The glittery, subversive homecoming of Mickalene Thomas
Camden native Mickalene Thomas on her first solo exhibit in Philadelphia and the joy of seeing portraits of her mother adorn the walls of the Barnes.
Mickalene Thomas is used to baring everything in her artwork. The Camden native’s current show at the Barnes Foundation gets a bit more personal, not only as the first major solo exhibit in her hometown region, but because some of her cousins are seeing the works in person for the first time. That includes nudes of her and her mom.
The video portrait Me As Muse (2016) displays Thomas’ reclined naked body across a dozen monitors, a continuation of her revolutionary portraits of Black women relaxing in luxurious positions — spotlights and privileges that have traditionally been reserved for white women in the canon of art history. Her works centering Black women as her muses, beginning with her own mom, Sandra Bush, are bold, subversive, and deliver a jolt.
That was certainly the case for her New Jersey relatives.
“They were like, ‘Whoa! OK, cuz, like, what’s up here?’” recalled Thomas, laughing at her family’s reactions. “‘Next time warn us, come on!’”
But Thomas’ work is entirely unapologetic, and that’s the point. Running through Jan. 12, “Mickalene Thomas: All About Love” highlights paintings, photography, collage work, and other mixed media. The touring show focuses on her reworkings of masterpieces by artists represented in the Barnes collection, including Henri Matisse and enc.
The most breathtaking is Thomas’ monumental version of Manet’s classic Le déjeuner sur l’herbe, displayed as a photograph and as a collage painting on a 10-by-24 foot wood panel. Wearing patterned designs by Thomas, three fabulously dressed Black women with rhinestone-dotted natural hair stare at the viewer. Friends of the artist, the models captivate completely with confident and challenging gazes.
That referential conversation across generations and styles is why Thomas wanted the show at the Barnes. “As people go in to see the collection, they can go, ‘Who’s this, Mickalene Thomas?’ Then they see a reference to Le déjeuner, or other references to Matisse and [Gustave] Courbet,” she said. “You start to get this sense of the historical conversation around the work. Then they can [say] ‘Wow.’ [They] probably would never even have thought that this African American queer girl from Camden, New Jersey would look at these white male artists and reshape this narrative of the black female body.”
Thomas brings that Camden pride with her. In the Los Angeles iteration of “All About Love,” she built large recreations of her childhood rowhouse to represent her hometown. In Philadelphia, she sees the Barnes stop as part of her continued connection to the city; Camden Mayor Vic Carstarphen saw the showas well.
“It allows me to continue my conversation with engagement with the arts in Camden,” she said. “They can bring people and say, ‘Look, this is Camden here.’”
As a kid across the river, Thomas would sneak over to the city with friends to people-watch punks on South Street. Her first concert was The Cure at the Spectrum in the late 1980s, when she rocked spiky hair and steel-toe Doc Martens. Philadelphia also provided her earliest exposures to fine art institutions on field trips from Pennsauken High School to the Art Museum and the original Barnes Foundation location.
Coming back to Philadelphia for the show has proved an enormously gratifying homecoming for Thomas. The most rewarding part has been seeing the portraits of her late mom, who posed for her often before her death in 2012, adoring the Barnes walls. The portraits of her mother include rhinestone-encrusted paintings and a photograph of her as a reclining nude. It was a meaningful revelation, she said.
“Having her at the Barnes as my muse, it’s a really indescribable feeling, because it really positions, not just her, but the legacy of women of her nature and spirit — all of that on this very elevated level is empowering, even for me to see,” Thomas said. “I actually looked at the photograph differently when I saw it in this context. It felt really like it broke through a different tier and moment.”
Seeing the paintings for the first time, Thomas’ older brother told her that she really captured Bush’s energy. That was beautiful to hear. Then, she heard from other relatives: “‘Why’d you got your mom’s breast out?’” she recounted, laughing again. “‘They’re like, ‘Girl. Why are you going to do that to your mom?’”
Undeterred, Thomas knows Sandra Bush — a fashion model who delighted in becoming her daughter’s frequent subject — would’ve been proud, too.
“Mickalene Thomas: All About Love” runs through Jan. 12, 2025, at the Barnes Foundation, 2025 Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia, 215-278-7000 or barnesfoundation.org.