Sun Ra's Gift to Tomorrow
These portraits are part of a much larger collection. They are practitioners I connect to my Afrofuturism philosophy of future-based liberation and freedom. These black and white images are works in progress highlighting a few illustrated selections from an ongoing series examining my vinyl record collection and hard to find aspired additions to that collection. These works inspired through my “crate digging” as research for over 30 years connecting golden age Hip-Hop samples to their original source material additionally illustrate other pop cultural references like animation and comic books. Inspired by artists like Abdul Mati Klarwein, Overton Loyd, and Pedro Bell, to name a few, these works are intended to prompt audiences to think about the Black cultural wealth of Hip-Hop as a collage culture of various influences that tether the past to the speculative future through the Ghanaian concept of Sankofa meaning to “go back and get it.” We go back and retrieve Black pasts, bring them into the future with us as a means of defining our Black liberated futures.
Stacey A. Robinson
American, b. 1972
Ewing Gallery Purchase
archival inkjet print of a digital drawing
52 x 34 inches
print
Jimmy and the Black Fist Fire This Time
They are practitioners I connect to my Afrofuturism philosophy of future-based liberation and freedom. These black and white images are works in progress highlighting a few illustrated selections from an ongoing series examining my vinyl record collection and hard to find aspired additions to that collection. These works inspired through my “crate digging” as research for over 30 years connecting golden age Hip-Hop samples to their original source material additionally illustrate other pop cultural references like animation and comic books. Inspired by artists like Abdul Mati Klarwein, Overton Loyd, and Pedro Bell, to name a few, these works are intended to prompt audiences to think about the Black cultural wealth of Hip-Hop as a collage culture of various influences that tether the past to the speculative future through the Ghanaian concept of Sankofa meaning to “go back and get it.” We go back and retrieve Black pasts, bring them into the future with us as a means of defining our Black liberated futures.
Stacey A. Robinson
American, b. 1972
Ewing Gallery Purchase
archival inkjet print of a digital drawing
52 x 34 inches
print
B(9)rn
The Five-Percent Nation (aka) the Nation of Gods and Earths is a Black nationalist movement formed in 1964 by their founder Clarence 13X. Their influence is integral in the originals of Hip Hop culture. Connecting their human relationship to the universe Five-Percenters utilize a coded alphabetical and numerical system which represents attributes for life and self-governance. The numerical system which is called Supreme Mathematics uses numbers 1-0. 1 = Knowledge
2 = Wisdom
3 = Understanding
4 = Culture/Freedom
5 = Power/Refinement
6 = Equality
7 = God 8 = Build/Destroy
9 = Born
0 = Cipher.
In this series I’m providing a visual language to the written meaning of the Supreme Mathematics. An interpretation of what these attributes mean for me. This is a deeper dive into grasping better understanding of Five Percenter lessons and culture I’ve heard growing up.
Stacey A. Robinson
American, b. 1972
Gift of the Artist
archival inkjet print of a digital drawing
52 x 34 inches
print
Doom
In this illustrated work rapper MF DOOM as King Geedorah is verbalizing his consciousness through the art of beatboxing. Geeodorah is beatboxing a rendition of the Original DMX’s performance on Just-Ice’s The Girl is a Slut (1986). This piece also illustrates Bob Sakuma’s sample for Emblem G (1981) from the animated series Battle of the Planets. Out of these samples emerges my interpretation of the song The Fine Print, King Geedorah (2003). As the graffiti-inspired abstractions form and morph around King Geedorah, the 3-headed monster Ghidorah is conjured from his crown. Out of that smoke and fire explodes the Fiery Phoenix, again, a nod to the animated series Battle of the Planets. Here the Fiery Phoenix is illustrated through my rendition of X-Men artists John Byrne and Terry Austin’s Phoenix power signature from the Dark Phoenix Saga, Marvel comics (1980).
Stacey A. Robinson
American, b. 1972
Gift of the Artist
archival inkjet print of a digital drawing
52 x 34 inches
print
Grace Jones
There are so many layered depths to Grace Jones’s work. This portrait is a work in progress that is as many of newer works represents the drawing through the sample as a state of Black becoming, transcendence, and evolution. As I’m making this work, I’m refamiliarizing myself with her catalogue. Still my fav work of hers is Operattack from her 1985 album Slave to the Rhythm. This piece is a House music/Disco classic. Which I first became familiar with circa 1990, in my house music, club dancing days. Her echoed scream of “Slave” continuously overlapping, reverberating at points becomes inaudible when intermingled with the words ``annihilating rhythm” in various tones and pitches. At the central point of her performance, Jones then goes into what seems like a series of vocal thrusts, listening to it I feel a sense of pain in her a cadence reminiscent of a chain gang laying miles of train tracks in rhythm while surviving the moment. The chant becomes faster, almost becoming a different sound through the layered staccato. The stereo sound production bounces back and forth through from both ears, while the following “Dance to the Rhythm” command reverberates much deeper calls to much higher place. The vocal thrusts return to then do the same. By the song’s end the vocalizations become horrifically heavy in a sense and brilliantly leaves us there with no resolve, only anticipation, and speculation.
Stacey A. Robinson
American, b. 1972
Ewing Gallery purchase
archival inkjet print of a digital drawing
52 x 34 inches
print
M/D
Diane Solomon Kempler
American (1938 - 2023)
Gift of Renee Junge
1996
ceramic
sculpture