Ebony G. Patterson: Dead Treez

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Ebony G. Patterson Dead Treez

© 2015



EBONY G. PATTERSON: DEAD TREEZ

Ebony G. Patterson: Dead Treez showcases the artist’s mixed-media installations and jacquard-woven photo tapestries that explore class, gender, and race through the lens of popular culture, social media, dress, and personal adornment. Her highly embellished, illuminated imagery is intended to attract the gaze of the viewer. Once captivated, the viewer is challenged to look beyond Patterson’s mesmerizing surfaces for a deeper commentary. Influenced by Jamaica’s popular yet controversial dancehall culture, Patterson explores the paradoxical relationship between traditional gender codes and the bombastic aesthetics of dancehall pageantry. Meant to present a complex vision of masculinity, the sculptural installation is a meditation on dancehall fashion and culture, regarded as a celebration of the disenfranchised in postcolonial Jamaica. Although its fashion has long employed a camp sensibility rooted in spectacle, the growing influence of male metrosexuality worldwide has encouraged a style that incorporates more feminine sensibilities. By camouflaging the body with textiles, Patterson isolates and highlights the gestures and postures often associated with machismo. In her floor tapestries, Patterson borrows the flamboyant aspects of dancehall dress to draw attention to murder victims. Inspired by the images and reports of violent fatalities she sees circulated on social media, Patterson creates visually compelling images of the deceased that seduce the viewer into bearing witness to the underreported and unacknowledged brutality experienced by those living on the lower rungs of the socioeconomic ladder.


Throughout Dead Treez, clothing is used to define and exemplify questions of visibility for the disenfranchised. By covering the body with pattern, Patterson references the popularity of skin bleaching and tattooing, suggesting that skin alteration is more than embellishment; it is an erasure motivated by a desire for presence. In the artist’s words: There is a challenge being made about seeing and looking. The seeing is what happens on social media, but the looking is what I’m asking you to do. The looking requires thought, it requires engagement, it requires awareness, it requires inquiry, and it requires presence. Dead Treez was organized by the John Michael Kohler Arts Center in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, and curated by Karen Patterson. It was secured for the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) by William and Mildred Lasdon Chief Curator Shannon R. Stratton. … buried again to carry on growing … is an original MAD exhibition, organized by Stratton with the support of Curatorial Assistant and Project Manager Barbara Paris Gifford. Ebony G. Patterson: Dead Treez is made possible by the generous support of Judith and Stanley Zabar; Barbara Karp Shuster; Christopher K. Ho; Marian C. Burke and Russell Burke; Peri and Nacho Arenas; Bill and Christy Gautreaux, Kansas City, MO; Janice Savin Williams and Christopher J. Williams; and Monique Meloche Gallery. Additional support is provided by the Director’s Circle, a leading Museum support group.


Ebony G. Patterson (Jamaican, b. 1981 Kingston, lives Kingston and works Lexington, KY) is the recipient of many prestigious fellowships, awards and grants, including the Aaron Matalon Award from the Jamaica Biennial (2014), William H. Johnson Prize finalist (2013), a Musgrave Medal from the Institute of Jamaica (2012), Small Axe Magazine and Andy Warhol Commissioned Grant (2012), and Rex Nettleford Fellowship in Cultural Studies (2011). Recently, Patterson was featured in the 12th Havana Biennial: Between the Idea and the Experience, Havana, Cuba (2015); Prospect.3: Notes for Now, curated by Franklin Sirmans, New Orleans, LA (2014), and the Jamaica Biennial 2014, National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston. Her work will be featured in the upcoming seasons of Empire, directed by Lee Daniels (20th Century Fox Television) and will exhibit at 32nd Sao Paolo Biennial in 2016. Her solo exhibition Dead Treez at the Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, WI travels to the Museum of Art and Design, New York, NY (November 2015). Recent and upcoming shows include a solo exhibition at the Studio Museum in Harlem (March 2016); Disguise: Masks and Global African Art, Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA (through Sept 2015); and En Mas’: Carnival 21st Century Style, The Caribbean as Site Specific Performance that recently closed at the Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA will now embark on a tour of the Caribbean that will begin at the National Art Gallery of the Cayman Islands (2016) and onto the National Gallery of the Bahamas. Her work has been published in The New York Times, The Financial Times, Forbes Magazine, Frieze Magazine, Vogue Italia, The Huffington Post, Artnet, Blouin Artinfo, ARC Magazine, Chicago Magazine, The Jamaica Observer, The Miami Herald, and Art Voices Magazine, amongst others. Her work is in the public collections of the National Gallery of Jamaica, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Nasher Museum at Duke University. Patterson is Associate Professor in Painting and Mixed Media at the University of Kentucky in Lexington and is currently on sabbatical and was awarded a faculty research grant for 2015.


