About the Artist
Mickalene Thomas
Mickalene Thomas (b. 1971) is a contemporary African-American artist best known for her complex paintings made of rhinestones, acrylic, and enamel. Her work draws from Western art history, pop art and visual culture to examine ideas around femininity, beauty, race, sexuality, and gender. She was raised by her mother Sandra "Mama Bush" Bush, who exposed Mickalene and her brother to art by enrolling them in after-school programs at the Newark Museum, and the Henry Street Settlement in New York. Thomas' mother raised her and her brother Buddhists. As a teenager, Mickalene and her mother had a very intimate and strenuous relationship due to her parents' addiction to drugs and Thomas dealing with her sexuality, which she documented in the short film Happy Birthday to a Beautiful Woman: A Portrait of My Mother. During her early career she found herself immersed in the growing culture of DIY artists and musicians, leading her to start her own body of work. Her depictions of African-American women explore notions of black female celebrity and identity while romanticizing ideas of femininity and power. Reminiscent of '70s style blaxploitation, the subjects in Thomas's paintings and collages radiate sexuality. Thomas's website notes that she presents a "complex vision of what it means to be a woman and expands common definitions of beauty" and "explores notions of beauty from a contemporary perspective influenced by popular culture and pop art."
