Lavaughan Jenkins
Miss Black America
July 21 - August 29, 2021
Abigail Ogilvy Gallery proudly presents its first solo exhibition by Boston-based painter Lavaughan Jenkins. The exhibition, titled Miss Black America, is a powerful message that honors women past and present, embraces Blackness to address the marginalization of a group that is underrepresented in visual spaces, and is a demonstration of Jenkins’ personal resilience as an artist. As his career has developed, Jenkins has experimented with dimensional space, texture, and color. Heavily influenced by fashion, the resulting body of work is an explosion of dynamic patterns used to explore the intersection of race, womanhood, and the Covid-19 pandemic. The exhibition is named after a song released in 1970 by musician and activist Curtis Mayfield, and still the lyrics remain just as relevant today. The paintings themselves capture both the chaos of the past year as well as the hope for the future.
“My work is layered in Black history and pop culture embracing blackness as a signifier of difference to address the marginalization of blacks in the visual and occupied space. The black aesthetic of the figures along with the countenance of grieving, non heroic, the quiet get thrusted into the grand narrative of art.” - Lavaughan Jenkins
August 13, 2021: The Boston Globe - ‘Miss Black America’ Spotlights Everyday Heroines
no place like you, 2021
Oil paint on paper
30 x 22 in.
🔴SOLD
(Don’t worry) If there is a hell below, we’re all going to go, 2021
Oil paint on paper
30 x 22 in.
🔴SOLD
Hold us together (cotton field), 2021
Oil paint on paper
30 x 22 in.
🔴SOLD
Coffy is the color, 2021
Oil paint on paper
30 x 22 in.
🔴SOLD
I’ve been trying, 2021
Oil paint on paper
30 x 22 in.
🔴SOLD
is that enough (cotton field), 2021
Oil paint on paper
30 x 22 in.
🔴SOLD
ain’t got time, 2021
Oil paint on paper
30 x 22 in.
🔴SOLD
I didn’t ask to come, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
18 x 9.5 x 7.5 in.
if you want me to stay, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
18 x 9.5 x 7.5 in.
🔴SOLD
where are we going, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
18 x 9.5 x 7.5 in.
🔴SOLD
hold on, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
19 x 9.5 x 7.5 in.
🔴SOLD
Pull the Pin, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
14 x 4 x 4.5 in.
🔴SOLD
make me believe in you, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
9.5 x 5.5 x 5 in.
🔴SOLD
S.R. Studio. L.A. CA., 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
13 x 6 x 5 in.
🔴SOLD
Untitled 173, 2020
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
10 x 3.5 x 3.5 in.
50% of sale will be donated to Stone House
Untitled 174, 2020
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
10 x 3.5 x 3.5 in.
50% of sale will be donated to Stone House
Untitled 175, 2020
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
10 x 3.5 x 3.5 in.
50% of sale will be donated to Stone House
for all we know, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
13 x 6 x 6 in.
🔴SOLD
better in color, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
13 x 7 x 6.5 in.
🔴SOLD
blue sky, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
13 x 6 x 6.5 in.
🔴SOLD
we shall not be moved, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
11.5 x 6 x 6 in.
the people, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
13 x 5 x 5 in.
the world... black history, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
11.5 x 6 x 6 in.
🔴SOLD
deep, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
11.5 x 6 x 6 in.
🔴SOLD
my people, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
13 x 6 x 6 in.
🔴SOLD
worship, 2021
Oil paint with foam and modeling paste structure
11.5 x 6 x 6 in.
🔴SOLD
"Hello Daddy"
"Hello baby, how is my love child?" "Fine"
"Tell me, of all your dreams, what most do you hope te be when you become a big girl?"
"Daddy, I would like to be Miss Black America"
Hurringly stepping so proud
Mother nature's only god child
Society salutes you today
And we'd like to say
God bless Miss Black America
Watch over Miss Black America
She cried tears of success
We wish her long happiness
Miss Black America
Sisters we're all so very proud
Of that natural look we se among the crowd
World wide admiration
From nation to nation
They love you Miss Black America
We love you too Miss Black America
You're such wonderful people
And so beautifully equal
Miss Black America
A culture no one can deny
If a young child should ask
Then tell them why
They should not be ashamed
Of their past, just explain
The true mother is Black America
None other than Miss Black America
She cried tears of success
We wish her long happiness
Miss Black America
Miss Black America
We're so proud of you
Miss Black America
Miss Black America, Curtis Mayfield