II Rosez, 2014 Mixed media jacquard weaved tapestry with jewelry and 150 crochet flowers 9 x 19.5 feet Installed at John Michael Kohler Arts Center, 2015


II Rosez, 2014 (detail)


II Rosez, 2014 (detail)


Left: Root and Shrub, 2014 Mixed media jacquard weaved tapestry with toys, flowers, and tassels 9 x 6.8 feet Installed at John Michael Kohler Arts Center, 2015 Right: Root and Shrubz, 2014 Mixed media jacquard tapestry with embellished toys, flowers, and tassels 9 x 6.8 feet Installed at John Michael Kohler Arts Center, 2015


Root and Shrub, 2014 (detail)


Root and Shrubz, 2014 (detail)


where we found them, 2014 Mixed media jacquard weaved tapestry with jewelry, shoes, gold chains, tassels, 100 crochet flowers 8 x 6 feet Installed at John Michael Kohler Arts Center, 2015


where we found them, 2014 (detail)



where we found them, 2014 (detail)



the passing (dead daadi), 2013 Mixed media jacquard woven tapestry with hand embellishment 84 x 60 inches


Swag Swag Krew from the Out and Bad series, 2011-15 Mixed media installation with 10 mannequins, clothing, cinder blocks, flowers, hand embellished objects, pedestal 16 x 4 x 7 feet


Swag Swag Krew from the Out and Bad series, 2011-15 (detail)


The following are excerpts from an interview with artist Ebony G. Patterson conducted by Karen Patterson, exhibition curator.


The Artist on the Articulation of Gender in Dress and Fashion “I have been thinking about gender and thinking about objects as a way to define gender; especially since the millennium, men’s fashion has shifted with this idea of metrosexuality. There is a kind of feminized aesthetic being used to describe the ‘macho.’ In thinking about how one defines gender through clothing, I wondered if we would be able to make these types of determinations if I removed the body altogether and began to include the gesturing and posturing. Swag Swag Krew is a three-dimensional imagining of these ideas.…In many ways, these works think about the body as a contested site regarding what is and isn’t masculine…As I was making this work, skin bleaching and tattooing became more popular at home (Jamaica), the covering of these mannequins, which was initially a layering of patterning, became a meditation of how skin is another dimension of dress. “The conversations around gender also stem from my own personal experiences. When I was younger, I always wore pants and because of this, my sexuality was always in question. I am coming from a particularly conservative society where there are these very clear rules or clear expectations about femininity or masculinity. Jamaica is a very matriarchal country that runs on patriarchal rules with expectations about what a woman is or isn’t. As I was working on this piece, an article came out in Jamaica stating that women were having a hard time finding jeans because men were buying them up because that was the style. When I saw these conversations happening, I saw people pointing at each other and it was interesting to me to see how these things ebb and flow. But to me, the conversations around defining sexuality hasn’t really changed. There are still rules and I just don’t understand why these kinds of rules need to be in play at all.” The Shift Toward Tapestries “Most of my works addressing masculinity were works on paper, but I had done a photo shoot with boys in a very decorative environment with wallpaper patterning and loved it so much that I wanted to work big. I was asked to participate in the Ghetto Biennale in Haiti and was interested in the intersection of popular culture and voodoo, which is infused into every aspect of everyday life. I opted to work with flags (traditionally designed and embellished to facilitate religious experiences). Ultimately, this project got me away from works on paper and thinking of new surfaces. One day, I was walking through Walmart and saw prints on tapestries, and I asked myself if this would work. I am always using feminine tropes to mesh on the masculine, and from a domestic standpoint, the tapestry seemed to make sense.”


The Use of Glitter and the Importance of Light “Krista Thompson’s [Northwestern University] work was very important to me; she was researching on the use of light in diasporic cultures and as I began to think about my work more critically, I started to see glitter for what it is; it is light, it is illumination. I was looking a lot at party photos on different websites and thinking a lot about light; in this case, it was photo light and video light and how the photo light becomes this way of giving visibility to people and a chance for the ordinary person to shine.” The New Work: Dead Treez “An image was circulating on social media of a threeyear-old child who was murdered in a tenement housing project. Bystanders took pictures and shared them with the intent to raise awareness—that this photo was so disturbing that it would get attention. I think there is something very strange that happens with people who choose to share images like that. We no longer think about the individual, it’s not a person, it’s an image, it’s an object. There is this distance, we now only experience the world through a screen which separates us from the reality. The catch-22 is that if we didn’t have social media, these people— these invisibles—would not be visible, we would not know about them. “With this new body of work, I started thinking a lot about visibility and the Internet in terms of the bee-and-flower syndrome. The bee is attracted to the flower because of its coloring, because of its beauty, and it isn’t until he gets in that he discovers if the flower has the nectar that he wants. So you are attracted to the work because of its shininess, because of its prettiness, but it’s not until you get into the work that you start to realize that there’s something more. There is a challenge being made about seeing and looking. The seeing is what happens in social media but the looking is what I’m asking you to do. The looking requires thought, it requires engagement, it requires awareness, and it requires presence.”


