#arvie smith

[oldsardens]

Arvie Smith - Hands Up Don't Shoot

[thankfulshawty]

Arvie Smith,

“2 Up and 2 Back”

baby took me on a surprise date🧡

[oldsardens]

Arvie Smith - Dem Golden Slippers

[barnsburntdownnow]

Blondie (detail) Arvie Smith; b. 1938 Oil on canvas, 2015

[bmoreart]

In his review of “The Image of the Black: Reimagined and Redefined” at Galerie Myrtis, Jermaine T. Bell explores seemingly conflicting approaches to asserting black identity in contemporary culture. 

http://bmoreart.com/2015/10/the-black-gaze-where-cliff-huxtable-and-cookie-lyon-can-coexist.html

[publicarthistory]

Arvie Smith (American, born 1938), Dem Golden Slippers, 2007, oil on linen, Gift of Donna Hammar, © Arvie Smith, 2010.80

This work is not currently on view.

BUT! There’s an exhibition of Arvie Smith’s work at Mark Woolley Gallery in Portland, OR opening Saturday May, 16 and running through July 12.

“My grandparents raised me in Texas. He was a college history prof in an all-black college. She was head teacher and principal for a separate-but equal grade school. The KKK burned down my ‘uppity’ grand uncle’s farm. Great grandmother was a slave in N. Carolina. Great grandfather stowed away on a ship from Jamaica and made a home in Texas. At 13, I was sent to South Central LA, where my mother worked three jobs to create a home for my siblings and me. I had never been in a world where children disrespected their elders. As a gang member, I was able to protect myself and my siblings. Gang membership offers black males a sense of fraternity and a sense of being in the absence of father figures, then and now. My post-Obama work captures the celebration, the amazement, the hope. Although the idea that blacks are seen as inferior continues. Obama’s election invites African Americans to say: ‘I can be President. I see and feel the audacity of hope; the encouragement that yes, I am in no way inferior nor am I a second-class citizen. I am somebody.’ Blacks depend on the largest of the dominant culture for recognition. In life, we filter everything. Before we speak we must consider the consequences of our words. No black person feels secure in their position. Through art there is freedom. I expose the slights, discrimination, condescension. I speak unfettered of my perceptions of the black experience. By critiquing atrocities and oppression, by creating images that foment dialogue, I hope my work makes the repeat of those atrocities and injustices less likely.” - Arvie Smith

[youdidwhatnow]

Arvie Smith: The Kiss

[gallery114]

For the month of June, Gallery 114 is excited to have Arvie Smith as a guest artist. Come on down to the gallery to see his work from June 5th through the 28th.