The Greensboro Opera House will host the opening reception for “Black Belt Baroque,” a new exhibition of works by Greensboro artist Ian Crawford, on Sunday, May 17, from 4 to 7 p.m. Crawford will offer remarks on the collection at 5 p.m.
The exhibition features ink on canvas and pen and ink pieces that explore life in the Black Belt through the visual language of baroque art, placing familiar local faces and landscapes into compositions inspired by the drama and grandeur of the European baroque tradition.
Crawford, a senior instructor in the Department of Clothing, Textiles and Interior Design at the University of Alabama, said the collection grew from his sense that daily life in the region carries a kind of storybook weight.
“There is an aspect of living in the Black Belt that feels very much like a baroque fairy tale, and that was the genesis of this body of work,” Crawford said.
The show follows a similar thread as “Black Belt Pantheon,” Crawford’s October 2022 solo exhibition at the 5&Dime gallery space in Selma, which drew on mythology and used friends and local residents as models.
“Black Belt Baroque” extends that approach, substituting saints, historic figures, and baroque narratives for the classical mythology of the earlier work.
“I constantly think of similes and metaphors, and there are all these stories of the saints and their deeds and historic figures from baroque art that remind me of people, places and things that have happened here,” Crawford said.
“To me it’s the same level of grandeur — our sweeping, panoramic green vistas and our ponds and rivers — as anything in the baroque European world, and I’ve enjoyed mixing those ideologies and putting familiar faces in with that.”
Crawford’s process begins with sketches and doodles made during meetings and between classes, some of which develop into medium-scale ink on paper drawings. His favorites are then projected onto canvas and drawn in ink to produce an effect resembling charcoal at a much larger scale.
The work incorporates recurring Black Belt imagery including catfish, kudzu, egrets, and wisteria.
“I love large-scale art, and the Opera House is the perfect venue to get to use big panel drawings and installation pieces,” Crawford said.
“Black Belt Baroque” will be on view from May 17 through June 11 and is open by appointment following the opening reception. The public is invited to attend.
