Kyle D. Jordan
Illuminated Innocence
Acrylic, oil pastel, & colored pencil on canvas 36” x 48” This piece comes as the second addition to a mini-series I found myself creating once I completed “She Who Sets the Table Shall Sit at It”. I wanted to explore the notion of the traditional, yet contemporary family unit, with “She...” serving as the matriarch. The young boy depicted is intended to assume the role of child in this family unit. Throughout the conceptualization and creation process I found that I was projecting myself onto both the child and patriarchal figures, likely because both the role of the young Black boy and a young Black man are so familiar to me; especially at this transitional period of life we call ‘Young Adulthood’. While projecting onto the boy, I recalled one of my first childhood drawings from when I was 5 or 6, which depicts an image of me being born. Both the image depicted in the drawing and the time at which I made the drawing were such innocent times in my life. All I knew was love and happiness. The age of the boy also represents a time in which young Black boys encounter what I refer to as ‘the social gaze’, but I’ll elaborate on that at a later time. And it is for those reasons that this is by-and-large a self portrait, though the image is not of myself.
Comments