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    Spirituality, Nature, and Performance Converge in Victoria Ruiz’s Vibrant Photographs

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    All images © Victoria Ruiz, shared with permission

    Spirituality, Nature, and Performance Converge in Victoria Ruiz’s Vibrant Photographs

    July 15, 2025

    ArtPhotography

    Kate Mothes

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    “For me, costume has always been part of everything,” says photographer and multidisciplinary artist Victoria Ruiz. “Culturally, I grew up in Venezuela seeing costume not as something separate from daily life but as something deeply embedded in it, especially through the lens of carnival. Carnival is in our blood. It’s not just a festival; it’s a way of expressing history, resistance, joy, and grief. A costume, at the end of the day, is something you wear that tells a story.”

    In striking, saturated images, Ruiz channels a fascination with nature, dance, spirituality, and African diasporic religion. Citing belief systems of the Americas like Santería-Ifá, Candomblé, Umbanda, and Espiritismo, the artist delves into the histories and cultural resonance of religion as modes of resistance and adaptation. These faiths often blend “African spiritual traditions with Indigenous and colonial influences,” she says in a statement.

    Currently based in London, Ruiz draws upon her childhood experiences in Caracas, Venezuela’s capital, where she and her family encountered both nuanced ancestral practices and urgent political violence. “I grew up surrounded by characters, some from folkloric traditions, others from more disturbing scenes like military or police repression,” the artist tells Colossal. She continues:

    I realized early on that uniforms are also costumes. What people wore during those moments of violence or protest created powerful symbols. It was a kind of dark carnival. And I became very curious about what those garments meant and how they could inspire fear, power, or solidarity.

    In her series Para Tú Altar: Las Fuerzas Divinas de la Naturaleza, which translates to For Your Altar: The Divine Forces of Nature, Ruiz draws upon a seminal music album by Cuban salsa artist Celia Cruz, who incorporated ceremonial Santería music into one of her early albums. Para Tú Altar references one of Cruz’s songs about different types of flowers used to honor the divinity of nature.

    At the time, African diasporic religions like Santería, in which Yoruba traditions, Catholicism, and Spiritism converge, were largely hidden from view due to widespread prejudice and marginalization. Ruiz adds, “It could be said that Celia did not truly understand that what she was doing at the time was transcendent for Cuba’s musical culture and the religion itself.”

    Music and performance are central tenets in Ruiz’s work. Since she was young, she studied ballet, flamenco, and contemporary dance, but it was only when she moved to London and began collaborating with dancers that elements of her practice began to truly gel. “Seeing them embody the costumes—activating them with movement and intention—transformed my whole practice,” she says. “It became a way to make the pieces alive and to create immersive, emotional storytelling.”

    Ruiz works with a range of fabrics and materials like faux flowers and other props, depending on the theme of the series. She often reuses the costumes to emphasize sustainability. “Each costume and each image is a portal to the divine; it is a visual offering, a spiritual invocation,” Ruiz says. “They’re my own interpretations of how these forces have shaped and protected me. I’m still on that journey, and this work is a kind of gratitude, a love letter to those unseen powers that have carried me.”

    The artist is currently working on a series of protective masks, drawing on the ingenuity of handmade masks used during protests that Ruiz witnessed while living in Caracas. “At one point, gas masks were actually banned from entering the country, so people responded with creativity and survival instinct creating masks from water bottles, cardboard, even stuffed animals,” she says. “I found it so powerful: this creativity in the face of danger—this need to resist and survive through making.”

    See more on the artist’s website and Instagram.

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      A Multifaceted Book and Exhibition, ‘Black Earth Rising’ Contends with Colonialism, Land, and Climate

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      Precious Okoyoman, “To See The Earth Before the End of the World” (2022). Photo by Clelia Cadamuro, courtesy La Biennale di Venezia. © Precious Okoyomon 2024. All images courtesy of Thames & Hudson, shared with permission

      A Multifaceted Book and Exhibition, ‘Black Earth Rising’ Contends with Colonialism, Land, and Climate

      July 14, 2025

      ArtBooksClimateHistoryNature

      Kate Mothes

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      Between 450 B.C.E. and 950 C.E., a particularly fertile soil known by researchers as terra preta, literally “black earth” in Portuguese, was cultivated by Indigenous farmers in the Amazon Basin. The soil was made with broken pottery, compost, bones, manure, and charcoal—which lends its characteristic dark shade—making it rich in nutrients and minerals.

