Baker Artist Portfolios

This series was prompted by the COVID shut down. The gym was closed, so my exercise became running/jogging/walking outdoors. I became aware of all of the beauty that surrounds me every day in nature in a way that I never had before. We all went through the changes of seasons as time went on and I was amazed by the variety of colors, forms, and textures of the changing environment. Being the constant collector, I began picking up all sorts of natural objects.

Look at the Music.

Convergence of Art and Music:

    Music has always been entwined with Elaine Weiner-Reed’s art. Sometimes she paints to the music of Chimene Badi, the Beatles, or Funky and Motown favorites, but her inner rhythm syncs best with Jazz. As a result, her studio is generally filled with the soulful music of Miles Davis, Maynard Ferguson, Sonny Rollins, Claude Nougaro, Herbie Hancock, and Vanessa Collier.

Within DeVane’s psyche, combined with her technical prowess for assemblage, she remembers and reimagines found, castoff materials. These works are conceived by the technique of bricolage with which she leverages the use of available materials. Those materials fuel and load her sculptures with symbolic signifiers of intangible and often uncontrollable, inexplicable forces, which include the crucial dynamics of being human and coexisting with otherworldly beings.

- Dr. Leslie King-Hammond

Oletha DeVane can be counted among a distinguished roster of artists, including Betye Saar, Howardena Pindell, Joyce J. Scott, Renée Stout, and Vanessa German, who each in their own way have engaged in an art- making process that Linda Goode-Bryant and Marcy S.

Something Worth Doing was my most recent solo exhibition at Hamiltonian Gallery, which was a reflection on the objects we surround ourselves with and the comfort they provide, both physically and psychologically. The exhibition centered around a series of four sculptures built on top of foam mattress toppers that include natural materials, curbside giveaways, products purchased from targeted ads, and things passed down to me by loved ones.