La Cotton Bowl

There are two main images in this work of art. One shows a person crouching to pick cotton in a field. The other shows a football player crouching on the field. The two poses look almost the same, inviting viewers to consider how the figures are alike and how they are different.

The image also makes a point about power and profit. Enslaved people worked for landowners in the past. Today athletes earn money, but they also make money for teams, brands, and advertisers. The artist asks us to think about who benefits most. 

Hank Willis Thomas is an American conceptual artist based in Brooklyn, New York. His work focuses on how media and pop culture influence the way people think about identity, especially in relation to race, history, and advertising. He often uses photographs, text, and familiar images to challenge viewers and encourage them to question what they see and believe.

My work is about framing and context. More specifically, I am fascinated with how history and culture are framed, who is doing the framing, and how these factors affect our interpretation of reality. 

Hank Willis Thomas

The Cotton Bowl is part of Thomas’s series titled Strange Fruit. The series looks at how Black bodies have been shown and remembered in American culture. The title comes from a powerful poem and a song about lynching, in which the phrase “strange fruit” refers to bodies hanging from trees. 

Another work by Thomas can be found in the NCMA Park. His interactive sculpture, Ernest and Ruth, features two large metal benches that are shaped like speech bubbles. Visitors can sit on the benches and engage with the artwork, while also connecting and talking with each other.

Etiquetas: contemporáneo, historia americana, estudios sociales