      The historic, fecund material becomes a symbolic nexus for the exhibition Black Earth Rising, now on view at Baltimore Museum of Art. Curated by journalist and writer Ekow Eshun, the show illuminates several links between the climate crisis, land, presence, colonization, diasporas, and social and environmental justice.

      Raphaël Barontini, “Au Bal des Grands Fonds” (2022), acrylic, ink, glitter, and silkscreen on canvas 70 7/8 x 118 1/8 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Mariane Ibrahim, Chicago, Paris, and Mexico City

      Accompanying the exhibition is a new anthology published by Thames & Hudson titled Black Earth Rising: Colonialism and Climate Change in Contemporary Art, which highlights works by more than 150 African diasporic, Latin American, and Native American contemporary artists.

      The volume explores intersections between slavery and forced migration, the environmental consequences of colonialism, socio-political injustices experienced by urban Black and Brown communities, and the violent occupation of Native lands—all through the lens of learning from Indigenous knowledge systems and a wide range of cultural practices to consider more carefully how we view and interact with the natural world.

      Black Earth Rising brings together striking works by some of the art world’s most prominent practitioners, from Cannupa Hanska Luger and Precious Okoyoman to Wangechi Mutu and Firelei Báez, among many others. Hanska Luger’s ongoing project, Future Ancestral Technologies, takes a multimedia approach to science fiction as a vehicle for collective thinking. Luger describes the project as a way to imagine “a post-capitalism, post-colonial future where humans restore their bonds with the earth and each other.”

      Carrie Mae Weems’ photograph “A Distant View,” from The Louisiana Project, approaches the history of enslaved women in the South through the perspective of a muse—the artist herself—spectrally inhabiting a seemingly idyllic landscape. Reflecting on the relaxed atmosphere of the image, we’re confronted with the stark reality experienced by Black people who were forced to labor on plantations, these grand houses now symbolic of atrocious violence and inequities.

      Cannupa Hanska Luger, “We Live, Future Ancestral Technologies Entry Log” (2019). Image courtesy of the artist and Garth Greenan Gallery, New York

      “Black Earth Rising presents a discourse on climate change that places the voices of people of color at the active center rather than on the passive periphery,” says a statement from the publisher.

      Through a wide variety of paintings, photography, sculpture, installation, and interdisciplinary pieces, readers—and visitors to the exhibition—are invited to consider how the continuum of history influences the climate crisis today and how we can proceed toward a future that centers unity and deeper relationships with nature.

      The Black Earth Rising exhibition continues through September 21. Find your copy of the anthology on Bookshop, and plan your visit to the show on the Baltimore Museum of Art’s website.

      Carrie Mae Weems, “A Distant View” from ‘The Louisiana Project’ (2003), gelatin silver print, 20 x 20 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Gladstone Gallery, New York; Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco; and Galerie Barbara Thumm, Berlin. © Carrie Mae Weems

      Akea Brionne, “Home Grown” (2023), digital woven image on jacquard with rhinestones, poly-fil, and thread, 48 x 60 inches. Image courtesy of the artist and Lyles & King, New York

      Todd Gray, detail of “Atlantic (Tiepolo)” (2022), four archival pigment prints in artist’s frames and UV laminate, 72 5/8 x 49 1/8 x 5 inches. Image courtesy of Todd Gray and David Lewi More

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      In a Baltimore Exhibition, the Transformative Potential of Today’s Griots Emerges

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      Alanis Forde, “A Sea Bath” (2023), oil on canvas, 25 x 20 inches. All images courtesy of the artists and Galerie Myrtis, shared with permission

      In a Baltimore Exhibition, the Transformative Potential of Today’s Griots Emerges

      June 27, 2025

      Art

      Grace Ebert

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      Stories have long helped us to understand the world and our place within it. For the western Sahel in West Africa, storytellers known as griots are often responsible for sharing oral histories and local legends. As generations pass and culture shifts, griots add onto the narratives they’ve inherited with contemporary details relevant to their audiences.

