Afua Richardson [ Pronounced Uh-FOO-wah ] is an American illustrator, author, musician, singer, songwriter, and mentor. In 2007, she made history as one of the first Indigenous Afro-American female artists to work for Marvel Comics as a penciler, inker, and colorist, earning the Nina Simone Award for artistic excellence.

She is best known for her work on the Eisner Award-winning series Black Panther World of Wakanda. This graphic novel marked the first Black Female writer-artist team to create a story for Marvel comics. Her contributions to that book influenced the Three-time Academy Award-winning blockbuster film by introducing the African philosophical symbolism seen in the first film and story elements that provided the basis for the second.

Afua is also a Julliard-trained classical flutist, singer, songwriter, and world-traveled vocalist and performer.

Her work extends beyond the page to the big screen in such films as HBO's Lovecraft country, The Dark Phoenix, and Spiderman across the Spiderverse. She is the creator of her upcoming series Aquarius, the Book of Mer. In all of her works and accomplishments, Afua strives to mentor and guide future artists to achieve beyond their expectations.

Her father, William Edward Richardson, is a decorated Military officer, physicist, and teacher. His support was essential to her work ethic and endurance under challenging times. She attended Laguardia High School for the Performing Arts, participating in an undergrad program at Julliard. She has been aptly called a Jane of All Trades.

Afua played with various groups across many different genres of music. at 17 she joined an all-female hip-hop crew; ' The Anomalies' as a human beat-box artist, at 21 an R&B soul duo ScarletBlue. at 23 she toured as a background singer and session vocalist and in 2016 released an album an eclectic soul trio Waking Astronomer. She's shared stages with Shelia E, Parliment Funkadelic, opening for Alicia keys, Raphael Sadiq and appearing on Soul train singing background for artist Urban Mystic.

In 2008 Afua was cast in Sir Melvin Van Peebles in his Broadway show, Brer Soul [ renamed An Unmitigated Truth] as an actor, vocalist and flute player where she transformed into 6 different main roles in a single night. All the while carrying a sketchbook and honing her craft as an illustrator, not having a computer of her own to work from, and getting office jobs just to use photoshop during lunch breaks to learn.

Although she was a self-taught illustrator she began creating comics professionally under the alias 'Lakota Sioux' in 2004. After being featured in the Eisner award-winning Anthology series '24 Seven' by Ivan Brandon and various other contributors, In 2006, her cover for Jim Bott's " Half Dead" horror series debuted her Marvel career. Today, Afua is known for her vivid colors, striking characters and non-traditional representations of [super] humanity.