Chakaia Booker
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- Visual Impressions I, 2002
- Rives BFK paper and modified dark brown
- 44 x 30 inches
- Edition of 10
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Biography
Chakaia Booker is an internationally acclaimed sculptor whose powerful pieces are created from discarded truck, car, and bicycle tires. Booker employs these forms to comment on themes ranging from black identity to urban ecology. The hardiness and adaptability of the tires represent, according to Booker, “the survival of the Africans in the diaspora.” In the black color of the tires she sees African skin, and the patterned treads represent tribal designs. Booker draws upon Louise Nevelson’s constructions of found objects, Romare Bearden’s energetic collages, and Jacob Lawrence’s manipulation of color and composition to form her own vigorous sculptures.
A sensation at the 2000 Whitney Biennial, Booker’s work was the subject of a retrospective at the Jersey City Museum, NJ and an expansive solo exhibition at Storm King Art Center, Mountainville, NY. Recent group exhibitions include shows at the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, TX; Museo Nacional de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid; and the Corcoran Biennial, Washington, DC. A past winner of a Pollock-Krasner Award, Booker was awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation fellowship. In 2006 the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC, opened an important exhibition of Booker’s work.