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Wendell George Brown'Swing Low, Sweet Chariot' - quilt - Negro Spirituals - figurative textile 2003
2003
About the Item
Columbia, South Carolina-based artist, Wendell George Brown creates quilts that explore the traditions of African American quilt-making and Negro Spirituals. After finding a hymnal book that belonged to his maternal grandmother, “Everlasting Life is Free,” he sang the words aloud, “I was surprisingly comforted. Transfixed on the rhythmical vibration of the sound, I visualized each word; pieced, bound, and stitched together as a cover protecting a mournful soul.”
This epiphany allowed Wendell to see the synergy between quilts and Negro Spirituals, and to examine how the two mediums served as a source of protection for generations of enslaved and free Black people through the Civil Rights Movement and beyond. His work embraces the folk art genre, because folk art’s “outsider” status often serves to recognize the voice of the voiceless. “My goal is to make sense of Social-cultural issues,” says Wendell. “I hope all viewers see themselves in my work, and our shared desire to be heard, recognized, and treated with human dignity.”
As an educator at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta in the early 90s, he became enamored with a soft-sculpture installation on view by American artist Faith Ringgold titled "Wake and Resurrection of the Bicentennial Negro.” Later as Ringgold's assistant in New York, he began experimenting with the quilt, black fabric, and iconography as a source to investigate the African American "Veil of Double Consciousness," a subject explored by scholar W.E.B. Du Bois in a book of collected essays titled “The Souls of Black Folk.”
Inspired by traditional African art, the figures in his early quilted works did not have feet. In traditional African sculpture, this symbolized staying in one place to learn a lesson. Once you gained knowledge, you grew feet to move forward on the journey. In many ways, his work reflects his life lessons and of the artists that Wendell has met, worked with, and studied - especially John Biggers, Elizabeth Catlet, and William H. Johnson.
A Virginia native, Wendell George Brown is an Associate Professor of Art and Director of the Henry Ponder Gallery at Benedict College in Columbia, South Carolina. In addition, Brown currently serves as a Commissioner at the Columbia Museum of Art, and has served as Assistant Director of the Boyden Gallery at St. Mary's College of Maryland and Director of Museum Education at Hampton University in Virginia.
- Creator:Wendell George Brown (1966, American)
- Creation Year:2003
- Dimensions:Height: 78 in (198.12 cm)Width: 66 in (167.64 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:Atlanta, GA
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU155211808782
About the Seller
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