      A group exhibition curated by Noel Bedolla and Ky Vassor at Galerie Myrtis gathers a dozen international artists continuing this tradition. Emergence: Stories in the Making presents “a mirror to contemporary society” by positing that the narratives we tell play a critical role in collective experiences, acts of solidarity, and ultimately, societal progress.

      Kachelle Knowles, “Queen’s College” (2025), graphite, decorative paper, colored pencils, thread, charcoal, acrylic paint, ink, acrylic gemstones, marker on paper, 28 x 18 inches. Image courtesy of the artist, Galerie Myrtis, and Tern Gallery

      For Alanis Forde, imagining paradise and its trappings is a way to excavate questions about internal conflict. She often paints figures with blue masks and bodies, the vibrant disguises becoming proxies that allow the artist to merge her likeness with a fictive version of herself. Subverting the art historical and cultural representations of Black women “as objects of pleasure and servitude,” Forde shapes an alternative narrative.

      Kachelle Knowles works in a parallel practice. Through mixed-media portraits with patterned paper, thread, and acrylic gems, the Bahamian artist focuses on Black teenagers and asserts their rights to fluid gender expressions.

      While portraits feature prominently in Emergence, Kim Rice’s “American Quilt” invokes the politics of the body without visualizing a figure. Her large-scale tapestry is comprised of maps distributed by the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation, the defunct federal agency responsible for delineating which neighborhoods were too “hazardous” to receive mortgages in a racist process known as redlining. Stitched together with red thread, “American Quilt” makes explicit the ways that “whiteness is woven into our everyday lives,” Rice says.

      If you’re in Baltimore, see Emergence: Stories in the Making through July 12.

      Alanis Forde, “Garden Gloves” (2024), oil on canvas, 40 x 40 inches

      Kim Rice, “American Quilt” (2025), HOLC “redlining” maps, acrylic gel, thread, 10 x 11 feet. Photo by Vivian Marie Doering

      Kim Rice, “American Quilt” (2025), HOLC “redlining” maps, acrylic gel, thread, 10 x 11 feet. Photo by Vivian Marie Doering

      Kim Rice, “American Quilt” (2025), HOLC “redlining” maps, acrylic gel, thread, 10 x 11 feet. Photo by Vivian Marie Doering

      Unyime Edet, “Spirit To Spirit: The Night Watchers” (2024), oil on canvas, 55 x 59 inches

      Damilare Jaimu, “All Things Bloom” (2025), oil and acrylic on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

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      Explore Storytelling Through 300 Years of Quilts in ‘Fabric of a Nation’

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      Bisa Butler, “To God and Truth” (2019), print and resist-dyed cottons, cotton velvet, rayon satin, and knotted string, pieced, appliquéd, and quilted; 117 1/2 x 140 5/8 inches. Photos © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. All images courtesy of Frist Art Museum, shared with permission

      Explore Storytelling Through 300 Years of Quilts in ‘Fabric of a Nation’

      June 25, 2025

      ArtCraftHistory

      Kate Mothes

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      While we often associate quilts with their function as bedspreads or an enjoyable hobby, the roots of the craft run very deep. The art form has long been associated with storytelling, and numerous styles have enabled makers to share cultural symbols, memories, and autobiographical details through vibrant color and pattern.

      African American quilters have significantly influenced the practice since the 17th century, when enslaved people began sewing scraps of fabric to make blankets for warmth. Through artists like Harriet Powers in the 19th century or the Gee’s Bend Quilters, this powerful mode of expression lives on in rich tapestries and textile works being made today.

      Civil War Zouave Quilt (1863–64), wool plain weave and twill, cotton plain weave and other structures, leather; pieced, appliquéd, and embroidered with silk. Photo © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

      A new exhibition titled Fabric of a Nation: American Quilt Stories from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston opens this week at the Frist Art Museum, surveying nearly 50 quilts from the MFA’s collection. Works span the 19th through 21st centuries, with bold textiles by contemporary artists like Bisa Butler included alongside Civil War-era examples and commemorative album quilts.

      Stories play a starring role in Fabric of a Nation, which delves into the socio-political contexts in which the pieces were made and how narrative, symbolism, and autobiography shaped their compositions. For example, a unique Civil War quilt completed by an unknown maker in 1864 repurposes fabric from Zouave uniforms. Small panels featuring birds, soldiers on horseback, and the American flag transport us to a time when the U.S. had been at war for three years.