Dead Treez, installed at the Museum of Arts and Design, 2015 Photo by Butcher Walsh


Dead Treez, installed at the Museum of Arts and Design, 2015 Photo by Butcher Walsh


Swag Swag Krew from the Out and Bad series, 2011-15 Mixed media installation with 10 mannequins, clothing, cinder blocks, flowers, hand embellished objects, pedestal 16 x 4 x 7 feet Photo by Butcher Walsh


Left: Root and Shrub, 2014 Mixed media jacquard weaved tapestry with toys, flowers, and tassels 9 x 6.8 feet Right: Root and Shrubz, 2014 Mixed media jacquard tapestry with embellished toys, flowers, and tassels 9 x 6.8 feet Photo by Butcher Walsh


II Rosez, 2014 Mixed media jacquard weaved tapestry with jewelry and 150 crochet flowers 9 x 19.5 feet Installed at the Museum of Arts and Design, 2015 Photo by Butcher Walsh


where we found them, 2014 Mixed media jacquard weaved tapestry with jewelry, shoes, gold chains, tassels, 100 crochet flowers 8 x 6 feet Installed at the Museum of Arts and Design, 2015 Photo by Butcher Walsh


… buried again to carry on growing … A POV by Ebony G. Patterson

Extending themes from Dead Treez, including the bee-and-flower syndrome and questions of social and cultural visibility, Ebony G. Patterson incorporates her material and collage sensibility with the Museum of Arts and Design’s (MAD) contemporary art jewelry to produce a mysterious garden landscape. Inspired by the Alnwick Garden’s “Poison Garden” in Northumberland, England, Patterson’s garden in the Tiffany Gallery presents a curated variety of dangerous flora and fauna to populate a landscape where camouflaged and patterned bodies commingle with bold and extraordinary selections from the jewelry collection. Using the cases like a terrarium, Patterson turns the gallery into a sculptural installation consisting of three scenarios in which bodies and body parts, like the ones seen in Dead Treez, represent the violence often endemic to marginalized communities. Throughout the cases the jewelry from the collection is incorporated into the landscape, positioned to appear as though it belonged to the bodies that are disappearing in the underbrush. Patterson’s work addresses how choices in clothing, jewelry, or other forms of personal adornment are endeavors to be visible on the part of populations rendered invisible by poverty, racism, and other oppressive socioeconomic conditions. Impoverished, inner-city communities in Jamaica often have the word “garden” in their names. Patterson’s installation accentuates the contrast between places that are designed to be about beauty, growth, and life, and the hardships and sorrow that are daily obstacles in neighborhoods that use the same name. In foregrounding this contradiction, Patterson raises urgent questions about what is at stake for people to blossom and thrive despite adversity. Patterson’s curated installation of jewelry drawn from MAD’s collection is the second in the series POV, a project that invites guests’ perspectives on the Museum’s permanent collection through the lens of their own work. The title … buried again to carry on growing … is inspired by the poem “Brief Lives” by Jamaican poet and author Olive Senior.


‌buried again to carry on growing‌, 2015 Installation view at the Museum of Arts and Design, 2015 Photo by Butcher Walsh


‌buried again to carry on growing‌, 2015 Installation view at the Museum of Arts and Design, 2015 Photo by Butcher Walsh


‌buried again to carry on growing‌, 2015 (detail) Photo by Butcher Walsh


‌buried again to carry on growing‌, 2015 (detail) Photo by Butcher Walsh


‌buried again to carry on growing‌, 2015 (detail) Photo by Butcher Walsh


EBONY G. PATTERSON Jamaican, born Kingston, Jamaica 1981 (lives Kingston, Jamaica/works Lexington, Kentucky) Education 2004-06 MFA, Sam Fox College of Design & Visual Arts, Washington University in St. Louis, Printmaking/ Drawing 2000-04 Edna Manley College for the Visual and Performing Arts, Kingston, Jamaica, Honors Diploma in Painting Selected Solo Exhibitions 2016 …when they enjoy grow up, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY Invisible Presence: Bling Memories, Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, Atlanta, GA 2015 Dead Treez, The Museum of Arts and Design, New York, NY unearthing treez, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL Lux Art Institute, Encinitas, CA Dead Treez, John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, WI 2014 dy/nas/ty, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS 2013 …until you see them, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL 2012 Out and Bad vs Cheap and Clean, CMAC Scène Nationale de Martinique, Fort-de France Bay, Martinique Out & Bad, Bermuda National Gallery, Hamilton, Bermuda Cheap & Clean: Interrogating Masculinities simultaneous Podcast at Fresh Milk platform (St. Georges, Barbados), Bermuda National Gallery (Hamilton, Bermuda), Alice Yard (Port-of-Spain, Trinidad), Popop Studios (Nassau, The Bahamas) & Kentucky Museum of Art 2011 Untitled from the of 72 series, Land of Tomorrow Gallery, Louisville, KY Ebony G. Patterson, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL ACT 5: 2 of 219, Alice Yard, Port of Spain, Trinidad 2010 Fashion Ova’ Style, See Line Gallery, West Hollywood, CA 2009 Gangstas, Disciplez, and the Doily Boys, Gage Gallery, Edna Manley College, Kingston, Jamaica 2007 Hybrids, See Line Gallery, Santa Monica, CA 2006 Specimen, University City Library, St. Louis, MO Case Studies: Venus, Cuts and Aprons, Mutual Gallery, Kingston, Jamaica 2005 Dialysis, UC Gallery, University of Montana, Missoula, MT Selected Group Exhibitions 2016 32nd Bienal de São Paulo, Brazil crated by Jochen Volz Sanford Biggers and Ebony G. Patterson, moniquemeloche LES, New York, NY Jamaican Routes, curated by Selene Wendt, Punkt Ø/Galleri F 15, Norway Southern Accent: Seeking the American South in Contemporary Art, Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, NC, travels to The Speed Museum, Louisville, KY En Mas’: Carnival 21st Century Style, The Caribbean as Site Specific Performance, The National Gallery of the Cayman Islands, Grand Cayman, travels to The National Gallery of the Bahamas, Nassau, Bahamas 2015 Art of Transformation, curated by Tumelo Mosaka, The ARC, Opa-Locka Arts & Recreation Center, Miami, FL


