Artist, art scholar and educator Dr. Fahamu Pecou is leading a new discourse in Atlanta on Black and brown identity through the lens of “Afrotropes,” the recurring iconography of Black aesthetics, codes and concepts.
A new solo exhibition of work by Dr. Pecou, the first in 11 years, is titled “They We Didn’t Realize We Were Seeds: We the Roses,” and it gathers paintings, drawings and sculpture that “create encounters with everyday objects,” recontextualized.
Dr. Pecou joined “City Lights” host Lois Reitzes to discuss the exhibition, on view at Johnson Lowe Gallery through Nov. 23.
“‘Afrotropes’ is a really beautiful nomenclature for a concept that I’ve been working with for a while,” says Dr. Pecou about the guiding principle behind his newest solo exhibition.
Much of history works in a similar sort of circular fashion, but art historians Krista Thompson and Huey Copeland noticed that Black history, in particular, tends to borrow heavily from itself in an extremely self-referential way. Their coining of the term “afro tropes” began a new chapter in America’s rich tapestry of conversation about Black identities.
