Colonialism and Abstract Art
(2019)

• Hank WILLIS THOMAS

Conceptual artist Hank Willis Thomas has reimagined the well-known 1936 art history graphic Cubism and Abstract Art, which was originally designed by the founding director of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), Alfred H. Barr, Jr. Thomas expands and edits the diagram to include the socioeconomic, cultural and political circumstances that inform some of the most iconic works in MoMA’s collection, from Pablo Picasso’s Les demoiselles d’Avignon, 1907, to Henri Rousseau’s The dream, 1910. Thomas intertwines art and history between 1870 and 1970, beginning with the European exploration and colonisation of the Congo and concluding with the decade of its independence a century later. In the diagram red text is related to Africa, green text denotes cultural movements, and blue arrows suggest connections across categories.