Mickalene Thomas
Appearances
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And I think there's one figure that depicts a female nude and then the kind of half-dressed female bather in the back that's often removed when it's remade. Three main figures on a picnic, and it's a woman seated with two dressed men, fully dressed men, I guess.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
that really is was at the time very controversial because to have a painting that sort of depicts this nude woman just and leisure at a picnic right right it's like what is going on here and then to recreate it where there's three black women yes but to recreate it with three black women who are fully dressed um but this particular painting made uh
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Edouard Manet, very famous, because it was very controversy, and it's an incredible work that is in France. And it's still there. I think it's at the Musée d'Orsay. I decided to reinterpret or reclaim the space with empowering the one woman –
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
are the half-dressed woman, the bather, and the one woman undressed as three powerful women who are fully clothed, seated, and not at a picnic, just lounging and giving each other their flowers. And I thought that was very important for me, as you see them, see her handing flowers. As a way, for me, as black women seeing each other as a sisterhood of community,
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
I think that's mostly what I wanted to convey, sort of this bond, this sisterhood, this love between black women that I grew up experiencing.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Oh, my gosh. I think if Instagram was around then, I probably would have had a million followers.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
It was 2010. And it stayed at the modern window for about two years. And I think the modern kept it there because they kept saying that it was bringing a large demographic of people into the museum. Which was amazing because— Also, right, it was also— It was on 53rd Street. You know, you walk by, you look like, what is this? And I think people expected to see more inside.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Yeah. I think— You know, we have to see images of ourselves. I mean, you go through a lot of the different spaces and you just, you know, unless you go to the specified or spaces of African art or Egyptian art, then you start to see elements of yourself. And this is just with their permanent collections. Now they're starting to realize that there have been gaps and they're collecting...
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
histories right that's really interesting in thinking about how art plays such a role and like it's a historical imprint it is I mean for me I have to say that art I would I think that art has saved my life for sure I you know growing up going to after school programs at the Newark Museum like it was like for me this safe haven this comfort this Refuge. I love going there after school.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
I love doing all the craft projects, the paper mache, you know, exploring different ways of making self-portraits or building houses with popsicle sticks and all of those things that you were doing or like, you know, the taller paper tubes and, you know, making constructions, you know.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Not at that time. For me, it was just an outlet, a way of expressing myself, but also a place to go after school until my mother got off of work.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Yeah, so when I was in Pratt, I couldn't afford oil paint. I would rummage often through the recycled stretcher bins and gather my materials from that. All I could afford was craft materials because they were cheaper than oil paint, like felt and different fabrics and glitter. It was cheaper than tubes of oil paint.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
I gravitated towards those materials because they were accessible and affordable for me. But what they did was open up a way of expressing myself. But then when I also, to note that during that time, it was the sensation show. at Brooklyn Museum.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
So you had all of these Great Britain artists that were showing at the Sensation Show, and they were using all kinds of materials from, like, Chris Ofili, Elephant Dong, and, you know, you had Tracy Emin personally tell a story, you know, making a tent out of, like, felt and canvas and all kind of material. And so I think seeing exhibitions like that really... were paramount.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
But yeah, there was a struggle completing some assignments because some you had to use oil paint or some you had to use the traditional materials to make the art.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
I would borrow or, you know, some of the, my peers were, they were good. They were like, oh yeah, he used some of this. People weren't too stingy or trying to keep you away from that. But I think we all were working and they saw that I was, I was, in my studio all the time.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And so sometimes people throw away tubes of paint because they think it's not good and you just cut it open and it's still painted there.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
It's kind of like, you know, like, you know, toothpaste, you know, you kind of, so I would, you know, take an exacto knife and cut it down the middle and just open it up. And it's kind of like with some of the turp medium, just use some of what I had.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Well, when I was very young, about 16 going on to 17 I was going through my own transformation of my identity uh Sexually, my mother was struggling with her addiction. I was living with my grandmother, my father's mother, who I was very close with up until she passed. And I fell in love. And so I moved to Portland, Oregon with my girlfriend at the time.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