      Another fascinating piece is another flag composition in which the stripes have been stitched with dozens of names, including Susan B. Anthony near the top of one of the central columns. Known as the “Hoosier Suffrage Quilt,” it’s thought to chronicle suffrage supporters.

      More recently, Michael C. Thorpe’s untitled work features the bold appliquéd words “Black Man” over pieced batik fabrics. Butler’s large-scale “To God and Truth” is a colorful reimagining of an 1899 photograph. She transforms a black-and-white image into a vibrant, patterned portrait of the African American baseball team of Morris Brown College, Atlanta.

      Fabric of a Nation opens on June 27 and continues through October 12 in Nashville. Find more and plan your visit on the museum’s website. You might also enjoy exploring more quilts by Black Southern makers or Stephen Townes’ embroidered tableaux of leisure in the Jim Crow South.

      Michael C. Thorpe, Untitled (2020), printed cotton plain weave and batting; machine quilted, 20 x 16 inches

      Hoosier Suffrage Quilt (before 1920), cotton plain weave, pieced, embroidered, and quilted. Photo © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

      Unidentified maker. Peacock Alley Chenille Bedspread (1930–40s), cotton plain weave, embroidered with cotton pile; 99 x 88 1/2 inches. Photo © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

      Baltimore album quilt (c. 1847–50), cotton plain weave, pieced, appliquéd, quilted, and embroidered ink. Photo © Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

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      African Mythology and Ancestry Merge in Zak Ové’s Exuberant Sculptures

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      “The Mothership Connection” (2022), stainless steel, bronze, resin, and mixed media, 9 x 1.8 meters. Images courtesy of Zak Ové and Library Street Collective shared with permission

      African Mythology and Ancestry Merge in Zak Ové’s Exuberant Sculptures

      June 20, 2025

      Art

      Kate Mothes

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      Merging themes of interstellar travel and cultural convergences, Zak Ové creates large-scale sculptures and multimedia installations that explore African ancestry, traditions, and history. The British-Trinidadian artist’s practice is deeply rooted in the narratives of the African diaspora, focusing on traditions of masquerade. He delves into its role in performance and ceremony, as well as masks as potent instruments for self-emancipation and cultural resistance.

      Ové’s interdisciplinary work spans sculpture, painting, film, and photography, exploring links between mythology, oral histories, and speculative futures. “His sculptures often incorporate symbols, iconography, and materials drawn from African, Caribbean, and diasporic traditions, merging them with modern aesthetics to celebrate the continuity and adaptability of culture,” his studio says.

      Detail of “Black Starliner” (2025), stainless steel, aluminium, fiberglass, and resin, 40 x 22.6 x 27.4 feet

      Ové often delves into the relationship between contemporary lived experiences and the spirit world, like in “Moko Jumbie” or a glass mosaic installation in London titled “Jumbie Jubilation.” In these works, the artist brings an ancestral spirit rooted in African and Caribbean folklore known as a Jumbie to life as a spectral dancer, cloaked in banana leaves with a torso of a golden, radiant face.

      The motif of rockets has emerged in Ove’s recent installations, like “The Mothership Connection” and “Black Starliner,” which feature totem-like stacks of African tribal masks and lattice-like Veve symbols—intricate designs employed in the Vodou religion to represent spiritual deities known as Lwa.

      “The Mothership Connection” combines architectural elements referencing the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C., and a ring of Cadillac lights nodding to Detroit, “Motor City.” The crowning element is a giant Mende tribal mask that glows when the 26-foot-tall sculpture is illuminated at night, with a pulsing rhythm suggestive of a heartbeat.

      The title is also a reference to the iconic 1975 album by Parliament-Funkadelic, Mothership Connection, in with outer space is a through-line in the group’s celebration of what BBC journalist Frasier McAlpine described as a response to the waning optimism of the post-civil rights era. Mothership Connection soared at a time when “flamboyant imagination (and let’s be frank, exceptional funkiness) was both righteous and joyful,” he wrote.

      “The Mothership Connection” (2022), stainless steel, bronze, resin, and mixed media, 9 x 1.8 meters. Installed at Frieze London 2023

      Ové echoes this exuberance through vibrant colors, repetition, and monumental scale. Library Street Collective, which exhibited “The Mothership Connection” on the grounds of The Shepherd in Detroit late last year, describes the work as a nod “to a future where Black people are included in all possible frames of reference.”

