Gallery > Abstract drawings

Abstract drawings focus on topic mixed identity and concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” Conté and charcoal used to explore labels. My work questions the confining nature of the black/white binary model, stereotyping, and the racialized experience.
Abstract drawings focus on topic mixed identity and concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” Conté and charcoal used to explore labels. My work questions the confining nature of the black/white binary model, stereotyping, and the racialized experience.
Abstract drawings focus on topic mixed identity and concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” Conté and charcoal used to explore labels. My work questions the confining nature of the black/white binary model, stereotyping, and the racialized experience.
Abstract drawings focus on topic mixed identity and concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” Conté and charcoal used to explore labels. My work questions the confining nature of the black/white binary model, stereotyping, and the racialized experience.
Abstract drawings focus on topic mixed identity and concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” Conté and charcoal used to explore labels. My work questions the confining nature of the black/white binary model, stereotyping, and the racialized experience.
Abstract drawings focus on topic mixed identity and concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” Conté and charcoal used to explore labels. My work questions the confining nature of the black/white binary model, stereotyping, and the racialized experience.
Abstract drawings focus on topic mixed identity and concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” Conté and charcoal used to explore labels. My work questions the confining nature of the black/white binary model, stereotyping, and the racialized experience.
Abstract drawings focus on topic mixed identity and concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” Conté and charcoal used to explore labels. My work questions the confining nature of the black/white binary model, stereotyping, and the racialized experience.
Abstract drawings focus on topic mixed identity and concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” Conté and charcoal used to explore labels. My work questions the confining nature of the black/white binary model, stereotyping, and the racialized experience.
Abstract drawings focus on topic mixed identity and concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” Conté and charcoal used to explore labels. My work questions the confining nature of the black/white binary model, stereotyping, and the racialized experience.

My current series of abstract drawings explore the topic of mixed identity and the concepts “blackness” and “whiteness.” I overlay very thin layers of conté and charcoal, and then add coats of black charcoal to the top layers, creating different arrangements of neutral colours (white, brown, and black). The overall effect is that the lighter colours – white and brown – get muted and overshadowed by the darker colour – black. I do this as a way to look at my blackness - a marker that’s followed me all of my life – and to explore the different ways I have been labeled by others, or have labeled myself, for example: “half black and half white,” “black but white,” etc. In general, the drawings examine the black/white binary often imposed on me, and the racialized experience. Some questions my work asks are: "What does being 'black' and/or 'white' mean?” “Do these labels of colour only function together as a pair, or can they be understood separately?” “Does the black/white binary model help perpetuate negative stereotyping?”