and end up going to a high school in Portland. And after living there with her probably about three years, we separated. She moves back with her family. I decided that I wanted to stay. My mother came to visit me to confirm that I wanted to stay. And I said, yeah. I was... Living in Portland, decided to go to Portland State for a couple of years.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And that's when I found interest in pre-law and theater arts.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Yeah. While I was living in Portland, after realizing that I couldn't really afford college and that I needed to work, I started working at Davis Wright Tremaine Law Firm. started as a file clerk and document clerk. And a good friend of mine who was a photographer, Christopher Stark, had just returned from his internship with Nan Golden.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And while he was in New York, he learned about all of these photographers. Carrie Mae Weems was one of the photographers he learned about. So when he came back to Portland... Ironically, Carrie Mae Weems had a show up at Portland Art Museum, and he said, you must see this photographer's work. I know you're going to connect with it.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And so I went with him to see Carrie Mae Weems' show at the Portland Art Museum.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Her art is a series of photographs that really depicting sort of the black woman she's known for her early works of the Kitchen Table series. And that's the work that I first saw at the Portland Art Museum was her series of photographs, which reminded me of my own family and myself. I just remember standing in front of those photographs and seeing myself.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And I never felt that way before in front of art. And that was because I saw myself in the image. I saw myself as that little girl sitting at the table. I saw the woman as my mother. I saw the male as whatever male figure that was in my life at the time. And it was like depicting family, love, domesticity. It was just...
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
an expression of a black experience that was complex and dimensional that allowed me to understand that there was a power with the image with black people in it. I kept going back to the exhibit after I went with my friend. Really? How many times did you go? Do you remember? Probably about four or five times. Yeah. Until it closed.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And then I also bought a stack of the postcards of the Table series and the Mirror Mirror. And went to the art store to grab some supplies of Reeves B.F. Cates. Paper and some oil pastels and used Carrie Mae Weems postcard photographic images as references and for like some of my drawings, just like looking at them.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Yeah. And then I was surrounded by artists in Portland who was embarking on that as a profession.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
I'm glad you asked this question because it wasn't like there was a story that I grew up with. It was a reality that I grew up with. You know, my brother and I lived in the hillside and a house. We had our own room and it was decorated the way any kid would want their room. You know, we had like the latest things all the time.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
My mother drove a Cadillac Seville, which was like at that time an expensive car. And my mother was taking care of the family in South Jersey, whether it was helping family members out with rent or medical bills or whatever was needed. That's what my mother was doing. At that point, she was involved and engaged to a drug dealer, and then he eventually got caught.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And so I guess at some point, my mother felt the responsibility to maintain things. And so she was selling the drugs with some other people in her life.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Thank you so much for having me. Hopefully I'm not too congested.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
I didn't know any of this until about 12 years ago. So a late adult. Because my mother kept a lot for me and my brother. She even kept the abuse that my father did in their relationship away from me and my brother. She never talked about that.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
It was devastating at first because I felt like there was a part of my life that was a lie. I didn't understand it. I had to go back in my own mind to try to figure out, but maybe understand why I was very shy to share things.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
That was my first set of photographs that I did within my class with David Hilliard at Yale University.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Oh, sexiness, strong, unapologetic, beauty, vigilante, savior, goddess.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
No, she didn't. And I think my mother, although she was very strong, I think unfortunately, uh, Which I think happens to a lot of women who are abused. They're robbed and things are stolen from them. And that's a level of confidence. So it was always manifesting in her life in different ways. And so I don't think she knew how to... get over that.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And so that opportunity for her to be a successful model, when that was also an opportunity that she lost, I think that was something that settled in her, that destroyed her a little. And I think that's part of my understanding as an adult, what might have led her to do some of the drugs she did, the addiction.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Yes, I am. And I feel like she's definitely always around me. I know that for sure. Like the other day is like I sat down in a certain way and I felt like I was sitting like my mother. I was like, oh, my mother sits like that. Like I felt her.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Oh, yes, and I love it now. Before I grew up as a kid not looking like her and always covet the fact that I was like, why don't I look like my mother? And I had a cousin who looked like her, and they used to always mistake my cousin for my mother's daughter, which was really kind of like, Messed me up as a child. Yeah. But now when I look in the mirror, I was just like, ah, there you are.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Oh, yeah. She's got to see it, experience it, celebrate it. She was celebrated for it. She loved the fact that she was a part of my art. She loved coming to the openings. Yeah. She loved coming to my friends' openings. She never, when I decided I wanted to be an artist, she never looked at it as like, now why are you wanting to go and do that?
