Walmart since 1999. Currently he works in a variety of mediums. Pastels for his dream inspired Secret Passage series featuring mermaids and mermen. He also uses mixed media on multi layered acrylic sheets. He calls this body of work “Freestyle” For these works, "he uses everything." It calls back to his teens all the way through to the present. He utilizes collage, original drawings, original text, motifs made from found objects and/or hand cut stencils and spray painted abstractions and computer generated artwork. Sometimes he cuts acrylic sheets into organic shapes.

He has placed in various contests, from web design to juried art exhibits. He also likes creating Flash animations and interactive websites. Recently, Shingavi taught adult education courses on Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator.