Featured image: Shirley Monestier at l’Atelier 65 — Bordeaux, France
© Jean-Marie Monestier

As we wound down the COVID-19 PAGES exhibition in September 2021, we contacted our professional artists to ask about the impact the show had for them.

In reply, Shirley Monestier sent me the following message via email:

“As a result of my artwork inclusion in the Covid-19 Pages exposition, I have received more than 100 positive reactions to a congratulations!!

“The exposure was significant and put me on the map as a Black Female Artist in France.  Since the Phase 1 Covid-19 Pages expo, I have had numerous request for podcasts and interviews.  Thank you so much for the opportunity to shine a light on me and my art!”

Because of her exposure in our show, Monestier has mounted her first solo exhibition.  It is being held in Bordeaux, France, the city she now calls home.

Monestier came to art late in life.  She was inspired to learn to paint when she and her husband, Jean-Marie moved into a new home in the Paris suburb of Taverny in the early 1990s.  She begin visiting galleries and artist studios in Paris with the intent to purchase works to decorate their home, but found that the price tags for the pieces she wanted to purchase exceeded the couple’s budget.

That prompted her to take art lessons so she could create her own paintings.

For two years, she took classes at the Municipal Centre d’Arts and Plastiques in Taverny (no longer in existence).

And she’s been painting and showing her work ever since!

Shirley Monestier with The Masks We Wear, her COVID-19 PAGES artwork
Image courtesy of the artist

Monestier’s one-woman show is called Multicultural Women in Vibrant Colors.  It is on display at L’Atelier 65, a Bordeaux café/gallery located in an up and coming trendy area of the city called Chartrons. The gallery hosts a different artist each month, and when the owner reviewed Monestier’s portfolio, she immediately offered to organize the exhibition.

I asked Monestier why she created this show.

She replied,

“During the pandemic and confinement, I started painting a series of women. I wanted to complete a series of artworks because I knew opportunities would come my way after Covid-19 confinement was over. I just put it out in the universe and knew that an opportunity to showcase my artworks would come.

“I always wanted a solo exhibition…it was on my bucket list. We must always ask for what we want.”

The vernissage (opening) for Multicultural Women in Vibrant Colors was held on December 1, 2022.  Monestier considered it a success because:

“I spoke with each of attendees who asked questions … the engagement was wonderful, so personal. The atmosphere at the event was warm and fuzzy-friendly. What was amazing is that all those attending stayed for the entire 2 hours – they did not want to leave! I had one sale and the possibility of more.”

Vernissage attendees
© Jean-Marie Monestier

 

Shirley Monestier (seated) and vernissage attendees
© Jean-Marie Monestier

Prior to Multicultural Women, Monestier had shown her work locally in France (Taverny and Paris) as well as in international exhibitions in the U.S. (Washington, D.C.) and Mexico (Puerto Vallarta). Shows include the month-long Fight Cancer fundraising exhibition at the Mona Bismarck American Center in Paris in 2007, Cherie Sibley Artists’ Exposition, Artist Without Borders, and Viva Mexico in Puerto Vallarta (2010, 2014, and 2015, respectively), and Viet Nam Orchids in Washington. D.C. in 2016.

Monestier has the following advice for professional women artists who want to establish themselves in France:

“Join art associations — you will receive information, encouragement, critiques, art exhibit exposure and a support group. Continue to promote yourself, have business cards, and always make art your first love!”

Once Multicultural Women in Vibrant Colors closes, Monestier plans to open a private home art gallery, where her works will be viewed by appointment only.

Her target date for opening is May 6, 2023.

To contact Shirley Monestier about her art, send email to shirley.monestier@neuf.fr.

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Lawton, the Florence Gaskins Harper Endowed Chair in Art Education at the Maryland Institute College of Art, is a fifth-generation educator and native of Washington, DC. Her artistic and scholarly research revolves around visual narrative and intergenerational arts learning in BIPOC community settings.

