Kamaal
Malak
Bass as architecture. Love as method. Sound built to be felt before it is heard.
Radical
Love
Like water nourishing soil, our tears of sorrow cultivate the seeds of resilience that bloom into unexpected strength and renewed purpose. Campos-Pons & Malak, Tate Modern, 2025
Radical Love is not a sentiment. In this work it is a method — love put to work as a force for healing, regeneration and transformation, and asked to carry real weight.
It moves through the low end. A 40 Hz drone arrives before anyone notices it has started: felt in the chest, in the floor, in the room's own frame. Bass is not accompaniment here; it is the architecture the audience stands inside. Around it gather painting made live, ritual, scent, projection, breath and the deliberate presence of ancestors.
The subject is inheritance — Afro-diasporic, spiritual, historical, ecological. Grief is not routed around. It is carried through to the other side, which is where the hope is kept.
Audiences are not spectators. They are invited into a sacred space where ancestral energies cross temporal boundaries, and a portal opens between what came before and what is here now.
Biography
Kamaal Malak is a musical Renaissance man — a bassist, producer, songwriter, singer, sound designer and academic whose career spans continents, genres and institutions.
His entry into stardom came when he joined the 2× Grammy Award-winning group Arrested Development, travelling the world as their bassist and helping shape the conscious hip-hop movement that defined the early 1990s. His first gig with the group was performing for Nelson Mandela in South Africa — a signal of the scale at which he has always operated.
As part of Arrested Development, Malak performed with Peter Gabriel on his WOMAD World Tour, appeared on The Late Show with David Letterman, and shared the stage at Woodstock ’94. His collaborations extend to country superstar Shania Twain, multi-instrumentalist Ray Parker Jr., and countless global artists — reflecting a rare ability to move between sonic worlds without losing his identity.
Today, Malak leads Kamaal Malak & The FuNk, an immersive live experience synthesising hip-hop, electronic, funk and world music into a singular sound. As a founding collaborator of KaMag — his interdisciplinary duo with MacArthur Fellow and Vanderbilt Professor María Magdalena Campos-Pons — his live work has moved into major museum and biennial spaces, fusing music, ritual, ancestral memory and visual installation.
At Vanderbilt University’s CAL program, Malak teaches Hip-Hop Culture in America, bridging lived experience with academic discourse. His research into frequency-based music for canine anxiety (Music For My Dog) and 40 Hz gamma wave entrainment place him at the frontier of neuroscience-informed sound design. Through KM Entertainment, his Nashville-based production company, his work has appeared on MTV, Fox FX, Coca-Cola, NBA, NFL and Churchill Downs.
Credentials at a glance
- World TourBassist and songwriter, Arrested Development
- Vanderbilt UniversityFaculty, Cultural Advocacy & Leadership; Hip-Hop Culture in America
- KM EntertainmentFounder and CEO, Nashville — film, TV, sport, commercial
- Neuroscience research40 Hz gamma entrainment; Music For My Dog study
- KaMagCollaborative duo with MacArthur Fellow María Magdalena Campos-Pons
- Global stageTate Modern · Venice Biennale · São Paulo Biennial · Woodstock ’94
Performances
Two years of museum, biennial and institutional work, newest first.
Resonance: Vanderbilt University in Venice
Venice, Italy · 10 May – 10 July 2026. Artistic directors and curators of Vanderbilt’s inaugural Biennale presentation, with more than 50 invited artists; led the poetry caravan of artists through Venice. ResonanceDesert X AlUla — Space Without Measure
AlUla, Saudi Arabia · 16 Jan – 28 Feb 2026. Site-responsive commission across AlUla’s valleys and canyons, part of the AlUla Arts Festival. Desert XVignettes in 3 Sessions
Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture, UMBC · Baltimore, MD. An immersive ancestral experience for the Arts+ Extravaganza, launching the public projection of I am Soil — My Tears Are Water (on view to 15 April 2026). CADVCAn Evening with KaMag
The National Gallery, Supporters’ House · London, UK. In conversation with Lee Sharrock on creative practice and the transformative potential of love as both philosophy and performance. National Gallery36ª Bienal de São Paulo
Auditório Ciccillo Matarazzo, Parque Ibirapuera · São Paulo, Brazil. Musical performance within Not All Travellers Walk Roads, followed by a talk with Odette Casamayor and Grace Aneiza Ali. BienalI Am Soil. My Tears Are Water
Tate Modern 25th Anniversary, The Tanks · London, UK. The performance at which the name KaMag was revealed. Dancers, live drawing, video projection, food, flowers and bespoke costume by OMER ASIM, with choreography by Naz Choudhury — a sonic arc from grief to hope. TateKamaal Malak & The FuNk at the Getty
Harold M. Williams Auditorium, Getty Center · Los Angeles, CA. Radical love as a force for healing and transformation, with María Magdalena Campos-Pons. Getty
Also presented at
- Brooklyn MuseumBehold · Brooklyn, NY
- Madison Square Park20th Anniversary · New York, NY
- Frist Art MuseumShowcase · Nashville, TN
- Woodstock ’94 · WOMAD World Tour · The Late Show with David Lettermanwith Arrested Development
Gallery
Select a frame to open it full size. All images available at 300 dpi from management.
Listen & Watch
0:00 / 0:00
I am Soil — My Tears Are Water
Single-channel video, 2025. Conceived for large-scale projection and collective viewing — a layered meditation on ancestry, land and healing. Adapted in December 2025 for the amphitheatre projection programme at UMBC.
Press
- ART AFRICA · May 2025A live performance blending music, ritual and ancestral memory invites reflection and healing. Read
- Forbes · June 2025On the Tate Modern performance and the move to the São Paulo Biennial. Read
- The Voice · May 2025A vibrant tapestry of diaspora, spirituality and ancestral connection. Read
- e-flux · 2025Bridging performance, sound and moving image to explore Afro-diasporic inheritances. Read
- Nashville Scene · May 2026Nashville’s presence at the 61st Venice Biennale. Read
Set the
backdrop
Drop in a JPEG and the whole site takes it as a ground. Nothing leaves this browser — the file is read locally and never uploaded.
Drag a JPEG here, or choose a file. Landscape images at 2000 px or wider hold up best on large screens.
JPEG only · 12 MB maximum · the file is checked for a real JPEG signature before it is used
82% — text stays readable
Contact
Booking, press, institutional commissions and academic invitations.
Booking
KM Entertainment, Nashville TN
kmenashville.com
Museum & biennial
KaMag Productions
booking@kamagproductions.com
Academic
Vanderbilt University — Cultural Advocacy & Leadership
Faculty profile