Sun Splashed

Referencing to African tribal art and African American “folk” traditions, Nari Ward’s mid-career survey at the Barnes Foundation touches the dynamics of power and politics.

“Sun Splashed” is a mid-career survey of the found-object assemblage art of Nari Ward, presented at the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia. Ward’s oeuvre resonates with the Barnes collection and speaks with penetrating insight and imagination to a broad range of subjects, including black history and culture, the dynamics of power and politics, and Caribbean diaspora identity.

Top: Nari Ward, Sun Splashed, installation view at the Pérez Art Museum Miami, 2015. Courtesy Pérez Art Museum Miami. Left: Nari Ward, Iron Heavens, 1995. Oven pans, ironed cotton, and burnt wooden

Animated by flânerie – the first-hand engagement with urban street life that similarly animated French Impressionism – he makes reference to African tribal art and African American “folk” traditions. Ward has expanded contemporary definitions of installation and assemblage with his massive, tactile approach to art. His deft use of materials gathered in and around urban neighborhoods imbues his work with a relationship to the real world, allowing him to challenge viewers’ perceptions of familiar objects and experiences.

Nari Ward, <i>Sun Splashed</i>, installation view at the Pérez Art Museum Miami, 2015. Courtesy Pérez Art Museum Miami
Nari Ward, <i>Sun Splashed</i>, installation view at the Pérez Art Museum Miami, 2015. Courtesy Pérez Art Museum Miami


from 24 June to 22 August 2016
opening party friday 24 June, 6 pm
Nari Ward. Sun Splashed
The Barnes Foundation
2025 Benjamin Franklin Parkway
Philadelphia, USA