Selected Group Exhibitions continued 2015 To Be Young, Gifted, and Black, curated by Hank Willis Thomas, Goodman Gallery, Johannesburg, South Africa BOTTOMS UP: A Sculpture Survey, University of Kentucky Art Museum, Lexington, KY Reality of My Surroundings, Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Durham, NC ReSignifications: European Blackamoors, Africana Re-Stagings, Florence, Italy, as part of Black Portraitures II conference co-organized by New York University and Harvard University Between the Idea and Experience, 12th Havana Biennial, Havana, Cuba Disguise: Masks and Global African Art, Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA Piece by Piece: Building a Collection, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO En Mas’: Carnival 21st Century Style, The Caribbean as Site Specific Performance, Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA 2014 Jamaica Biennial 2014, National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston, Jamaica Prospect.3: Notes for Now, curated by Franklin Sirmans, Newcomb Art Gallery, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA Dis-semblance: Projecting and Perceiving Identity, 21C Museum Hotel, Bentonville, AR GOLD, Bass Art Museum, Miami, FL; travelled to Neuberger Museum of Art, State University of New York, Purchase, NY Caribbean: Crossroads of the World, curated by Elvis Fuentes, Perez Art Museum, Miami, FL, co-organized with El Museo del Barrio, the Queens Museum of Art and The Studio Museum in Harlem, NY Pictures from Paradise : A Survey of Contemporary Caribbean Photography, curated by Melanie Archer, Mariel Brown and Kenneth Montague, The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery, Toronto, Canada In Retrospect: 40 Years of the National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston, Jamaica 2013 eMERGING: Visual Art and Music in a Post-Hip-Hop Era, curated by James Bartlett, The Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts (MoCADA), Brooklyn, NY Explorations II: Religion and Spirituality, National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston Jamaica Six Degrees of Separate Nations, Ebony G. Patterson and Peterson Kamwathi Waweru, curated by Claire Breukel, Frost Art Museum, Florida International University, Miami, FL Natural Histories, Curated by O'Neil Lawrence and Nicole Smythe-Johnson, National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston, Jamaica 2012 OFFSPRING, 21c Museum Hotel, Cincinnati, OH Bigger than Shadows, curated by Rich Blint and Ian Cofré, Dodge Gallery, New York, NY Aruba Biennial: Happy Islands, curated by José Manuel Noceda Fernández, Aruba National Biennial 2012, National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston, Jamaica Caribbean: Crossroads of the World, The Studio Museum in Harlem, co-organized with El Museo del Barrio and the Queens Museum of Art, New York, NY I is Another, Curated by Rachael Barrett, New Art Exchange, Nottingham, UK Contemporary Jamaica Art Circa 1962/Circa 2012, Curated by Veerle Poupeye, Art Gallery of Mississauga, Canada Into the Mix, Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft, Louisville, KY


