Mickalene Thomas: All about love - Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Mickalene Thomas: All About Love will be the first major international tour focused on the work of the pioneering artist, whose influences range from 19th-century painting to popular culture. Co-organized by the Hayward Gallery, London, and The Broad, Los Angeles, and in partnership with the Barnes, All About Love will be shown as a series of independent presentations, with further venues to be confirmed.

 

In her art, Mickalene Thomas (American, b. 1971) articulates a complex and empowering vision of self while expanding on and subverting common definitions of beauty, sexuality, celebrity, and politics. The show will highlight how Thomas has redefined contemporary ideas of portraiture and subjects, introducing new ways of seeing the female body and dissecting the complexities of Black and female identity within the Western canon.

 

Through her work, Thomas subverts art history to claim notions of love, desire, and repose. She draws on representations of intergenerational female empowerment, autobiography, memory, and tenets of Black feminist theory in writing by authors and academics such as Kimberlé Crenshaw, Patricia Collins, and bell hooks, whose acclaimed 2000 essay collection All About Love is referenced in the exhibition's title. This exhibition will explore the ways in which Thomas's work draws on relationships and collaborations centered on love, self-expression, and joy.