Howardena Pindell: A New Language

Artist, activist, writer, and teacher Howardena Pindell has been a force in contemporary art since the late 1960s. This book is a celebration and critical examination of her painting and writing and marks her first solo exhibition in the UK. It takes its title from her: “I am an artist. I am not part of a so-called ‘minority’, ‘new’ or ‘emerging’ or ‘a new audience’. These are all terms used to demean, limit, and make people of color appear to be powerless. We must evolve a new language which empowers us and does not cause us to participate in our own disenfranchisement.” With illustrations of a selection of paintings from the 1970s to now; new writing from Anna Lovatt of the Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Amy Tobin of the University of Cambridge, and Adeze Wilford from The Shed in New York; and a selection of Pindell’s own writing, this book presents Pindell’s inspiring and unflinchingly active imagination, and explores her articulation of a ‘new language’ as exemplary in articulating empowerment. [publisher's note]