“For me, a black woman artist, to walk into the studio, is a political act.” — Emma AmosEmma Amos wa

“For me, a black woman artist, to walk into the studio, is a political act.” — Emma AmosEmma Amos was raised in Atlanta, Georgia, where her family was involved in the rich cultural scene cultivated by African American colleges, businesses, and community leaders in the face of the legal segregation of the time. Relocating to New York in 1960, Amos found herself closed off from the art world owing to her race and gender. A few years later Amos would become the youngest member—and only woman—of the New York collective Spiral, assembled as a support and networking group for black artists interested in social change. Spiral sought space and greater visibility for black artists in a racist art world, and its members debated art’s role in political activism.Utterly of its moment, Amos’s Sandy and Her Husband (1973) depicts a happy couple dancing in her apartment. The loving scene spotlights contemporaneous fashions as well as another of her own paintings, Flower Sniffer (1966)—also on view in We Wanted a Revolution. In this self-portrait, Amos presents herself alone in a vast, abstract field of paint, simply enjoying the fragrance of flowers. The artist nonetheless steadily returns the viewer’s gaze, asserting and defining her own place within her work.Emma Amos (America, born 1938). Sandy and Her Husband, 1973. Oil on canvas. Courtesy of Emma Amos. © Emma Amos; courtesy of the artist and RYAN LEE, New York. Licensed by VAGA, New York. -- source link

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