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Some of those things were in my head, but she never vocalized that. She was a supportive dance and music and all things theater. I mean, that's one of the things we shared.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
I think I would describe my art as radically shifting sort of notions of beauty by claiming space that has been often not have us on the platform as the leading character. We've been supportive characters for far too long and
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Would you please sing something? No!
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And do you think it was being made even stronger by the fact there were four of you bouncing off one another?
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
historical images and that my art gives black women their flowers and let them know that they are the leading role and validating that and so there's intersections of using and juxtaposing historical tropes but also Disrupting and breaking sort of down those notions of beauty, of ideation that is hold to what is beauty, right?
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And so for me, I just look around my community within my world and started with my mother.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Yeah, I think the Barnes as an institution has always been committed to a particular community engagement. And it always has been about the art and the artists. But for this exhibition to be 15 minutes away from my family, I mean, it was, to be quite honest, like I was very anxious and nervous about it. Really? Yeah, because...
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Most of my family members were going to see my work for the first time in person, like my aunts and uncles, my cousins.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Yeah, even my father showed up. My brothers brought my father. And a lot of times, you know, people have their own understanding of art. And sometimes, you know, art can be a little elitist and we kind of go off and do things and it's conceptual and, you know, visually you might not understand. And some of them were going to see my mother and reposed in the nude.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
They would see me reposed and reclined in a nude. And they may go, why are you doing that? Yeah. It's so interesting. Why are you showing all that? Why are you exposing yourself?
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Well, one of my cousins was like, why are you going to go and show your mom that way? And I said, well, you know, my mother loves being shown that way. She actually gave me the permission to photograph her exposed. And so I think for them, they were so proud and excited to just be a part of it. Most of them came to the opening night, which was a gala event. So it was a
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
You know, it's like very just like colorful and just lots of different types of people and the music and the energy. So I think for them to experience that part of my life made them feel special. Because I admit, I haven't always been open to sharing that part of my life.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Freeing. It felt freeing and it felt supportive. And just to see the smiles. My brother stood in front of one of the paintings of my mother titled Dim All the Lights. She's wearing a red and black sweater and her hands are on the side. And it was quite beautiful to watch him engage with with the painting.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
But he stood there just, and I was behind him speaking with other family members, but I was watching him on the side. And he kept gesturing the same movement as her for a long time. And he turned around and said, that's her. I know that, Stan. I know that's her. That's what she does. And that just made me feel so good. He had this glow and this light
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And I think for him, you know, my mother's birthday was coming up, so it was like this energy. You know, my mother's birthday, October 27th. The opening was October 18th. So I think it was this energy. She was there, right? And there was this moment that you had to witness that you could see he was connecting to her.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Yeah. I think still today, I still believe, based on my experiences as an artist, that institutions are not comfortable with the nude black body if it's not stereotypically presented in ways of... I think I present the nude black body in a way of just like celebrating and honoring and putting forth like all of the strong qualities. I think unless it's about trauma.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Servitude, yeah, yeah, or entertainment, yeah. And I think – The gesturing of like us being performative for an audience is still the notions that the boxes in our compartmentalize some visual artists.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
It just is. And it's the state of resting, the state of being, the state of existing and rooted and grounded in that space, I think, is somewhat threatening to people. of the ownership of it, taking accountability for their own space. I think when that is exuded, that sense of strength is oftentimes kind of felt with aggression or a threat.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