      In a monumental assembly of African masked figures titled “The Invisible Man and the Masque of Blackness,” Ové conceived of 40 graphite sculptures organized in a militaristic grid, each six-and-a-half feet tall, that have marched across the grounds of Somerset House, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, San Francisco City Hall, and Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

      The title of this piece references two groundbreaking works in Black history—Ralph Ellison’s 1952 novel Invisible Man, which was the first novel by a Black author to with the National Book Award, and Ben Jonson’s 1605 play The Masque of Blackness, noteworthy for being the first time blackface makeup was used in a stage production.

      “Invisible Man and the Masque of Blackness” (2016), graphite. Installed at Yorkshire Sculpture Park

      Ové reclaims and reframes dominant narratives about African history, culture, and the diaspora, interrogating the past to posit what he calls “potential futures,” where possibilities transform into realities. “By fusing ancestral wisdom with Afrofuturist ideals, Ové ensures that the voices of the past remain integral to shaping the futures we envision,” his studio says.

      “The Mothership Connection” will be exhibited later this summer and fall at 14th Street Square in New York City’s Meatpacking District, accompanied by a gallery show at Chelsea Market. Dates are currently being confirmed, and you can follow updates on Ové’s Instagram.

      “Moko Jumbie” (2021), mixed media, overall 560 centimeters

      Detail of “Moko Jumbie” (2021), mixed media, overall 560 centimeters, installed at Art Gallery of Ontario, commissioned with funds from David W. Binet and Ray & Georgina Williams, 2021. Photo courtesy of AGO

      “Jumbie Jubilation” (2024), glass mosaic panels, dimensions vary around 11.5 x 1.2 meters per panel

      Detail of “Jumbie Jubilation” (2024)

      “Virulent Strain” (2022), graphite, 22-carat gold leaf, and bronze, 120 centimeters in diameter

      “Invisible Man and the Masque of Blackness” (2016), graphite. Installed at Somerset House, London

      “Black Starliner” (2025), stainless steel, aluminium, fiberglass, and resin, 40 x 22.6 x 27.4 feet. Installed at Louvre Abu Dhabi

      “The Mothership Connection” (2022), stainless steel, bronze, resin, and mixed media, 9 x 1.8 meters. Photo courtesy of Library Street Collective

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    • 138 Shares199 Views

      in Art

      In ‘Pu$h Thru,’ Yvette Mayorga Examines Latinx Experience Through Rococo Maximalism

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      “She’s in the cake/Put out the fire, after Nicolas
      Lancret” (2025), collage, glitter, buttons, textile, birthday candles,
      pastel, cardboard, gold foil, silver foil, gold flakes, stickers, cake
      toppers, acrylic marker, acrylic nails, nail charms, and acrylic piping on canvas, 60 x 120 inches. all images courtesy of the artist and Monique Meloche Gallery, Chicago, shared with permission

      In ‘Pu$h Thru,’ Yvette Mayorga Examines Latinx Experience Through Rococo Maximalism

      June 11, 2025

      Art

      Kate Mothes

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      Known for her delectable, frilly, occasionally ominous acrylic paintings made with bakery tools, Yvette Mayorga (previously) nods to memories of her mother working as a baker and references Baroque and Rococo art while critically examining family, community, and notions of prosperity.

      Mayorga’s pieces are “dominated by shades of pink to critically examine the American Dream and the Latinx experience, often borrowing compositions from personal and family photos and art history,” says Monique Meloche Gallery, which presents a solo show of the artist’s work opening this weekend.

      “W3 R TIR3D” (2025), collage, rhinestones, plastic butterflies, acrylic marker, pastel, silver foil, gold foil, pen, acrylic nails, car sticker, butterflies, glitter, gold flakes, silver flakes, textile, belt, rhinestones, nail charms and acrylic piping on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

      Pu$h Thru, the artist’s first show with the gallery and the first in her hometown of Chicago since 2018, takes a semi-autobiographical approach by reflecting on her experiences during the last decade in the city. Beyond her characteristic confection-inspired works, she has created large-scale compositions incorporating found objects like lampshades, clothing, and jewelry, along with bits of ceramic, pastels, gold foil, acrylic nails, and more.