In 2019 she was an associate artist at the Tate Exchange in London. Her project, Artstories UK, involved collaborating with 1800+ museum visitors over the course of five days. She was also the 2019 Distinguished Chair Fulbright Scholar at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. Her artwork is grounded in social practice; seeking to illuminate contemporary issues, cultural traditions, and the stories of people affected by them.

In addition to many scholarly publications, her artworks are in collections at several universities, the Tate Britain Library, Eugene E. Myers Charitable Unitrust, Frederick Douglass Museum and Cultural Center, and Zenith Gallery.

Lawton’s contribution to the COVID-19 PAGES is a self-portrait entitled, “Be strong, Be the Coffee.” The Artist states:

“I take inspiration from my family history, most notably the women in my family and the work of artist Elizabeth Catlett. For [sic] the piece I submitted, I’ve had to wear as a mantle to stay grounded in these unprecedented, challenging, and scary times. This wood-cut with hand-drawn elements was initially created as part of an artists’ book collaborative work with 8 other mature Black women artists. The theme of the book I created this piece for, was “We, the Coffee,” a riff on a proverb in which a daughter comes to her mother complaining about her struggles and being in ‘hot water.’ The mother says, you can be an egg (which gets hard in hot water), a carrot (which gets limp in hot water), or coffee—which gets stronger the hotter the water is. Like coffee, Black women come in various tints and shades—so around the portrait are different types of coffee: cafe au lait, expresso, cappuccino, and mocha.”

To visit COVID-19 PAGES: The Influence & Inspiration of Women, click on the following link: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/

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Born in D.C., Dr. Thompson received her BFA in printmaking from the Philadelphia College of Art and her MFA in printmaking from Tyler School of Art, Temple University. She also holds a Ph.D. in Urban Education/Art Education from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She has been printmaking and art education faculty at numerous institutions including Cornell University, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and Buffalo State College where she retired from full-time teaching. Her work has been shown in galleries and museums across the U.S. including the University of Wisconsin Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and in Buffalo, Hallwalls Contemporary Arts Center, Burchfield Penney Arts Center, El Museo Buffalo, Kenan Center, and the Western New York Book Arts Center.

Dr. Thompson explores memories of family, relationships, and ancestors. Using assorted collage materials including patterned fabric, textured papers, and photographs along with pencil and crayon drawing, she creates one-of-a-kind mixed media monotypes.

She says of her submission for COVID-19 Pages “Ancestor with Sunday Hat #3” –

“During the Covid-19 lockdown, I learned that so many people, especially Black people, were becoming sick and dying. Working at home, I organized old family photographs and included them in my artwork. I spent time reflecting on my ancestors who resisted and survived slavery and the repressive conditions that followed. Ancestor with Sunday Hat #3 is about coming from mothers who survived because of their spirituality and resistance to negative forces, and who continue to do so. In this way, I honor them and give them a new life.”

To visit COVID-19 PAGES: The Influence & Inspiration of Women, click on the following link: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/

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Gail Shaw-Clemons is a printmaker and mixed-media and artist-activist born in Washington, DC. She earned her MFA in Printmaking from the University of Maryland specializing in stone lithography. She went on to teach art for 24 years at the United Nations International School in NY and retired in 2014 returning to DC, where she currently resides.

With residencies in Africa, Sweden, Ireland, Pennsylvania, and New Mexico she spent summers away making art. She has exhibited extensively with work in collections as far away as China, Brazil, and Sweden. Her work is represented in collections at the Library of Congress, Ballenglen Museum of Ireland, DC Commission on the arts and humanities, and the National Women’s Museum to name a few.

Her submission for COVID-19 Pages is a series called “We Wear the Mask.”

[The] series “We Wear the Mask” was inspired by Paul Laurence Dunbar’s poem that speaks to the “metaphoric mask” that [our] ancestors had to wear to disguise their feelings and disappointment while negotiating through a racist American society. Since COVID 19 we all wear the mask.

To visit the exhibition, click here: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/

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Ms. Gibson-Hunter was born in Philadelphia, PA. She graduated from Temple University (BS), and Howard University (MFA). Aziza attended Bob Blackburn’s Printmaking Studio, the New York Arts Students League, and later received a fellowship from the Bronx Museum of Art. She joined “Where We At“, a group of Black women artists in the early 1980s. Ms. Gibson-Hunter was an administrator at Parsons School of Design and a faculty member at Howard University and Bowie State University.

Aziza was awarded the Individual Artist Fellowship Program Grant, from the DC Commission of the Arts and Humanities in 2014, 2006, 2018, and 2020. Her work can be found in the collections of the Washington DC Art Bank, the Liberian Embassy, Montgomery County, Maryland, and other noted collections. She completed two public commissions for Washington, DC Department of General Services. The Wall of Unity (2017) and, ANCESTORS, (2019) are both located in Washington, DC public schools. In 2019 Aziza was a Pyramid Atlantic Denbo Fellow.

She is currently a cofounding member of Black Artists of DC, a member of WOAUA, and a post-studio member of STABLE, a Washington DC arts community. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally. You can find more about Aziza on the digital archive JEMBE. Follow her studio in Washington, DC at #gibsonhunterstudio.

Aziza’s contribution to the COVID-19 PAGES is “Garvey’s Ghost,” of which she states:

Given the sober times in which we find ourselves, a whirlwind has formed. The forces of millions of our ancestors are here to assist us by reinforcing our grit, faith, tenacity, our creativity, and sense of humor. We have only to call their names. Those in power say they want things to go back to normal. That normal is powered by race, class, and gender oppression. There is something more that must be born despite all of the death. May our ancestors and Garvey’s ghost help to give us both the direction and courage to usher in a just world.

To visit COVID-19 PAGES: The Influence & Inspiration of Women, click on the following link: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/

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Dawn Kunkel began her career as the art guide at Nature’s Way following graduate school at The University of Tennessee in 1998. While working at Nature’s Way, she has exhibited her work at the Brooks Museum in Memphis and San Francisco State University, and she is an active participant/teacher in the Knoxville art community. She has received many awards and is included in the public collections of The Academy of Fine Arts, Poznan, Poland, The Hunter Museum of Art, Chattanooga, TN, and The Mississippi Museum of Art, Jackson, MS. Dawn enjoys teaching art to the diversity of ages and is enthusiastic about bringing the visual arts to the students at Nature’s Way.

Dawn has completed both her Bachelor’s and Master’s of Fine Arts degrees with an emphasis in Printmaking. She has taught art to the children at Nature’s Way Montessori School, has exhibited in a variety of spaces, and is an active participant/teacher of the Knoxville Art Community. She is included in the public collections of The Hunter Museum of Art, Chattanooga, TN, The Mississippi Museum of Art, Jackson, MS. and The Academy of Fine Arts, Poznan, Poland. She also has work in private collections.

Her love of experimenting with a variety of mediums is a hallmark of her artwork. Collectively, she has produced prints, sculptures, collages, and paintings over the years. Most recently, her work has been focusing on painting and watercolor.

Dawn’s Contribution to COVID-19 Pages is a collage called “Days at School.”

Dawn says about the collage she created “I used masks, my daughter’s work, and my watercolor to create this piece. It is actually glued and sewn together on top watercolor paper. It is a recognition of my daughter’s teachers.”

To visit COVID-19 PAGES: The Influence & Inspiration of Women, click on the following link: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/

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Adjoa is a visual artist, author, and art educator. She earned a B.F.A. in printmaking from Howard University and an M.A. in Art Education at Corcoran College of Arts. Burrowes has studied with artists in Ghana, Nigeria, Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. She has authored three children’s books and has illustrated over a dozen. As an educator, she has designed and implemented a series of art and writing workshops and residencies, and her extensive community-based teaching practice includes residencies with at-risk and underrepresented youth and adults. Burrowes’ artwork has been exhibited throughout the U.S. and is represented in collections including the Banneker Douglass Museum of Culture and History, Pyramid Atlantic Art Center, Brooklyn Art Library, The Southside Community Art Center, Art Colle Museum of Collage in Plemet, France, and the Verbeke Foundation in Belgium.

Adjoa’s contribution to COVID-19 Pages is “Say It Loud.”

She says about her work, “The paper sculpture, Say It Loud, was created in 2020 during the height of the worldwide pandemic and the socio-political trauma that resulted. For women of color around the world, COVID-19 laid bare many social inequities and injustices. In spite of multiple challenges, women have continued to sacrifice and make major contributions in efforts to fight the virus, from essential workers to medical practitioners. The title, Say It Loud, references singer, songwriter James Brown’s song, Say It Loud, I’m Black and I’m Proud, produced over 50 years ago as a rallying cry for Black pride and empowerment. The message is still relevant today as strong Black women make relevant contributions in all arenas of society. The sculpture stands as a monument to their strength.”

To visit the exhibition, click here: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/To visit COVID-19 PAGES: The Influence & Inspiration of Women, click on the following link: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/

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Tina Williams Brewer is an internationally renowned fiber artist known for her artistic exploration of African American history and culture. She uses layered textiles, images, and embellishments to create story quilts rich with symbolism and is motivated by issues focusing on family, women, and spirituality.

Tina is a teaching artist working predominantly with young people in urban communities. She is an “elder” in the African American community of Pittsburgh, and takes great pride in mentoring young people to empower them to communicate about their life and culture through the arts.

Tina’s art has been recognized by the American Arts in Embassy Program for more than 20 years and she has consistently been at the forefront of artists recognized by Pennsylvania’s Governors. She received the 2018 Pennsylvania Governor’s Award for Artist of the Year. Her work is represented in the permanent collection of The State Museum of Pennsylvania, the African American Museum in Dallas, Huntington Museum of Art, the National Afro-American Museum & Cultural Center, and other collections throughout the country.

“Out of Troubled Waters Comes Bliss” is a fiber art story quilt that Tina contributed to COVID-19 PAGES. She describes it as “an inspiration born from forced isolation.”

Tina wrote of her pandemic lockdown experience as follows:

“Spring, the season formally known as a rebirth period. A forced redefining of expectations that I had known for the past seven decades of my life. Over time I realized the necessity of a safe haven. Where was it? Realizing how much I depended on the outside world, its predictable yet unpredictable nature, to float in from one day and out to the next. Moving through this space I called my own, yet I knew nothing of it.”

To visit the exhibition, click here: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/To visit COVID-19 PAGES: The Influence & Inspiration of Women, click on the following link: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/

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Lindsay Lee Long is a visual artist and educator based in Brooklyn, New York. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Art in illustration from the School Of Visual Art in New York City. She is currently enrolled in Pratt Institute’s graduate program for Art Therapy and Creative Development.

In 2017, Lindsay founded Respect The Art, a non-profit organization dedicated to bringing art education to youth and families in underserved communities.

Lindsay’s contribution to COVID-19 PAGES is a mixed media collage called “Balancing Act.” Here is her comment about this work:

“The images of the women in this piece are sourced from a story in Essence magazine’s July/August 2020 issue. The overlapping images tell a story of multiple fights, multiple duties, and a multitude of resilience. Women of color, and Black women specifically, have been among the hardest hit during this pandemic. The work extends outside of the jobs we do. Constant double duty. A balancing act.”

To visit the exhibition, click here: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/To visit COVID-19 PAGES: The Influence & Inspiration of Women, click on the following link: https://wellsinternationalfoundation.org/covid-19-pages-exhibit/

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