Mahlet Cuff (They/Them) is a multidisciplinary artist, and arts cultural worker based in Winnipeg Manitoba (Treaty 1). Through an ethnographic based practice they are interested in themes of memory and erasure in order to make sense of the Black Queer diasporic communities they are a part of and engage with. By using Black feminist citational praxis and interrogating their own personal familial archives, they create reimagined Black Queer Diasporic dance and music histories by visually and sonically collaging moving images and sound. Their video piece titled UTOPIA (an ode to the past, present and future) was shortlisted for the 2025 FluxusMuseum Prize for Experimental Video. In 2026 they were nominated for the Winnipeg Arts council RBC on the Rise Award. They are the Platform Photography Award 2026 Winner and their first solo exhibition will be taking place in March 2027. Cuff holds a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Women’s and Gender Studies from the University of Winnipeg.  

Their debut short experimental film titled why some people be mad at me sometimes is a meditation on the misappropriation of Dancehall music while using Black Feminist Citational praxis. The film has screened nationally and internationally.

Within their writing practice, they strive to make connections between contemporary art and socio political issues. Cuff is invested in unraveling what arts criticism can be and look like as a way to go outside the colonial constraints of white supremacist binaried arts writing. They have written pieces for BlackFlash, Peripheral Review, Cmag, Public Parking and Akimbo and Platform Centre for Photographic + Digital Arts. Cuff's curiosity as a curator stems from themes of critical fabulation, erasure and grief. They have curated work for Window Winnipeg, Nocturne Festival, Take Home BIPOC arts house. They are a part of the curatorial collective Patterns Collective, where they curated work for Gallery 1c03 and The School of Art at the University of Manitoba. 

As a film programmer they are fascinated by experimental filmmaking by Black artists in the Prairies and artists using generative methods to world-build. They have programmed films for the Winnipeg Underground Film Festival, The Dave Barber Cinematheque, the8fest, Vancouver Queer Film Festival, BlackFlash Expanded, and VTape. They have been on film juries for major film festivals across Canada.

Within their sound arts practice, Cuff performing under the name, Konjo. They have performed their experimental moving image and DJ set titled HYPERFEMME GALACTICA. HYPERFEMME GALACTICA uses the medium of DJing as a way to fill in the gaps and counter the erasure of Blackness from genres such as house, electronic and techno music. Through a collage of sound and video, they honour and recognize the Black originators of these genres and transform the dance floor into a space for dreaming and a site for liberation. They have performed this piece for spacedoxa, Cluster Festival, Send + Receive and at the Remai Modern for the exhibition Great Plains Series: Points of Return – Spaces of Departure.