Hebru Brantley “Wait a Cotton Picking Minute”
Lyons Wier Gallery
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From the absurd and blatant to the subtle and subversive, Hebru Brantley’s work explores the stereotypes and racist propaganda found in American mass media, such as early Warner Brothers and Disney cartoons. What emerges is an intelligent and vivid deconstruction of America’s social history and the chilling possibility that we have all in someway been infected by the same subliminal, racially insensitive media virus.
Brantley’s subjects are often cinematic, gleaned from “Blaxploitation” films and science fiction thrillers. His spray-painted and stylistically brushed canvases show the influence of Romare Bearden, Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Black Folk Art. The raw emotion and youthful expression in Brantley's work depicts themes of race like an open, unhealed wound. The characters in Brantley's art, such as his “Coon Toons” series, reveals our shared past co-mingling with our present consciousness and sensitivities.
How should we deal with our racial history and all the artifacts that come along with it? Do we bury the offending materials and pretend it never existed or do we inject the materials into the ongoing public dialogue about race and racism in America? These questions serve as both impetus and fodder for Brantley’s work. The magic and mythology of childhood animation meets a fitting analysis, through a young artist whose critical eye dismantles the soft power of this “entertainment.”
Media
Schedule
from September 10, 2010 to October 04, 2010
Opening Reception on 2010-09-10 from 18:00 to 21:00