Selected Group Exhibitions continued 2011 Black Gossamer, Curated by Camille Morgan, Columbia College Chicago, Chicago, IL From Jamaica to China, a new evolution, The Painting Center, New York, NY Wrestling with the Image: Caribbean Interventions, Art Museum of the Americas, Washington, DC Winter Experiment, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL 2010 National Biennial 2010, National Gallery of Jamaica , Kingston, Jamaica Young Talent V, National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston, Jamaica Gathering Together, Kravets / Wehby Gallery, New York, NY Art Fresh, Mutual Gallery, Kingston, Jamaica Vous etes ici/ You are Here, Fondation Clement, Le Francois, Martinique 2009 Ghetto Biennale, Grand Rue, Port-au-Prince, Haiti Rockstone and Bootheel: Contemporary West Indian Art, Curated by Kristina Newman-Scott and Yona Becker, Real Art Ways, Hartford, CT Caribbean Vibrations Festival, Maison des Cultures du Monde, French Alliance Foundation, Paris, France Here and New UK College of Fine Art Faculty Exhibit, Tuska Gallery, University of Kentucky LIP/ STICK , Praxis Gallery, New York, NY Incognito, Santa Monica Art Museum, Santa Monica, CA Wi Did Di Deh, Morlan Gallery, Transylvania University, Lexington, KY 2008 Boys of Summer, moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL De Facto, Sam Francis Gallery/ Crossroads School, Santa Monica, CA New Blue Emerging: First Kentucky Art Biennial, Kentucky Art Museum, Louisville, KY Wall to Wall: Large Scale Drawing, Lexington Art League, Lexington, KY Four Aces: Exhibition of Large Scale Prints, (Traveling Exhibition) Bruno David Gallery, St. Louis, MO, University of Texas, Austin, TX, San Marcos State University, San Marcos, CA, University of Madison, Madison, WI The Art of Collage, Mutual Gallery, Kingston, Jamaica 2007 Infinite Island: Contemporary Caribbean Art, Curated by Tumelo Mosaka, Brooklyn Museum, NY Closet Project (Installation), Mack B Gallery, Sarasota, FL Woolworth Windows, Tacoma Contemporary, Tacoma, WA Four Aces, University of Louisiana Lafayette, Lafayette , LA University of Kentucky New Faculty Exhibit, Tuska Contemporary Art Centre, Lexington, KY Four Aces, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 2006 Jamaica Biennial, National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston, Jamaica Intimate Matter, Two Person Exhibit, Off-Campus Gallery Charlottesville, VA Making New Friends, Mack B Gallery, Sarasota, FL University of Virginia Faculty Exhibit, Off-Campus Gallery, Charlottesville, VA Flat Files, St. Louis Contemporary Art Museum, St. Louis, MO Redhead Experimental Exhibit: A History of Women’s Art, New York, NY Young Generations 2006, Mutual Gallery Kingston, Jamaica MFA Thesis Exhibit II, Washington University St. Louis, MO


Selected Group Exhibitions continued 2005 Identity and History: Personal and Social Narratives in Art in Jamaica, Curated by Eddie Chambers, Curator’s Eye II, National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston, Jamaica Super Plus Under 40 Artist of the Year, Mutual Gallery, Kingston, Jamaica Eight, First Year MFA Show, DesLee Gallery, St. Louis, MO Young Generations, Mutual Gallery, Kingston, Jamaica Saakhi: A Multi-Ethnic look at Women’s health and Women’s Bodies, 3rd Floor Gallery, St. Louis, MO 2004 Jamaica Biennial, National Gallery, Kingston, Jamaica Young Professional, Pegasus, Kingston, Jamaica exhibition in association with Centre d’Art Contemporain, (CIAC) Pont Aven, France Stages, Edna Manley College, Kingston, Jamaica SUNY Brockport / Edna Manley College Student Exchange Show, Brockport, NY Selected Bibliography 2016 Cotter, Holland. “Ebony G. Patterson: Dead Treez,” The New York Times, Arts section p. C25, February 12. Standley, Michelle. “Life and death in a poisonous garden” The Brooklyn Rail, February 11. Krasinski, Jennifer. “Women on the Verge: Solo debuts by two artists with breakout potential.” The Village Voice, January 12 Yood, James. “Top Ten 2015: Chicago,” art ltd. January/February 2016. 2015 Buffenstein, Alyssa, “The 30 Most Exciting Artists in North America Right Now: Part One”, artnet, December 23. MacMillan, Kyle. “Ebony G. Patterson at Monique Meloche”, Art in America, December 17. Laster, Paul. “Ebony G. Patterson”, Modern Painters, December, p. 103. Binlot, Ann. “Her Art Hangs in Museums and ‘Empire’”, The New York Times, November 27. Thrower, Alexis. “Ebony G. Patterson’s ‘DEAD TREEZ’ at MAD”, Whitewall, December 18. Yood, James. “Ebony G. Patterson: “unearthing treez” at Monique Meloche Gallery, art ltd, Nov. Frank, Priscilla. “When Bling Becomes A Matter of Survival”, The Huffington Post, November 12. Winter, Alexander. “Dead Treez”, the new asterisk, November 10. Thompson, Krista. Shine: The Visual Economy of Light in African Diasporic Aesthetic Practice, Duke University Press (cover, pp. 3, 34, 38, 42, 115-117, 156-167). McClusky, Pamela and Erika Dalya Massaquoi. DISGUISE: Masks and Global African Art, Seattle Art Museum and Yale University Press, New Haven and London. Sargent, Antwuan. “’Empire’: TV’s Contemporary Art Gallery”, The New Yorker, October 15. “Ebony’s Empire”, Jamaica Observer, September 27. Horodner, Stuart. BOTTOMS UP: A Sculpture Survey, University of Kentucky Art Museum cat. Zevi, Clara. “The Disturbing Truth Buried Within Ebony G. Patterson's Lavish Tapestries”, artnet news, Aug 28.


