Based in Pittsburgh’s Homewood neighborhood, German is a self-taught sculptor, painter, writer, activist, poet, and performer whose work is primarily influenced by her childhood and community. In her art, German explores themes of race, feminism, street violence, poverty, and injustice. Her work has been displayed in art museums, on the stage, and within exhibits across the country including a traveling Smithsonian Institute retrospective of African-American art.

German’s well-known “contemporary power figures” pieces are created from everyday objects that are then transformed into an iconography of astonishing metaphors. These mixed-media sculptures bring together doll parts, plaster, tar, and household items to make incredibly creative individual pieces that hold meaning and message.

Her performance art infuses her love of storytelling, opera, hip-hop, and African storytelling into Spoken Word Opera, an innovative form of poetry that she pioneered as a fellow at the August Wilson Center of African American Culture. Her opera root went on to perform at Pittsburgh’s Kelly-Strayhorn Theatre and at the Vineyard Playhouse in Martha’s Vineyard. She has also performed her poetry at TEDxPittsburgh, TEDx Harvard, and TEDxMIT.

In response to gun violence in Homewood in 2011, German began creating art on her front porch due to lack of space and soon enough, children in the neighborhood were joining her with paintbrushes. She deemed the project “Love Front Porch.” Eventually, the demand was greater than the space available and German expanded Love Front Porch into ARThouse, a community art institution in Homewood she now runs. ARThouse encourages members of the Homewood community to heal trauma by making art.

German has been recognized for her artistry with the Jacob Lawrence Award from The American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2017; the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Biennial Grant in 2015; the Ronald H. Brown Community Leadership Award from the Urban League of Greater Pittsburgh in 2014; the Emerging Artist of the Year Award from the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts in 2012; and the Duquesne Light Leadership Award: Arts, Culture, Recreation in 2007.

Her artwork is permanently displayed at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas; American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore, Maryland; The Progressive Art Collection in Cleveland, Ohio; David C. Driskell Center for the Study of the Visual Arts and Culture of African Americans and the African Diaspora in College Park, Maryland; Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio; Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation in Los Angeles, California; and the IP Stanback Museum in Orangeburg, South Carolina.