For more than two decades, Simone Leigh has interrogated the past and present of Black femme subjectivity through sculpture, video, and performance. Leigh describes her work as “autoethnographic,” focused on research and self-reflection, inspired by a range of African and Black American material cultures. Among several works in Glenstone’s collection is Village Series, 2021, a sculpture measuring over seven feet tall. The towering figure emerges defiantly from a hoop skirt with arms bent, fists to hips, head tilted down. Echoing other works in Leigh’s oeuvre, she dances between abstraction and figuration. In lieu of facial features, a wreath of hand-built ceramic rosettes frames a black, concave space reminiscent of Leigh’s first love, ceramic vessels.

–Anisa Olufemi, from the Glenstone Field Guide