“The Crucifixion”
Over the weekend I enjoyed conversation with many of you about my post on the “Abdias Nascimento and Black Art Museum,” exhibition at Instituto Inhotim.
A number of the discussions focused on the inclusion of my 1996 painting, "Crucifixion," in the Second Act of the Abdias "Dramas Para Negros e Prólogo Para Brancos,” Exhibition.
Based on that interest, I thought I would share an image of “Crucifixion," a large work of geometric and figurative shapes that I painted in 1996 using oil a
There is a great deal of symbolism in this painting beginning with the Black person looking from Africa towards the Straits of Gibraltar and beyond into the new world---an unknown world of enslavement crucifixion.
The religious icon of Jesus crucified casts a feint shadow of a cross ready for society’s genocidal crucifixion of races across the world.
The bronze vessel in the painting is a Bakota, an exact replica of a piece of traditional African Art. I included it in acknowledgement of Picasso, who it has been said was influenced by such works when he created “Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907. ) It was the first of Picasso's Cubism Period paintings, and employed a style that he and other contemporary artists of the time emphasized in their movement from classical to modern art.
LEROI: Living in Color Exhibition includes the work of students from Buffalo Center for Arts and Technology (BCAT,) Buffalo Public Schools (BPS,) Just Buffalo Literary Center (JBLC,) and Squeaky Wheel Film & Media Art Center. The exhibition will be on view at the Burchfield Penney Art Center through March 26, 2023, presented by M&T Bank, with additional support from organizations and individuals throughout the Western New York community.