Join the Joshua Johnson Council on Facebook Live for their November meeting featuring a presentation from Baltimore artist Jerrell Gibbs.

Joshua Johnson Council (JJC) Members share a passion for African American and African art. Named after an 18th-century African American portrait painter who lived and worked in Maryland, the JJC is one of the oldest African American museum support groups in the U.S. Its mission is to forge meaningful connections between Baltimore’s African American communities and The Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) by promoting and highlighting the achievements of African American artists.

JJC Membership offers a wide range of opportunities for active participation within a network of friends and colleagues dedicated to art, education, community, and family. JJC programs and meetings take place on the second Thursday of each month.

About the Presenter:

Jerrell Gibbs retraces family memories, examining the origin of his own life by representing intimate and instantly joyous moments. While affirming the multilayered experience of the African American diaspora, Gibbs plunges the viewer into an immersive experience, the realm of his childhood.

Growing up in Baltimore influenced his perspective of socioeconomics, body politics, race, economic disparities, and their influence on one another. Through his figurative portraits, Gibbs accentuates banal representations of Black identity by depicting empathy, inviting the possibility for a spiritual connection. The works are adapted from small Polaroids into life-sized paintings. The artist draws from revised characters in his own life and narratives such as Charles M. Schulz’s Peanuts, mimicking the comic strip’s playful illustrative style.

Gibbs will graduate in 2020 with an MFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore. He has exhibited at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum, the Galleries at CCBC, and the Gallery at Howard University. His work appears in the permanent collection in the Harbor Bank of Maryland.