Malik Gaines (born 1973, Visalia, California) is an artist, writer, and professor who is one of three members of the artist collective My Barbarian.^[1][2] The group formed in 2000 and includes Jade Gordon and Alexandro Segade as they perform musical/theatrical and critical techniques to act out social difficulties.^[3] They have exhibited internationally, including at the Whitney Museum, New York in 2021.^[4]Gaines's practice includes events and exhibitions, music composition, video work, scholarly research and collaboration.^[5][6] He is the author of the book Black Performance on the Outskirts of the Left: A History of the Impossible (2017, NYU Press) and is the co-artistic director of The Industry opera company in Los Angeles.^[7][8]