“The Greek and Roman mythology is a means of smuggling in the Yòrúba religion, in a way that is by no means the same as, but is nonetheless reminiscent of, the original identifications by the Lucumí of their deities with those of their enslavers,” Morales said. “(It’s) the story of how she challenged Olodumare, turned herself into a peacock and stormed the heavens, only to be burned by the sun, giving her golden vitiligo,” Morales writes. Rosales uses Greek and Roman mythologies to draw viewers in, then takes them into potentially less familiar territory.īotticelli’s “Birth of Venus,” for example, tells the story of the goddess Oshun. Rosales is more interested in what connects us than what divides us.” “It’s social justice but with an optimistic trajectory. “Rosales focuses on what unites us all,” said Morales, who wrote an essay for the catalog. Morales deepened her understanding of West African religions by seeking advice from Elizabeth Pérez, an ethnographer and historian of Afro-Diasporic and Latin American religions at UCSB.
Rosales’ style of painting mirrored canonical Renaissance works that Morales knew well, such as the Sistine Chapel, but they depict scenes from West African myths.īy recasting the European Renaissance style to depict the West African slave trade and tales of the Yorùbá spirits (known as orishas), Rosales contributes to a rewriting of art history’s master narrative. Rosales’ paintings first caught her attention because of how they engaged with, and supplanted, Greek mythology. That show, now on view at MBMA through June 25, was curated by Patricia Daigle ’15, an alumna of UCSB’s doctoral program in art history.Ī classicist and cultural critic, Morales’ research considers myths as foundational beliefs and spaces for cultural resistance, such as in her book “Antigone Rising: The Subversive Power of the Ancient Myths” (Bold Type Books, 2020). Morales was the lead curator of the AD&A show Harmonia Rosales: Entwined, which MBMA later broadened in scope under the title, “Harmonia Rosales: Master Narrative.” “Her work draws on the transatlantic slave trade because of which many of the Yorùbá myths almost did not survive.” “Rosales creates a new Renaissance visuality that foregrounds Black and Latinx experiences,” said Helen Morales, Argyropoulos Professor of Hellenic studies at UCSB, who contributed to the new publication. The show inspired a touring exhibition from Memphis Brooks Museum of Art (MBMA) that will soon visit Spelman College, an Historically Black College, and recently, a catalog
In a stunning exhibition that centered Black experiences, the Art, Design & Architecture Museum (AD&A) at UC Santa Barbara in 2022 presented a new exhibition with largely new works by artist Harmonia Rosales, who employs the pictorial tropes of Renaissance painting to reimagine tales from the West African religion Yorùbá.
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