      Many of these works draw on Mayorga’s personal memories, like snapshots of the artist as a child during a birthday party or sitting in her family’s living room. Converging with romantic Rococo aesthetics and style, like portraits modeled after Elizabeth Vigee Le Brun or Jean-Honoré Fragonard, the artist addresses the Euro-centric narrative of art history and its overarching omission of other identities. Mayorga has even coined a term to describe her approach, “Latinxoco,” which merges Latinx identity with Rococo aesthetics.

      “Pink, a color that has a long history with Mayorga’s practice, is deployed as a conceptual strategy to destabilize Western ideals of skin tone, evoking questions of race, class, and gendered embodiment while also referencing cosmetic and domestic aesthetics—an ironic and radical reclamation of softness as strength,” the gallery says.

      Pu$h Thru runs from June 14 to July 26. See more on the artist’s website and Instagram.

      “La Ursupadora Not 4 Me” (2025), collage, textile, glitter, lamp shade, pen, electrical outlet, hoop earrings, shoes, jeans, marker, pastel, drawer handles, lampshade, ceramic, belt, felt, pastel, clock, stickers, gold flakes, gold foil, mirror, acrylic nails, textile, nail charms, TV control, and acrylic piping on canvas, 60 x 120 inches

      “What’s Hidden Beneath (Remnant Series)” (2025), found objects, nail charms, and acrylic piping on canvas, 16 x 12 inches

      “Hot and Ready” (2025), collage, rhinestones, acrylic marker, silver foil, gold foil, pen, pastel, mirror, acrylic nails, stickers, rhinestones, gold flakes, nail charms, collage, glitter and acrylic piping on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

      “Self Portrait of the Artist After Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun” (2025), textile, collage, stickers, gold flakes, silver flakes, pen, lace, buttons, acrylic nails, nail charms, and acrylic piping on canvas, 72 x 60 inches

      “The Portal (Remnant Series)” (2025), found objects and acrylic piping on canvas, 16 x 12 inches

      “Rhinestone Vaquero After Élisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun” (2025), textile, rhinestones, buttons, belt buckle, gold flakes, silver flakes, glitter, and acrylic piping on canvas, 72 x 60 inches

      “Taffy Taffy (Remnant Series)” (2025), found objects and acrylic piping on canvas, 16 x 12 inches

      “PU$$H PU$$H THRU” (2025), collage, rhinestones, glitter, acrylic marker, silver foil, gold foil, pen, toy boat, mirror, marker, acrylic nails, stickers, textile, leather, nail charms, and acrylic piping on canvas, 48 x 36 inches

      “La Serpiente (Remnant Series)” (2024), found objects and acrylic piping on canvas, 16 x 12 inches

      Installation view of ‘Pu$h Thru’ at Monique Meloche Gallery

      “Party Favor (Remnant Series)” (2025), found objects, nail charms, party favor, and acrylic piping on canvas, 16 x 12 inches

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      ‘Wonder Women’ Celebrates the Dazzling Figurative Work of Asian Diasporic Artists

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      Dominique Fung, “Bone Holding Fan” (2021). All images courtesy of the artists and Rizzoli, shared with permission

      ‘Wonder Women’ Celebrates the Dazzling Figurative Work of Asian Diasporic Artists

      May 15, 2025

      ArtBooksSocial Issues

      Kate Mothes

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      In February 2020, curator and gallery director Kathy Huang met artist Dominique Fung—a month before the COVID-19 pandemic shut everything down. Their conversations, which continued throughout quarantine, served as an impetus for what would become Huang’s Wonder Women exhibitions at Jeffrey Deitch.

      During their chats, Huang and Fung lamented “the uptick in violence against Asian American communities, particularly against women and the elderly,” Huang says in the introduction to her forthcoming book, Wonder Women: Art of the Asian Diaspora.

      Mai Ta, “mirror image” (2022)

      The two also found it difficult to pinpoint when the last major exhibition had been staged that thoughtfully presented Asian artists, and neither could think of an instance where women and nonbinary artists had been the focus. Both of Huang’s exhibitions and her new book are the fruit of that desire to highlight the remarkable spectrum of figurative work being produced within the Asian diasporic community today.

