art: an imaginative take on black beauty – the illustrations of adeola goodwin

Take a look at the striking illustrations of Adeola Goodwin – a New York artist focused on black empowerment and the quirky side of black beauty. The Philadelphia native tells us: “This year, I’ve been putting a more specified purpose into my art. I’ve been writing short, simple poems dedicated to the beautiful brown people who may need extra assurance that their melanin is not a deficiency or a joke. I’ve been creating expressionistic images of brown people, some from life, some from imagination. I feel as though, so often, we are depicted as struggling/angry/bleeding. I do not necessarily want to counter that, because our plight as people of color in this country is real. However, my images reflect the beauty, the romance, the imagination, and the abstractness I feel that I see in black people and myself today. As much as we have history, we have a future and a present. Sometimes, I include old symbols to demonstrate the fact that we are everywhere in human history. Sometimes, I recreate images of my brother, my muse. I leave his skin colorless, but it is clear that he has the facial features of a black man. To me, that represents how our DNA and our essence always prevails. I believe that we do have a place in this modern world. But we don’t have cartoons or much media that supports our surrealness, our connection to nature, our serenity, our quirks,our indigo-ness, and our imaginative beauty. We can be anything that we want.” Explore below.

By Alexander Aplerku, AFROPUNK Contributor

.