I've had people say, oh, your images of the women are very confronting. And I said their gaze is very confronting.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
They're looking straight out at you. They're demanding the space. They're not demanding to be validated. They're just letting you know that they're there. But with all that, too, there's still, you know, the other side is there. vulnerability and sensitivity. And I think it's just one-sided if you're going to look at it as that the women are confronting you.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
But I think that comes from their understanding. Like, if you approach an image, I can't control what you bring to it. Because you're bringing these ideas of what you think of black women when they're sort of seated in the position of all knowingness. There's, you know, but we have been, we sat on thrones before. And I think, you know, we've been queens and kings.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And, you know, I think more of those images are now being put forth and celebrated, which is incredible. I love seeing that.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Yeah, I do. It was, uh, An idea I had, I was already working with the images. I've seen like Renee Cox. There's been a lot of artists who work with luncheon and grass as a concept of shifting sort of the paradigm of sort of the black bodies and sort of these Western canon ideas.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
histories and I wanted to lie myself and sort of it was through actually Ramir Bearden that I started thinking about Lunching in the Grass and thinking about what it would mean to have three black women
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
seated in this position and it came from a commission that was presented to me by Klaus Biesenbach at the time he was the curator of photography and media at MoMA and also the director of MoMA PS1 and so he commissioned me to present a body of work in the window of the modern. And I immediately knew when I saw the space that I wanted to do Le Dijonais.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
One, because of the opportunity of the space that it was going to be located. Two, because I had the opportunity for the first time to shoot sites specifically at the MoMA and the Sculpture Garden with the Matisse in the background. And three, I knew that many people would see this.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
And then it was going to be my largest painting to that date. At that point, I was only working like four by five or four by five feet or like no larger than six feet.
Fresh Air
Artist Mickalene Thomas Gives Black Women Their Flowers
Oh, Lunching in of the Grass, La Dijonais Saloon by Manet. And it was a very provocative painting, large oil painting of three figures, but it's actually four figures. Oftentimes they always speak about lunching in of the grass with – Three figures, but there's a fourth figure because there's one person that's bathing in the back.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Thank you so much for having me. Hopefully I'm not too congested.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
I think I would describe my art as radically shifting sort of notions of beauty by claiming space that has been often not have us on the platform as the leading character. We've been supportive characters for far too long and
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
historical images and that my art gives black women their flowers and let them know that they are the leading role and validating that and so there's intersections of using and juxtaposing historical tropes but also Disrupting and breaking sort of down those notions of beauty, of ideation that is hold to what is beauty, right?
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
And so for me, I just look around my community within my world and started with my mother.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Yeah, I think the Barnes as an institution has always been committed to a particular community engagement. And it always has been about the art and the artists. But for this exhibition to be 15 minutes away from my family, I mean, it was, to be quite honest, like I was very anxious and nervous about it. Really? Yeah, because...
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Most of my family members were going to see my work for the first time in person, like my aunts and uncles, my cousins.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Yeah, even my father showed up. My brothers brought my father. And a lot of times, you know, people have their own understanding of art. And sometimes, you know, art can be a little elitist and we kind of go off and do things and it's conceptual and, you know, visually you might not understand. And some of them were going to see my mother and reposed in the nude.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
They would see me reposed and reclined in a nude. And they may go, why are you doing that? Yeah. It's so interesting. Why are you showing all that? Why are you exposing yourself?
