I Am Everything That Will Save Me - Hand to Hand, Heart to Heart 2 (Bird and Lava)
Year: 2024
Medium: wood, acrylic, graphite, string
Dimensions: 91.4 cm in diameter x 9.5d cm (36 in. In diameter x 3 3/4d in.)
Acquired from Pace Gallery, 2024
Torkwase Dyson exhibited a work with the same title in 2020. In that piece, the white grain of the underlying wooden panel remained visible. Here, in contrast, the surface is entirely coated with black paint and graphite. “Bird and Lava” refers to a series that the artist has been developing in recent years. In this project, Dyson addresses the history of slavery—which still remains unbroken even in contemporary society—and pursues a spiritual liberation from that history, drawing on the beauty of black as a color and the richness of sculptural form to do so. Her practice makes viewers confront the reality that cities and architecture inherently contain structures that perpetuate racial and social disparities. The “Bird and Lava” series, to which this work belongs, may serve as a key indicator of Dyson’s architectural theoretical framework—an approach that seeks to preserve the full dignity of Black people, including herself. She has stated that “...we will need to be both liquid and mountains, bird and lava,” and this work evokes the image of black liquid passing through a groove cut vertically through the centerline of the circle to pool in a round vessel. The seemingly viscous black makes one feel the heat and mass of lava. Perhaps endless lava will someday swallow the disparities of society and urban environments, before cooling and solidifying into a mountain of pitch black. The result may liberate people into free beings akin to birds soaring through the vastness of the sky. One sees Dyson’s firm conviction that this is not something to be achieved by others—it must be accomplished by no one else’s hands and hearts but our very own. Perhaps the circle that contains this black liquid is suggestive of us human beings, or even the structure of human society.
