Rodney McMillian Deftly Treads the Line Between Politics and Aesthetics
In Body Politic, McMillian unveils the insidious racial exclusion and oppression in Abstract Express
"LOS ANGELES — Rodney McMillian’s Body Politic at Vielmetter Los Angeles builds on themes the artist has long engaged with: racial and socioeconomic injustice, and the relationship between politics and aesthetics.
Rodney McMillian, “Mississippi Appendectomy” (2020), 53 x 90 inches (image courtesy the artist and Vielmetter Los Angeles, photo by Brica Wilcox) The exhibition is comprised of drawings with text and semi-abstract sculptures, as well as one wall-sized installation. McMillian’s strategies are not novel, but he has rigorously honed his craft. His grasp of nuance and light-handed approach coax viewers in before confronting them with the history of racism in the United States.
In the drawing “Mississippi Appendectomy” (2020), for example, a statement by civil rights scholar Dorothy Roberts on medical procedures performed on Black women without their knowledge in the 1960s emerges from a smoggy pink-gray murk, framed by a swirl of oily black and toxic green pigment that seeps off the page. A turquoise circle near the top suggests an eerie moon or all-seeing eye, and conjures a polluted landscape."— Natalie Haddad, Oct. 30, 2020
This post is an excerpt. Read the full article on the Hyperallergic website.
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