Tavares Strachan Presents 'In Broad Daylight' at Perrotin
A series of Black Madonna sculptures that draw on the history of religious storytelling.
Tavares Strachan is best-known for his multi-layered compositions that fuse science, art, history and sports into a cosmic arena that probe questions into loss and representation. His latest solo exhibition, In Broad Daylight, is a noticeable departure.
On view at Perrotin in Paris, the show is Strachan’s first with the gallery and presents a series of Carrara marble sculptures that depict various Black mothers as they weep the loss of their child. In a statement on the work, Strachan was notably drawn to how religious storytelling has historically smashed “beauty and tragedy” together. “This is what I am trying to do with this series of sculptures.”
The title of the show refers to the idiom used when describing the brazen-ness of a crime — one that is committed unabashedly with witnesses around, leaving the public in a state of shock. Under this framework, each of Strachan’s Black Madonna sculptures serve as a funeral monument — imploring the onlooker to ponder the universality of the mother-child bond, along with the burden Black mothers face when mourning the death of a child who was violently murdered, while inadvertently mediating the civic unrest that is caused, as a result.
“In Broad Daylight asks the audience to consider the lives of these men through the quieted, but stalwart, agencies (creative, intellectual, nurturing, tactical) of their mothers, all common enough Black women, who had to manage the anger and secrets that evolve from the societal limits that have historically predetermined that position,” wrote Romi Crawford, professor of Visual and Critical Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
The exhibition will be on view at Perrotin’s Impasse Saint-Claude location until December 17.
On the topic of exhibitions, Antony Gormley is showcasing his latest sculptures at Xavier Hufkens.
Perrotin
10 Imp. Saint-Claude
75003 Paris, France
