Afua Richardson

Afua Richardson (born April 25, 1980, New York City) is an African-Native American comic book artist, writer, and musician, also known by her alias Docta Foo and formerly published under the alias Lakota Sioux in honor of her Native American heritage. She is self-taught as a comic artist, citing Alan Moore's Swamp Thing and Hiroaki Samura's Blade of the Immortal as formative influences. Raised in New York, she studied classical flute from age nine and performed with a citywide ensemble at Carnegie Hall by age eleven. She attended LaGuardia High School for the Performing Arts and later trained at the Juilliard School. She is a member of the Ormes Society, which promotes African-American women in comics. Her breakthrough came with Genius — a five-issue series from Image Comics/Top Cow Productions (2014), co-created with writers Marc Bernardin and Adam Freeman, about Destiny Ajaye, a 17-year-old Black military genius from South Central Los Angeles. The concept won Top Cow's 2008 Pilot Season competition. She subsequently joined Marvel's Black Panther relaunch, contributing cover art to five issues of Black Panther: World of Wakanda (2016–2017, written by Roxane Gay) and a 10-page backup story in issue #1, co-created with Ta-Nehisi Coates. World of Wakanda won the Eisner Award for Best Limited Series and the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Comic Book. She is also the artist on Run — the graphic memoir by Rep. John Lewis, illustrated for Abrams ComicArts. Her cover work spans DC, Valiant, Dynamite, Kodansha, and Marvel titles including All-Star Batman, X-Men '92, Captain Marvel, Totally Awesome Hulk, Black Magick, Attack on Titan Anthology, James Bond (Dynamite), and Vampirella (Dynamite). She also writes, records, and performs music.