Johnson Lowe Gallery Fall Exhibits (Fridays)

From the venue:

The Sea Urchin Can’t Swim: Tales from the Edge of a World

Cosmo Whyte
4 October - 23 November 2024

Johnson Lowe Gallery is pleased to present our inaugural solo exhibition of Cosmo Whyte. Opening on October 4th, with a reception from 6-9 pm, and coinciding with the Atlanta Art Fair and Atlanta Art Week, Cosmo Whyte’s The Sea Urchin Can’t Swim: Tales from the Edge of a World, marks his first presentations with the gallery.

In The Sea Urchin Can’t Swim: Tales from the Edge of a World, Los Angeles based artist Cosmo Whyte continues his explorations of race, nationalism, and displacement in what ostensibly culminates in a presentation of land and seascapes. Drawing from his archives of personal migration, Caribbean folklore, and historical photographs related to water practices spanning from the 1930’s to the present, Whyte interrogates the controversial maritime practice of flags of convenience (FOC). The works on view scrutinize access, privilege, sovereignty, and decolonial nationhood, juxtaposing these historical maritime traditions with contemporary geopolitical dynamics. Through a diverse array of media, encompassing drawings, photography, sculpture, and installation, Whyte articulates the dialectical tensions between the foreign and the domestic, mirroring the liminal spaces of migration and the perpetual evolution of identity formation.
exhibit page here

They-- We Didn’t Realize We Were Seeds: We The Roses

Fahamu Pecou
4 October - 23 November 2024

Johnson Lowe Gallery is pleased to present our inaugural solo exhibition of Fahamu Pecou. Opening on October 4th, with a reception from 6-9 pm, and coinciding with the Atlanta Art Fair and Atlanta Art Week, Fahamu Pecou’s They We Didn’t Realize We Were Seeds: We The Roses, mark their first presentations with the gallery and his first Solo Exhibition in Atlanta in over 11 years.

Featuring new paintings, drawings, and sculptures, Fahamu Pecou’s exhibition “They We Didn’t Realize We Were Seeds: We The Roses” employs “Afrotropes”—a term coined by Huey Copeland and Krista Thompson, referring to the recurring codes, symbols, aesthetics, and concepts emanating from Black culture—to create encounters with everyday objects transformed and empowered through his meticulous process of recontextualization and cultural reclamation.

Presented across three distinct installations, the exhibition reimagines modern objects as mimetic fetishes, intertwining traditional African spiritual artifacts with contemporary Black cultural symbols. Through a series of drawings, Pecou highlights the Jordan 1 sneaker, illustrating its evolution from a mere basketball shoe to a cultural icon embodying aspiration, hope, triumph, and the transcendent power of flight. His paintings in “REAL NEGUS DON’T DIE” employ the graphic t-shirt—often a posthumous tribute to fallen Black icons—to challenge and overturn narratives of death and violence, instead celebrating their enduring legacies. In the vitrinal sculptures of “Louis Knapsack Where I’m Holding all the Work At,” Pecou transforms the transparent plastic backpacks, initially designed to monitor Black students, into fashionable objects, thereby addressing themes of racial violence and resilience. This exhibition, Pecou’s first gallery presentation in Atlanta since 2011, marks a significant and poignant homecoming for the artist.

exhibit page here

Solace in What Remains

Ashante Kindle
4 October - 23 November 2024

Johnson Lowe Gallery is pleased to present its second Project Space exhibition with Ashante Kindle, Solace in What Remains. Opening on October 4th, with a reception from 6-9 pm, and coinciding with the exhibitions of Cosmo Whyte’s The Sea Urchin Can’t Swim: Tales from the Edge of a World and Fahamu Pecou’s They Didn’t Realize We Were Seeds: We The Roses, this intimate presentation of Kindle’s work challenges notions of Black hair as merely an aesthetic and looks at its function as a deep well of history, autonomy, and resilience.

Solace in What Remains is an exploration of material transformation and the cultural significance of Black hair—its textures, history, and rituals—serving as its bedrock. This exhibition presents two interrelated bodies of work that deepen the engagement with a phenomenon central to African and African diasporic cultures—hair as a ritualistic, intimate, and symbolically rich site of where community and individual identity converge. Kindle employs a macro/micro analytical approach, wherein hair coloring is conceptualized as an expansive chromatic field, and the S curl is reimagined as a petri dish, presenting an assortment of puesdomolecular hair adornments.

At the heart of the exhibition are three circular tondos from the artist’s Stain Painting series, rendered in acrylic and hair dye. These ethereal, chromatic landscapes, shaped by their circular forms, evoke the head or crown—a potent symbol of authority, dignity, and identity. The repurposed stretchers and the use of hair dye emerged during Kindle’s fellowship with NXTHVN (2022-2023), where she began incorporating hair dyes from the infamous Dark & Lovely brand, a product line from L’Oreal marketed to black women. With evocative names like Red Hot Rhythm, Honey Blonde, and Poppin Pink, these dyes transcend their material origins, turning these works into sites of transformation, renewal, and aspiration.

In contrast, the Dark & Lovely series features densely textured black tondos that celebrate the culture and adornment of Black hair. Through materials such as satin, hair bows, barrettes, and styling strips, these pieces highlight the intricate rituals of Black hair care. The layering of acrylic creates tactile surfaces that elevate these objects—traditionally associated with beauty, protection, and care—into a celebration of identity and pride.

The tension between the colorful, atmospheric stain paintings and the heavily textured black tondos creates a dialogue about the many ways Black hair can be represented and honored—whether through soft expanses of color or through rich, tactile layers. Both approaches explore the depth of history, identity, and beauty embedded in Black hair, bringing to light its profound cultural and personal significance.

exhibit page here