Selected Bibliography continued 2015 Norman, Lee Ann. “Review: Look at Me Now!/Monique Meloche Gallery”, Newcity, Aug 1. “Look At Me Now! At Monique Meloche Gallery”, ARTNEWS, July 27. Graves, Jen. “SAM Invokes New Spirits in the Ambitious Disguise: Masks and Global African Art”, The Stranger, June 24. Tatum, Charlie. “Between Carnival and Performance Art: Nine Artists on Masquerade” Hyperalleric, June1. Cooper, Carolyn. “Jamaican Art Disappears in Cuba”, Jamaica Gleaner, May 31. Welch, Diane Y. “Deeper insights lie beneath the glitter of Lux artist’s works”, Encinitas Advocate, April 12. Chute, James. “Jamaican artist asking tough questions”, UT San Diego, April 8. D’Addario, John. “Common roots traced in Carnival exhibit at CAC”, New Orleans Advocate, April 12. Jelly-Schapiro, Joshua. “EN MAS’: Carnival and Performance Art of the Caribbean,” ARTFORUM, March 7. Bookhardt , D. Eric. “CLAIRE TANCONS on the Political Aesthetics of Carnival” Art Papers, March 4. Frank, Priscilla. “Where Caribbean Carnivals and Contemporary Performance Art Meet”, The Huffington Post, February 13. Sutton, Benjamin. “In New Orleans, an Exhibition Shines on the Surface”, Hyperallergic, Jan.12. Ebony, David. “David Ebony's Top 10 Most Memorable Artworks of 2014”, artnet, Dec 25. Frank, Priscilla. “These Are The Artists To Watch In 2015”, The Huffington Post, Dec 9. Binlot, Ann. “What Not to Miss at Miami’s Satellite Art Fairs”, New York Times blog, Dec 4. Voynovskaya, Nastia. “Miami Art Week 2014: UNTITLED Art Fair Recap”, Hi Fructose, Dec 3. 2014 Donoghue, Katy. “UNTITLED: BOLD, BRIGHT, AND BIG”, whitewall, Dec 3. Munro, Cait. “The 10 Best Booths at UNTITLED, Plus One Super Selfie Wall”, artnet, Dec 2. Indrisek, Scott. “Searching New Orleans During Prospect.3”, Blouin Artinfo, October 27. Ebony G. Patterson – Emerging Queen of 21st Century Pop Art, ARC Magazine, October 20. Fredericks, Susanne. “Real Mas’ mi seh!”, Jamaica Observer, May 4. Thorson, Alice. “In Nerman Museum Exhibit, Ebony Patterson probes beneath the surface of Jamaica’s dancehall culture”, Kansas City Star, May 2. Bynoe, Holly, Charles Campbell, Amanda Couldson, John Cox, Annalee Davis and Caryl Ivrisse-Crochemar. Island Life, FRIEZE, issue 162 April (cover and pp. 128-136). Dobrzynski, Judith H. “What’s Showing Around the Country,” New York Times, March 20, Museums section, pp. 38,40. (illustration). Bindman, David and Henry Louis Gates, Jr. “The Image of the Black in Western Art”, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass & London, UK in collaboration with the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research and The Menil Collection.


Selected Bibliography continued 2013 Foumberg, Jason. “The 20 Best Shows At Art Galleries in January”, Chicago Magazine, Dec. 27. Cohen, Patricia. “A Collector Bets His Eye and His Gut”, New York Times, December 6. Foumberg, Jason. “The 19 Top Exhibits in Chicago Art Galleries This December”,Chicago Magazine, November. Sanders, Terrance. “25 Artists to Watch and Collect”, artvoicesmagazine.com, September. Campbell, Charles. “Critical Juncture: Review of the 2012 National Biennial”, Jamaica Journal, Vol. 34, No.3, August. James, Jamillah. “Ebony Patterson: Dancehall’s Body Politic”, International Review of African American Art, Vol. 24, No. 3, pp. 20-27 “30 Black Artists Under 40 You Should Know”, Huffington Post, February 26. 2012 Eytan, Declan. “Ebony G. Patterson,” The Black Blog, Vogue Italia, Nov 12. Laughlin, Nicholas. “Ebony Patterson: All the Right Moves”, Caribbean Beat, September/October. Coppola, John. “Cultural Crossroads”, Miami Herald, Aug 26. Cotter, Holland. “Islands Buffeted by Currents of Change ‘Caribbean: Crossroads of the World’ Spans 3 Museums,” The New York Times, June 14. Scott, David. “Small Axe: A Caribbean Journal of Criticism”, Duke University Press. Vol 16. Moniz, Jesse. “Fashion Statement”, The Royal Gazette, Jan 10. 2011 Castellano, Calos Garrido. “Ebony G. Patterson”, Art Absolument, Art Caribeen Issue, October. Rawlins, Richard Mark. “9 of 219: Ebony G. Patterson’s new work at Alice Yard”, Artzpub Blog, July. Bynoe, Holly. “Ebony G. Patterson awarded Rex Nettleford Fellowship”, ARC Magazine, Sept 5. Bosh, Milo. “FIVE: Ebony G. Patterson”, http://blackartistnews.blogspot.com, March 7. “Ebony G. Patterson Installation and New work: Chicago”, www.lipsticktracez.com, Feb 20. Ellis, Nadia. “Ghetto Geographies”, The Caribbean Review of Books, Jan. “Art & Design - Ebony G. Patterson”, Timeout Chicago, Out and About blog entry, Feb 12. Weinberg, Lauren. “Critic’s Pick”, Timeout Chicago, Issue 311, Feb 10-16. Nusser, Madeline. “Sneak Peak: Networking Events”, Timeout Chicago, Issue 307, Jan 13-19. “Wrestling with the Image: Caribbean Interventions”, curated by Christopher Cozier and Tatiana Flores, (catalogue), Art Museum of the Americas, Washington D.C. Viera, Lauren. “Meloche Experiments with Performance Art”, Chicago Tribune, Jan 14. Wenzel, Eric. “Winter Experiment”, Artslant, Jan. Archer, Petrine. “Chicago Conversation”, Petrinearcher.com, Jan. 2010 Chen-Young. Leisha. “Art Crosses the Pond”, Jamaica Observer, Lifestyle Section, Dec 12.


