Akea Brionne
How I Hate to Leave
2021
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Akea Brionne
How I Hate to Leave
2021
Physical Qualities
Jacquard tapestry, Poly-fil, and rhinestones, 50 × 70 in. (127 × 177.8 cm.)
Credit Line
Purchased as the gift of the Joshua Johnson Council in Honor of Christopher Bedford, Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director, 2016–2022; and Art Fund established with exchange funds from gifts of Dr. and Mrs. Edgar F. Berman, Equitable Bank, N.A., Geoffrey Gates, Sandra O. Moose, National Endowment for the Arts, Lawrence Rubin, Philip M. Stern, and Alan J. Zakon
Object Number
2022.265
Akea Brionne’s series An Ode to (You)’all pays homage to four important women in her family— her great-grandmother and three great-aunts, the Phelps sisters. These women sacrificed to ensure the men in their family, and future generations, could move north and take opportunities that would allow them to achieve upward mobility.
From Black leisure and romantic relationships to young children from the family school, An Ode to (You)’all affectionately displays the Phelps sisters’ time in Columbus, Mississippi. Brionne adapted a trove of her family’s photographs dating from the 1920s through the 1950s by reproducing them as jacquard textiles, then carefully hand-sewed embellishments onto their surfaces. Together, these works are a window into understanding Black motherhood and honoring its legacy across generations in the artist’s family.
The Baltimore Museum of Art by purchase, 2022; the artist