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Well, one of my cousins was like, why are you going to go and show your mom that way? And I said, well, you know, my mother loves being shown that way. She actually gave me the permission to photograph her exposed. And so I think for them, they were so proud and excited to just be a part of it. Most of them came to the opening night, which was a gala event. So it was a
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
It's extravaganza, you know, it's like very just like colorful and just lots of different types of people and the music and energy. So I think for them to experience that part of my life made them feel special because I admit I haven't always been open to sharing that part of my life.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Freeing. It felt freeing and it felt supportive. And just to see the smiles. My brother stood in front of one of the paintings of my mother titled Dim All the Lights. She's wearing a red and black sweater and her hands are on the side. And it was quite beautiful to watch him engage with with the painting.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
But he stood there just, and I was behind him speaking with other family members, but I was watching him on the side. And he kept gesturing the same movement as her for a long time. And then he turned around and said, that's her. I know that, Stan. I know that's her. That's what she does. And that just made me feel so, and he had this glow and this light
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
And I think for him, you know, my mother's birthday was coming up, so it was like this energy. You know, my mother's birthday, October 27th. The opening was October 18th. So I think it was this energy. She was there, right? And there was this moment that you had to witness that you could see he was connecting to her.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Yeah, I think still today, I still believe, based on my experiences as an artist, that institutions are not comfortable with the nude black body. If it's not stereotypically presented in ways of – I think I present the nude black body in a way of just like celebrating and honoring and putting forth like all of the strong qualities. I think unless it's about trauma –
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Servitude, yeah, or entertainment, yeah. And I think the gesturing of like us being performative for an audience is still the notions that the boxes in our compartmentalize some visual artists.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
No, but it's not.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
It just is. And it's the state of resting, the state of being, the state of existing and rooted and grounded in that space, I think is somewhat threatening to people. of the ownership of it, taking accountability for their own space. I think when that is exuded, that sense of strength is oftentimes kind of felt with aggression or a threat.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
I've had people say, oh, your images or the women are very confronting. And I said their gaze is very confronting.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
They're looking straight out at you. They're demanding the space. They're not demanding to be validated. They're just letting you know that they're there. But with all that, too, there's still, you know, the other side is there. vulnerability and sensitivity. And I think it's just one-sided if you're going to look at it as that the women are confronting you.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
But I think that comes from their understanding. Like, if you approach an image, I can't control what you bring to it. Because you're bringing these ideas of what you think of black women when they're sort of seated in the position of all knowingness. There's, you know, but we have been, we sat on thrones before. And I think, you know, we've been queens and kings.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
And, you know, I think more of those images are now being put forth and celebrated, which is incredible. I love seeing that.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Yeah, so when I was in Pratt, I couldn't afford oil paint. I would rummage often through the recycled stretcher bins and gather my materials from that. All I could afford was craft materials because they were cheaper than oil paint, like felt and different fabrics and glitter. It was cheaper than tubes of oil paint.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
I gravitated towards those materials because they were accessible and affordable for me. But what they did was open up a way of expressing myself. But then when I also – to note that during that time, it was the sensation show. at Brooklyn Museum.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
So you had all of these Great Britain artists that were showing at the Sensation Show, and they were using all kinds of materials from, like, Chris Ofili, Elephant Dong, and, you know, you had Tracy Emin personally tell a story, you know, making a tent out of, like, felt and canvas and all kind of material. And so I think seeing exhibitions like that really... were paramount.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
But yeah, there was a struggle completing some assignments because some you had to use oil paint or some you had to use the traditional materials to make the art.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
I would borrow some of the My peers were – they were good. They were like, oh, yeah, he used some of this. People weren't too stingy or trying to keep you away from that. But I think we all were working and they saw that I was definitely in my studio all the time. And so sometimes people throw away tubes of paint because they think it's not good and you just cut it open. It's still painted there.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
It's kind of like, you know, like, you know, toothpaste, you know, you kind of, so I would, you know, take an exacto knife and cut it down the middle and just open it up. And it's kind of like with some of the turp medium, just use some of what I had.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Yes, I am. And I feel like she's, Definitely always around me. I know that for sure. Like the other day, it was like I sat down in a certain way, and I felt like I was sitting like my mother. I was like, oh, my mother sits like that. Like I felt her.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Oh, yes, and I love it now. Before, I grew up as a kid not looking like her and always covet the fact that I was like, why don't I look like my mother? And I had a cousin who looked like her and they used to always mistake my cousin for my mother's daughter, which really kind of like messed me up as a child. Yeah. But now when I look in the mirror, I was just like, ah, there you are.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
Oh, yeah. She's got to see it, experience it.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
celebrated she was celebrated for it she loved the fact that she was a part of my art she loved coming to the openings she loved coming to my friends openings she never when I decided I wanted to be an artist she never looked at it as like now why are you wanting to go and do that some of those things were in my head but she never she never vocalized that she was a supportive dance and music and
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
All things theater. I mean, that's one of the things we shared.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Jon Batiste's 'Beethoven Blues' / Visual Artist Mickalene Thomas
We've been supportive characters for far too long and My art gives Black women their flowers and let them know that they are the leading role.