Tufted Cotton is an immersive exhibition that explores the nuance of an ancestral portal through global tapestries and the engagement of black as a color, community, and consciousness. The works, including sculpture, painting, installation, and gallery interventions, celebrate spirituality and the Black experience through the historic symbols of cotton, roses, Church fans, Holy Bibles, text, and the African and African American image. He includes nuances of Asia, India, and Africa as a single community.
The mirrors, inspired by the Minkisi-Power figures and nail fetishes from central Africa, symbolize desire, mortality, and ancestral protection. The nails hold the energy of a prayer request. The small cloth bags (Heirloom Bags) adorning many of the paintings bear the spiritual and physical memories of the ancestors. In addition, the bags contain seeds, money, crystals, hair, prayer cloths, and more.
Tufted Cotton is on view through Saturday, February 24.
Bryan Keith Thomas was born in Dyersburg, TN and received his Master of Fine Arts from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Thomas currently resides in Oakland, CA, where he works as a Professor of Fine Art within the Painting and Drawing and Critical Ethnic Studies departments at California College of the Arts in San Francisco, CA.
Thomas has exhibited nationally, internationally, and within the Bay Area including Art Basel, Miami; de Young Museum, San Francisco, CA; Oakland Museum of California, Oakland, CA; Gallery Guichard, Chicago, IL; ArtJaz Gallery, Philadelphia, PA; E & S Gallery, Louisville, KY; the American Embassy, Dakar, Senegal, and Du Sable Museum, Chicago, IL, among others. Thomas received the "White House Honor" as First Lady Laura Bush's guest for his work within the Art in Embassies Program, Washington, DC, and his paintings are in several private and public collections worldwide.
