Highly effective Photography Explores and Reimagines Black Identification By way of Classical Art Historical past

On view October 15, 2025–March 8, 2026

Tawny Chatmon: Sanctuaries of Truth, Dissolution of Lies

WASHINGTON—This fall the National Museum of Women within the Arts (NMWA) presents a solo exhibition of richly layered, photography-based works by Tawny Chatmon. In Tawny Chatmon: Sanctuaries of Truth, Dissolution of Lies, the artist makes use of stylistic languages drawn from historic ornamental motifs and potent African American cultural markers to create lush and strikingly highly effective portraits that problem racism and erasure. On view from October 15, 2025, to March 8, 2026, the exhibition options greater than 25 large-scale images from latest collection courting from 2019 to the current. This is the artist’s first museum exhibition in Washington, D.C.

“My colleagues and I have followed Chatmon’s career avidly for several years, with an eye to developing an exhibition that highlights her inventive vision, powerful iconography and exceptional level of craft,” stated Virginia Treanor, senior curator on the National Museum of Women within the Arts. “NMWA is renowned for partnering with outstanding artists early in their careers—creators who go on to ever greater renown—and that history continues with Tawny Chatmon.”

Central to Tawny Chatmon’s work is the celebration of Black childhood, Black resistance and self-determination, and she or he usually makes use of her family members as fashions. While her studio observe relies in images, Chatmon intensifies her works by meticulous guide processes, intricate staging and digital manipulation. Chatmon at instances adorns her prints with hand-applied acrylic paint, pure gold leaf, semiprecious stones, beads, and different supplies. She frames her portraits in gilded vintage or modern baroque-style frames. These interventions give Chatmon’s topics a gravitas that always belies their youth and confronts the absence, exclusion and devaluation of the Black physique in Western artwork.

“Is there a redemptive power in visual arts? Do artists have the ability to control and shift the narrative through their work? These are questions that inform my creative process,” stated Chatmon. “I believe both to be true. In the same way that literature continues to be a tool for shaping the human psyche, I believe visual arts carry the same ability.”

Exhibition Overview

The exhibition begins with iconic gilded works from Chatmon’s collection “Remnants” (2021–23) and “Iconography” (2023–current). These massive and intricately patterned works depicting Black kids are stylistically impressed by Austrian painter Gustav Klimt’s turn-of-the-century “Golden Phase” and medieval European non secular icons. In the brand new work We Are the Ones We’ve Been Waiting For, from the collection “Iconography” (2023–current), Chatmon’s younger son is depicted in a sweatsuit with a sample harking back to historical mosaics, standing earlier than a shimmering background of painted tile-like squares. The topic’s hoodie contains a depiction of a father, clad in denim, holding a baby. Chatmon’s photographs name on the viewer to acknowledge the “significance, preciousness, sacred nature, and value” of her Black topics.

Chatmon’s work presents an unyielding affirmation of Black magnificence and power. To create the richly detailed clothes and background in works from the collection “Remnants” and “Iconography,” she usually makes use of gilded remnants of her previous works. Some of her topics put on clothes that options imagery of Black historic figures, whereas others present dad and mom and kids. These photographs serve to honor ancestral heroes. “I originally planned to focus primarily on historical figures as the iconographic imagery,” Chatmon says, “but as I progressed I felt it was important to focus on the icons within our own families and communities.”

Works from Chatmon’s collection “The Restoration” (2024–current) are introduced in an intimate gallery adjoining to the central house. In this physique of labor, Chatmon transforms dolls and collectible figurines from the early twentieth century that depict Black figures in demeaning methods and replicate dangerous racial stereotypes. With the intention of eradicating these objects from the market, Chatmon sources fabric “Mammy” dolls from vintage shops and on-line auctions, then offers them new life by sensitively repainting their options and reclothing them in new, richly detailed outfits. Photographs on view depict the restored dolls being held and cherished by kids likewise wearing luxurious apparel, with a number of the dolls displayed in an adjoining case. In Chatmon’s fingers, the dolls reclaim dignity as new heirlooms and maintain positions of honor within the artist’s compositions.

