Dindga McCannon was born in Harlem and studied at the Art Students League, where she found mentors in Jacob Lawrence, Richard Mayhew, Al Hollingsworth, and Charles Alston.  Her approach to making art grew out of sewing dashikis (traditional African garments). This evolved into her practice of creating wearable art, and "from there I went into printmaking, from there I went into writing and illustrating children's books; from there I did murals and on and on and on, one fed into the other." McCannon began making prints at Bob Blackburn's Printmaking Workshop.

McCannon became a member of the Weusi Artist Collective in the late 1960s, and then was a founding member of "Where We At" (WWA), Black Women Artists, Inc., a collective of black women artists affiliated with the Black Arts Movement. She hosted the first WWA meeting in early 1971.

McCannon illustrated several books by Edgar White and wrote and illustrated two books of her own, Peaches and Wilhemina Jones, Future Star both for young adults. Her paintings were included in the traveling museum exhibition, We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women, 1965–85; and at the Brooklyn Museum, Out of Place: A Feminist Look at the Collection Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art.

Afrodesia & Mira Gandy is a deceptively simple linocut printed in black ink on red-printed paper. McCannon gives us two children confronting our world with a sophisticated understanding of graphic power. Afrodesia (McCannon's daughter) is held close by Mira Gandy's arm, and the block is carved to indicate many patterns and pieced forms of their dress. McCannon's understanding of wearable art and design informs the structure. More complex patterns tell us of Afrodesia's braided hair while looping lines indicate Mira Gandy's soft curls.