      A response to racism against Asians exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, Huang conceived of the shows that went on view in 2022 in New York and Los Angeles as a means to highlight the incredible, groundbreaking work made especially by women and nonbinary artists.

      Forthcoming from Rizzoli, Wonder Women shares a similar title to a poem by Genny Lim, which follows experiences of Asian women through the lens of a narrator who observes their everyday routines and considers how their lives relate to hers.

      Huang expands on this view in her approach to showcasing the work of forty artists, each represented through at least four pieces and a personal statement. These artists “subvert stereotypes and assert their identities in places where they have historically been marginalized,” Rizzoli says.

      Sally J. Han, “At Lupe’s” (2022)

      Artists like Sasha Gordon or Nadia Waheed explore identity through sometimes fantastical self-portraiture, while others highlight family, community, and colonial or patriarchal systems in the West. Some address Asian myths, legends, and visual culture, like Fung’s exploration of antique objects or Shyama Golden’s otherworldly scenes in which hybrid human-animals interact with nature or urban spaces.

      Wonder Women will be released on May 20. Order your copy from the Colossal Shop.

      Shyama Golden, “The Passage” (2022)

      Chelsea Ryoko Wong, “It’s Mah Jong Time!” (2022)

      Nadia Waheed, “Bolides/ 852” (2022)

      Cover featuring a painting by Sasha Gordon

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      Kandy G. Lopez Embroiders Striking, Life-Size Yarn Portraits Highlighting BIPOC Narratives

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      Detail of “City Girls” (2025), yarn, acrylic, and spray paint on hook mesh canvas, 102 x 168 inches. All images courtesy of the artist and ACA Galleries, shared with permission

      Kandy G. Lopez Embroiders Striking, Life-Size Yarn Portraits Highlighting BIPOC Narratives

      May 8, 2025

      ArtCraft

      Kate Mothes

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      On large swaths of colorful mesh, Kandy G. Lopez embroiders large-scale portraits of people from historically marginalized communities. “Her works are created out of the necessity to learn something new about her people and culture,” says a statement.

      Drawing on her Afro-Caribbean ancestry, the Fort Lauderdale-based artist celebrates the style, culture, and heritage of individuals as a way to build connections and generate dialogue around representation.

      “R² – Roscoe and Reggie” (2024), yarn and acrylic paint on hook mesh, 90 x 60 inches

      Lopez began working with mesh and fiber almost ten years ago, but she began to approach it more seriously as a major tenet of her practice in 2021 while an artist-in-residence at The Hambidge Center in Georgia. “As a painter, my backgrounds were minimal. Sometimes they would have monochromatic cityscapes,” Lopez tells Colossal, “So, leaving the background rare is something I’m familiar with.”

      Visibility, presence, and representation are vital to the artist’s work. In each composition, she centers vibrantly dressed, life-size figures so their gazes directly meet the viewer. Through the use of material and metaphor — like layered threads suggesting how BIPOC individuals “disappear and reappear” — she intertwines notions of community, resilience, and narrative. “I love the connections and stories that the individuals tell but also how the stories narrate the material,” she says.

      The gridded backgrounds evoke associations with neighborhood street patterns and the overlapping layers of woven warp and weft. “I also love the metaphor in transparency, layers, and vulnerability,” the artist says, sharing that she sometimes still incorporates cityscapes painted onto the mesh.

      Lopez is represented by ACA Galleries. See more on her website and Instagram.

      “Reyna” (2025), yarn and spray paint on hook mesh canvas, 96 x 60 inches

      “City Girls” (2025), yarn, acrylic, and spray paint on hook mesh canvas, 102 x 168 inches

      “Rohan” (2023), yarn and acrylic paint on hook mesh, 96 x 60 inches

      “Miami” (2025), yarn and spray paint on hook mesh canvas, 96 x 60 inches

      “Rohan” (2023), yarn and acrylic paint on hook mesh, 96 x 60 inches

      Detail of “Reyna”

      Installation view of “Tayina”

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    • 138 Shares129 Views

      in Art

      ‘Of Salt and Spirit’ Celebrates the Legacy of Black Southern Quilters

      by

      Hystercine Rankin (1929–
      2010), “Memory Quilt” (ca. 1994), fabric; appliquéd, hand-embroidered, and hand-quilted, 88 x 82 inches. All images courtesy of Mississippi Museum of Art, shared with permission