A 3rd gallery house options alternatives from Chatmon’s collection “The Reconciliation” (2024– current), during which Chatmon continues her custom of depicting Black topics in poses of magnificence, power and energy. In these works, the sitters are proven with meals related to communities all through the African diaspora. Black meals traditions are rooted in a historical past of resilience and survival, and Chatmon deftly explores the nuances usually embodied in meals objects, akin to watermelon. Initially a crop grown and bought by Black farmers who have been newly freed after the Civil War, the watermelon grew to become a logo of mockery and contempt by white individuals who have been resentful of Black success. Chatmon’s imagery restores the fruit to its rightful place within the financial and cultural heritage of Black Americans and reclaims it as a supply of pleasure.

These works replicate a reclamation and celebration of each communal and familial heritage. In one other work from “The Reconciliation,” a bowl of black-eyed peas, which have been delivered to the Americas by enslaved West Africans and function a logo of excellent luck and prosperity within the American South, are held by Chatmon’s niece. A portrait of her mom carrying collard greens affords a poignant evocation of resilience and nourishment.

For this new physique of labor, relatively than utilizing gilded paper and paint to brighten her images, Chatmon makes use of thread to embroider the clothes of her sitters with dazzling patterns. Concerns over unethical sourcing of gold, notably within the Democratic Republic of the Congo, have led Chatmon away from using gold leaf, and she or he as an alternative explores the optical and conceptual potentialities of thread, beads and shells. The symbolism-laden layers proceed her use of overlapping bodily and digital collage.

About the Artist

Tawny Chatmon (b. 1979, Tokyo, Japan) is a photography-based artist identified for her richly layered portraits that remember her Black topics, particularly kids. Combining her personal images with different mixed-media supplies, her work explores the complexity and fantastic thing about Black tradition in Western society. In 2022, Chatmon was featured within the Venice Biennale exhibition The Afro-Futurist Manifesto: Blackness Reimagined, curated by Myrtis Bedolla of Galerie Myrtis. In 2018, she obtained first place in each the Prix de la Photographie and International Photography Awards, the latter additionally crowning her “Photographer of the Year.” Her work is within the collections of the Minneapolis Institute of Art, the Petrucci Family Foundation Collection of African American Art and Microsoft. She lives together with her husband and kids in Maryland.

National Museum of Women within the Arts

The National Museum of Women within the Arts (NMWA) is the primary museum on this planet solely devoted to championing girls by the humanities. With its collections, exhibitions, applications and on-line content material, the museum conjures up dynamic exchanges about artwork and concepts. NMWA advocates for higher illustration of ladies and nonbinary artists and serves as a significant heart for thought management, neighborhood engagement and social change. NMWA addresses the gender imbalance within the presentation of artwork by bringing to gentle necessary girls artists of the previous whereas selling nice girls artists working right this moment. The assortment highlights a variety of works in a wide range of mediums by artists together with Rosa Bonheur, Louise Bourgeois, Lalla Essaydi, Lavinia Fontana, Frida Kahlo, Hung Liu, Zanele Muholi, Faith Ringgold, Niki de Saint Phalle and Amy Sherald.

NMWA is positioned at 1250 New York Avenue, NW, Washington, D.C. It is open Tues.–Sun., 10 a.m.–5 p.m. and closed on Mondays and choose holidays. Admission is $16 for adults, $13 for D.C. residents and guests 70 and over, and free for guests 21 and underneath. Admission is free the primary Sunday and second Wednesday of every month. For info, name 202-783-5000, go to nmwa.org, Broad Strokes weblog, Facebook or Instagram.

Media Contacts

National Museum of Women within the Arts
Katrina Weber Ashour, kweber@nmwa.org

Nicole Straus Public Relations
Nicole Straus, nicole@nicolestrauspr.com
Amanda Domizio, amanda@domiziopr.com