Selected Bibliography continued 2010 “Jamaican Artist Ebony Patterson uses Pattern Innovatively”, Wallpaper Weekly, Nov 12. Paul, Annie. “Brave New World” (Young Talent V Review), The Caribbean Review of Books, July. Wood, Eve. “Ebony G. Patterson @ Seeline Gallery”, Whitehot Magazine. Casagrande, Reggie. “Ebony G. Patterson; Fashion Ova Style,” www.lipsticktracez.com. Cooke, Mel. “Bleaching Gangstas’? Artist Interogates Dancehall’s Expressions of Masculinity”, Jamaica Gleaner, Aug. Cooke, Mel. “Edna Manley College: A Training Ground in ‘Making do’”, Jamaica Gleaner Aug 1. “Young Talent on the Rise”, Jamaica Observer, July 11. Campbell, Howard. “A New Day for Local Art?” Jamaica Gleaner, July 25. “Young Talent V: Slide Show Ebony G. Patterson , National Gallery Blog, June 7. Boxer, Dr. David. “Young Talent V: Ebony G. Patterson”, National Gallery Blog, May 11. 2009 Hood, Susan. “West Indian Exultation Many Voices, Many Images Offer an Alternate View of the English-Speaking Caribbean”, Hartford Advocate, Dec. Catlin, Roger. “Rockstone and Bootheel Comes to City With Nation’s Third Largest Indian Population”, Hartford Courant, Nov 8. Genocchio, Benjamin. “Colorful, Witty, Noisy, A West Indies Melange” New York Times, Dec. Poupey, Veerle. “What Times are These?: Visual Art and Social Crisis in Postcolonial Jamaica,” Smalle Axe, Number 29 (Volume13, Number 2) June. Paul, Annie. “Dream it, Plan it, Chance it, Risk it: Kingston Logic”, Essay, Venice Biennale. Halpereren, Max. “Art on Paper 2008”, Art Paper, Jan/Feb Issue. Mi Did Deh Deh Sees Through Jamaica’s Sunny Façade”, Lexington Herald Leader, Jan. 2008 Boxer, Dr. David. “The National Biennial- A Preview”, Sky Writings, Jan/Feb Issue. “Art on Paper 2008: The 40th Exhibition”, Weatherspoon Museum, University of North Carolina at Greenboro, (exhibition catalogue). “Boys of Summer: A Review”, fNews Magazine, July 28. Morrison, Keith. “Time, Ceremony and Space: Curators Eye III”, National Gallery of Jamaica (Catalogue) “Taboo Identities: Race, Sexuality + the Body - A Jamaican Context”, Self Published, June. Deeitch, Mike. “Wall to Wall”, Lexington Art League (Catalogue), June. Glover, Terry. Dancehall to Doiley Boyz. EbonyJet.com. May 30. “An Artistic Eye” (Curators Eye III Review), Jamaica Observer, March. “Young Professionals on Display”, Jamaica Sunday Gleaner, March. “Young Generations 2008”, Mutual Gallery (Catalogue), Kingston, Jamaica. 2007 “Infinite Island: Contemporary Caribbean Art,” edited by Tumelo Mosaka, Brooklyn Museum (exhibition catalogue). “Intimate Parts,” The Sunday Observer, Aug.