      ‘Of Salt and Spirit’ Celebrates the Legacy of Black Southern Quilters

      April 23, 2025

      ArtCraft

      Kate Mothes

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      You may have heard of the remarkable quilters of Gee’s Bend, but do you know about the Crossroads Quilters, like Gustina Atlas? Or Hystercine Rankin? Mary Mayfair Matthews? You’re in luck if you have a chance to visit Of Salt and Spirit: Black Quilters in the American South at the Mississippi Museum of Art, which shines a light on dozens of incredible Black Southern quilters and takes a celebratory approach to showcasing their myriad styles and techniques.

      MMA is home to one of the South’s largest collections of quilts, from which more than 50 handmade and machine-stitched examples were drawn for this expansive exhibition. Merging research, interpretation, and community engagement, curator Dr. Sharbreon Plummer aimed for “a cohesive, experiential study of American art through a Black feminist lens.” The show parses cultural narratives around the art form, spotlighting the impact of the craft across generations and geography.

      Emma Russell, “Star Quilt” (1978), cotton blend; hand-pieced, appliquéd, and hand-quilted, 81 x 77 inches

      A wide range of contemporary and historic pieces converge in Of Salt and Spirit, including figurative and narrative works alongside vibrant geometric compositions. Many of the works were acquired by the museum from Roland L. Freeman (1936-2023), a photographer who documented African-American craftspeople and guilds in his work as a stringer for Time magazine and Magnum Photos.

      Freeman collected more than 100 quilts, made several of his own, and published a couple of books on the subject. “Quilts have the power to create a virtual web of connections—individual, generational, professional, physical, spiritual, cultural, and historical,” he says in his second book, A Communion of the Spirits (1996).

      In conjunction with the exhibition, the museum also highlights the large-scale, ongoing AIDS Memorial Quilt project, which was initiated in 1985 at the height of the epidemic. Paralleling Of Salt and Spirit’s focus on creative expression, identity, and strength, the AIDS quilt—which will be on display at MMA for a two-week period beginning May 5—honors quilting for its role in resistance and remembrance.

      Of Salt and Spirit continues through May 18 in Jackson. Plan your visit on the museum’s website. You may also enjoy a look back at Souls Grown Deep Like the Rivers, a monumental survey recognizing the artistic traditions of Black artists.

      Mary Mayfair Matthews, “Folk Scenes Quilt” (1992), rayon, cotton polyester blend, lace, lamé, and buttons; hand-pieced and appliquéd, 86 1/4 x 74 inches

      Annie Dennis (designed by Roland L. Freeman), “Voodoo Quilt” (1987), fabric; hand-pieced, appliquéd, hand-embroidered, and hand-quilted, 83 1/2 x 64 inches

      Detail of “Voodoo Quilt”

      Gustina Atlas, “Variation on Dresden Plate Quilt” (1998), cotton; machine- pieced and hand-quilted, 81 1/2 x 80 inches

      Clancy McGrew, quilted and appliquéd by Jeraline Nicholas, “Storytime at the Library” (2004), fabric; machine-pieced, appliquéd, embroidered, and hand-quilted, 41 3/4 x 83 1/8 inches

      Mabel Williams, “Improvisational Strip Quilt” (1968), cotton, polyester, wool, twill; hand-pieced and hand- quilted with appliquéd and embroidered backing, 85 x 65 inches

      Clancy McGrew, quilted by Tammy McGrew, “Clancy’s Beauty Salon” (2004), fabric; machine-pieced, appliquéd, and hand-quilted, 67 5/8 x 49 1/2 inches

      Roland Freeman, “Maya Angelou, Author, Educator, and Quilter (top left and bottom right); Dolly McPherson, Maya Angelou, and Beverly Guy-Sheftall (top right and bottom left), Winston-Salem, North Carolina, November 1992” (1992), Chromogenic print with quilted mat (1996) by Anita Knox, 36 x 36 inches

      Roland Freeman, “Catherine Gill with Sunburst Quilt (left) Made by Her Mother, Classy Blaylock, fromDecatur, Mississippi, Flagstaff, Arizona, April 1993″ (1993), Chromogenic print, 27 x 38 inches

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