Bettye J. (Mbitha) Parker Smith says: Green's brush strokes are
Gullah Anointed. Gullah is an appellative used to describe a
population of Africans who were taken against their will from the Gold Coast of
West Africa and transferred permanently, with a culture intact, to the
Americas--specifically to the coastal region of South Carolina and Georgia.
Jonathan Green is the first visual artist from the Gullah community to be
academically trained and achieve national and international prominence. He has
accepted the calling of his ancestors and is on a mission to preserve the
magnificence of their way of life. The timing of Jonathan Green the artist, and
the level of momentum to which he subscribes, is not just one of happenstance.
Indeed, while he may not have arrived in swaddling clothing, it is perhaps safe
to say that he carries the sign of one anointed.
Ronne Hartfield says: Jonathan Green is a truth teller. His paintings
function as a marriage of the communal and the personal, the conceptual and the
experimental. His skill, his gift, is to take images of ordinariness, filter
them through metaphoric lens, and return them to us as extraordinary icons of
our heritage. In the words of W. E. B. Du Bois, "these crooked marks on a
fragile leaf...turn the tangle straight."
Please go the these links to find more information on Jonathan Green and his
artistry: http://www.jonathangreenstudios.com/Jonathan-Green-details
http://www.gallerychuma.com/jgreen_bio.html
This is Tuesday talk--so honored and proud to be called a Gullah Lowcountry Gal.
©2013 Theda Okona All Rights Reserved