Selected Bibliography continued 2007 “What’s Wow Now, The Ones to Watch in Jamaican Art” -Insiders offer clues as the next supernovas to define the Jamaican aesthetic”, Sky Writings May/June. 2006 “Inner Dimensions: UVA Artists Delve Deep,” The Hook, Oct 19. “Studies of the Female Physique,” The Sunday Gleaner, July 30. “A Closer Look at Venus Cuts and Aprons,” The Sunday Herald, July 23-29. “Stimulating Exhibit by Ebony Patterson,” The Sunday Herald, July 16-22. “Venus Observed,” The Jamaica Gleaner, Jan 15. 2005 “Art and Society II,” The Jamaica Gleaner, Jan 8. “Danforth Scholar Named Jamaica’s Best Young Artist,” The Record, Oct 7. “Through their Eyes- Review of the Super Plus Under40 Artist of the Year Competition,” The Sunday Gleaner, Aug 21. “Young Artists Shine In Super Plus Competition,” Sunday Herald, Aug 14. “Self Reflection Through Art,” Jamaica Observer, Aug 1. “There’s Something About Ebony !,” Sunday Gleaner, Aug 14. “Biennial 2004: A Postscript,” National Gallery of Jamaica Quarterly Magazine,April/June. “Artistically Speaking,” Radio Mona, July 29. 2004 “Le Pont de Artistes du Monde,” Le Telegramme, July 20. 2003 “ROSL Arts Scholars 2002,” Overseas Magazine, Dec 2003/ Feb 2004 “Blazing through the Art Trail,”Jamaica Gleaner, Sept 14. “Young Artist Showcases in London,” Jamaica Observer, Aug 23. 2002 Television Jamaica Artist of the Week, Feb 7 –11. Residences, Teaching and Lectures 2015 Assistant Professor of Painting, University of Kentucky Lexington (since 2008) Lecture, Museum of Arts and Design, New York, NY Lecture, Tyler School of Art, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA Lecture, Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA Lux Art Institute Residency, Encinitas, California 2014 Caribbean Queer Visuality Symposium, Yale University, New Haven, CT 2012 Symposium: Bridging Art and Text, Karen Blixen Museum in Copenhagen, Denmark Lecture: The Artist's Voice: Ebony G. Patterson in conversation with Krista Thompson, The Studio Museum in Harlem 2011 Residency, Alice Yard, Trinidad Lecture, TEDxIrie, Re-Fashioning the Urban Male (April) 2010 Artist Talk - Bicardi Biennale, National Gallery of Bermuda (November) 2008 Residency, Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT 2007 Lecture, Infinite Island: Contemporary Caribbean Art, Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, NY Residency, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 2006 Lecture, Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts, Art History Depart, Kingston,Jamaica Lecture, Women’s Symposium, Women’s Committee, Washington University in St. Louis 2005 Lecture, “Meet the Artists’. Super Plus Under 40 Artist of the Year Artist Talks, Mutual Gallery


Residences, Teaching and Lectures 2005 Lecture, Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts, Painting Depart, Kingston, Jamaica Internship, Papermaking, Joan Hall Studio, St. Louis, MO 2004 Internship, Pont Aven School of Contemporary Art, Brittany, France 2002 Residency, Patrick Allen Fraser’s Hospital Field House, Arbroath, Scotland Awards, Fellowships and Grants 2015 Joan Mitchell Award Faculty Research Grant, University of Kentucky 2014 Aaron Matalon Award, Jamaica Biennial, National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston 2013 William H. Johnson Prize finalist 2012 Musgrave Medal from the Institute of Jamaica for highest contribution to art The Andy Warhol Foundation Grant Small Axe Inc. Grant 2011 Rex Nettleford Fellowship in Cultural Studies 2010 Aaron Matalon Award, Honorary Mention, National Gallery of Jamaica 2009 College of Fine Arts Travel Fellowship, University of Kentucky 2008 Vermont Studio Center Artist Fellowship Faculty Summer Research Fellowship, University of Kentucky 2006 Prime Minister’s Youth Awards for Excellence, in Art and Culture, Jamaica Peter Marcus Award for Printmaking, Washington University Nominated for the Joan Mitchell Fellowship for Painters, Washington University Emerson Visiting Critics and Curators Series, Museum of Contemporary Art, St. Louis, MO 2005 Super Plus Under 40 Artist of the Year, Jamaica Vicky Award Washington University, Printmaking Department William Danforth Fellowship, Washington University 2004 Nancy Glanstien Scholarship for Graduate Students, Washington University Diploma (4 years) First Class Honors (lower), Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts Albert Huie Award for Outstanding Student in Painting, Edna Manley College, Jamaica 2003 Order of French Merit Scholarship, Pont -Aven School of Contemporary Art Enid Driscoll Spalleti Memorial Award (ROSL) 2002 Two Bronze Medals, Jamaica Cultural Development Commission Fine Arts Competition Travel Scholarship, Royal Over-Seas League Brian Morgan Scholarship, Edna Manley College, Jamaica Selected Collections Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA 21c Museum and Foundation, Louisville, Kentucky Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, Alabama Edna Manley College of the Visual Arts, Kingston, Jamaica Eastern Illinois University, Tarble Arts Center, Charleston, IL Jamaica A.I.D.S. Foundation, Jamaica Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft, Louisville, KY


Selected Collections continued Nasher Museum, Duke University, Durham, NC National Gallery of Jamaica, Kingston, Jamaica Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, Kansas Pont-Aven School of Contemporary Art, Pont-Aven, France Patrick Allan Fraser Hospitalfield House, Arbroath, Scotland Speed Museum of Art, Louisville, KY


moniquemeloche was founded in October 2000 with an inaugural exhibition titled Homewrecker at Meloche’s home, and officially opened to the public in May 2001. Working with an international group of emerging artists in all media, the gallery presents conceptually challenging installations in Chicago and at art fairs internationally with an emphasis on curatorial and institutional outreach.



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