A steady visual rhythm: Taylar Sanders and Harold Smith at Mulberry Art Gallery
An exhibition of paintings by Kansas City artists Taylar Sanders and Harold Smith offers an invitation to witness blackness in full bloom. It's on view at Mulberry Art Gallery through May 16 and Harvester Arts through April 25.
There is perhaps no more poignant an art exhibition in Wichita at the moment than “Rhythm and Bloom,” on view at Mulberry Art Gallery in partnership with Harvester Arts. The collection of paintings by Kansas City-based artists Taylar Sanders and Harold Smith, which was organized by Dominique Williams, invites viewers to witness a presentation of the reality of Black identity in response to public perception.
A dozen or so acrylic, digital, mixed media, and oil paint works are on display in the bright, contemporary shipping container gallery space that Mulberry Art Gallery occupies on the second floor of Revolutsia. At Harvester Arts, now located on the first floor of downtown apartment building The Lux, 18 more works are arranged on one gallery wall.
A self-taught visual artist, Taylar Sanders writes in an artist statement that her paintings “shed light into the diverse African American experience in order to help us love and appreciate our differences, while simultaneously pointing out our oneness in our human experience.” Sanders captures highly relatable moments of quiet joy and nurturing: a breastfeeding mother in “A Mother’s Love” and a woman perched on a stool reading a book, surrounded by her house plants, in “Serenity.” She shows humans being human, seeking connection through nature or one another.
Digital paintings by Taylar Sanders, from left: "A Mother's Love," 8 by 12 inches; "Serenity," 6 by 10 inches. Images courtesy of Taylar Sanders.
Sanders’ oil on canvas painting “A Grateful Heart” features the anonymous bust of a person clasping their hands to their heart as they face the sun, a grassy field, and what looks like a row of round hay bales in the background. The figure wears a simple, white, V-necked T--shirt and no jewelry. In confident brush strokes, the ochre hands are bathed in golden light. For what is this person grateful? Perhaps a perfect sunset or a peaceful afternoon. Mother Nature belongs to no one, but we all deserve to bask in her beauty.
While Sanders conveys serene nature and realism, Harold Smith uses bright colors and thick, broad strokes to create abstract portraiture. I was transfixed by the power of his textured color, applied with a heavy hand and sometimes even mixed directly on the canvas. The internationally exhibited visual artist explores “the simultaneously complementary and contradictory internal and external narratives that black men in America must navigate in order to survive and flourish,” as he notes in his artist statement on his website.
His portraits prominently feature men in deep contemplation. In “Man of Color,” a man in a wide-lapeled suit jacket and tie sits up straight in anticipation, perhaps ready for an interview. In “Friday Night Blues,” a man leans his head against his fist, holding a box of Church’s Chicken and a bottle of Colt 45, ready for the week’s end and a chance to relax.
Acrylic on canvas works by Harold Smith, from left: “Man of Color,” 24 by 36 inches; “Friday Night Blues,” 24 by 36 inches. Photos by Jessy Clonts Day for the SHOUT.
In Smith’s “Complex Narratives,” the faces of two men side by side appear obscured, their tired, sleep-ringed eyes out of alignment as though refracted behind a rainy window. Their skin tones are a visual thesaurus of blues: azure and cerulean and royal, highlighted in golden yellow, orchid purple, and even glittery bronze. Bits of comics like "Power Man" and "Iron Fist" are collaged under thick, impasto layers of acrylic.
From left: Harold Smith, “Complex Narratives,” acrylic on canvas, 36 by 24 inches; detail of “Complex Narratives," Photos by Jessy Clonts Day for the SHOUT.
As the story of Marvel’s Luke Cage goes, Power Man attains his superhero strength and unbreakable skin after being experimented on in prison, while serving for a crime he didn’t commit. Smith’s imagery of railing against societal expectations of eternal strength, despite the seemingly never-ending barrage of violence against Black men, is urgent and palpable.
Both Smith and Sanders endeavor to challenge the viewer to consider and internalize the complexities of Black American existence. From keenly differing approaches, together their work achieves a steady visual rhythm, though Smith’s pieces carry the melody with their sheer volume. “My work is about giving visibility to the overlooked, about finding harmony in identity,” Smith says in his exhibition statement. “Through art, we reclaim space, we bloom in ways history never expected us to.”
I only wish there had been more of Sanders’ work on view, especially the painting “I Come in Peace,” which was featured in the exhibition’s promotions but wasn’t on display. In this piece a young man with eyes closed takes in the simple joy of smelling the warm-weather blooms of pink zinnias and yellow forsythia in front of him.
In contrast to Smith’s portraits of men collaged with comic book fight scenes and indulging in the escapism of food and alcohol, Sanders’s portrait of a man in repose could have helped anchor a sense of the “fight, flight, or freeze” reflexes of survival that this exhibition conveys.
Do yourself a favor and visit both locations to view "Rhythm and Bloom." The images will stay with you long after you experience them.
The Details
“Rhythm and Bloom”
April 4-May 16, 2025, at Mulberry Art Gallery, 2721 E. Central in Wichita
April 4-25 at Harvester Arts, 120 E. 1st St. N. in Wichita
Accessibility note: Mulberry Art Gallery is located on the second floor of the Revolutsia shipping container mall, and the elevator is currently out of service.
Mulberry Art Gallery is open to the public from noon-6 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday. Harvester Arts' gallery hours are 3-6 p.m. Monday-Friday and 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturdays. Harvester is also open from 6-9 p.m. Mondays during the meeting of the Wichita Sketch Club.
Jessy Clonts Day is a writer, roller skater, and mother. After living ten years in the American South and Southwest she and her spouse returned to Kansas to raise their family, where the sunsets are otherworldly and the arts community is alive and well.
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