Brent Holmes

Jones Ranch Egypt is an ongoing process engaging historic European cataloging traditions and mid-twentieth century western agitprop. Holmes explores their relationship with mark-making, their Western / cowboy roots, and the African sculptural / spiritual traditions of their ancestors. Each image is based (however loosely) on a symbolic African sculpture and a piece of American Western art. In the incorporation of the two, Holmes depicts an imaginary West highlighting the dual stolen history. The often obfuscated role that people of color have played in the development of western expansion, and the colossal act of theft that is the institutional African artifacts collection industry. In iconic depictions of the West, we find a cultural erasure of black and brown bodies presented in the “Cowboy”. 20th-century Cowboy culture serves as a soft propaganda about American individuality, sparingly distributed to the 25% African American workforce (or the 35% Latino) that made up most cowboys at the end of the 19th century. In comparison, the collection and display of tribal artifacts by private and institutional collections mirror this. From an egocentric hegemonic lens both the creation and display of African sculpture and masks is a curious note in art history excluding them from what should be considered some of the most dynamic and meaningful object-making in all of humanity’s creative endeavors. To amalgamate the two, it’s to build a libratory narrative around foregone trajectories in human history.