Aminah Brenda Lynn Robinson's Artworks at Columbus Museum of Art

Written by Abigail Tennant Sunday, 23 October 2011 21:31

Columbus, OH.- The Columbus Museum of Art presents "Street Talk and Spiritual Matters: Aminah’s Mt. Vernon Avenue" from  May 20th through September 4th. This exhibition explores two related aspects of Aminah Robinson’s work: her documentation of the Mt. Vernon Avenue community where she grew up and her depictions of women who personify the African-American spirituals she heard emanating from area churches and radios in the neighborhood. “The work in this exhibition pulsates with Aminah’s drive to document and remember,” said Carole Genshaft, CMA adjunct curator of education.

“The Mt. Vernon paintings and prints reflect stories handed down from her ancestors, personal memories, and her careful research from primary sources. Aminah’s depiction of spirituals honors the memory of the slaves who used these songs as a coping mechanism before and during the Civil War. Through her work in diverse media and subject, Aminah reminds us that it is our ability to remember that makes us human.”

Street Talk features Aminah’s RagGonNons, paintings, drawings, hogmawg sculptures, prints, and books about Mt. Vernon Avenue, the heart of the African-American community in Columbus, Ohio from the 1900s to the 1960s. While the discrimination of Jim Crow abounded outside the neighborhood, the Mt. Vernon area was a tight-knit community where family and commercial life flourished. Aminah Brenda Lynn Robinson captured this spirit in “Memory Maps” that document the lively street life and each shop, church, and business establishment on the street. Her depiction of civil rights protests and Marcus Garvey back-to-Africa parades allude to the serious civil rights issues that plagued African Americans outside the neighborhood at the time. In order to add context to Aminah’s work, the exhibition features video-taped interviews of individuals sharing their memories and stories of living and working on the street. Aminah’s depictions, in combination with these interviews, present a broad view of this eastside community and help visitors gain a fuller understanding of the complex historical and social issues at play.


When Aminah was growing up in the Mt. Vernon neighborhood, she was captivated by the African-American spirituals she heard emanating from area churches and radios on Sundays. Spiritual Matters highlights her  interpretation of the spirituals through drawings, watercolors, and the monumental sculpture, My Lord, What a Morning. My Lord, What a Morning consists of ten, large wooden pipes from an antique organ. Each pipe has music box workings that play the spiritual, “My Lord, What a Morning.” Each pipe, which is topped with a wrought iron crown, represents a woman and together the ten pieces create a choir. My Lord, What a Morning will be surrounded by watercolor studies of the work that have not previously been exhibited.  For the first time, Aminah’s twenty-six original drawings for The Teachings, a book of spirituals published in 1992 will be on view. Visitors to the exhibition will be able to listen to a variety of the spirituals Aminah has illustrated. The recorded spirituals have been arranged specifically for the exhibition by music director and composer Milton Ruffin and performed by the Milton Ruffin Gospel Chorale.

Columbus Museum of Art's mission is to create great experiences with great art for everyone. Approximately 200,000 people tour the Museum each year, many participating in programs designed for diverse audiences from school children to scholars. Art begins a conversation within ourselves and our community. The Columbus Museum of Art is where that conversation begins. CMA houses art that speaks to diverse interests and styles. They have an outstanding collection of late nineteenth and early twentieth-century American and European modern art. Our collection includes spectacular examples of Impressionism, German Expressionism, and Cubism. We are also recognized for extraordinary regional collections such as the largest public collection of woodcarvings by Columbus folk artist Elijah Pierce and the world's largest repository of paintings and lithographs by Columbus native George Bellows, who is widely regarded as the finest American artist of his generation. In 2001, the Museum acquired The Photo League collection which includes photographs by artists Berenice Abbott, W. Eugene Smith and Weegee. In 2005, the Museum acquired the Philip and Suzanne Schiller Collection of American Social Commentary Art 1930–1970, considered to be, according to Virginia Mecklenburg, Chief Curator of Smithsonian American Art Museum, "unquestionably the most important collection of its kind in the country," The collection includes works by Jacob Lawrence, Romare Bearden, Ben Shahn, Lucile Blanch, Lucienne Bloch, Moses Soyer, George Tooker, Paul Cadmus, Jared French, Rockwell Kent, and George Grosz. Today a commitment to contemporary art, folk art, and photography continues the Museum's dedication to showcasing art of our time. The Museum also presents a rich menu of traveling and CMA-organized special exhibitions that reflect the diverse voices in our community. Visit the museum's website at ... http://www.columbusmuseum.org

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