Arris’ Cohen’s artwork (featured above) will be on display at the “Irrepressible Soul” exhibition at the Urban Arts Space. Credit: Iyana Hill
Viewing art is often considered a deeply intimate and individualized experience. But Iyana Hill, creator and co-curator of the “Irrepressible Soul” art exhibition, has a more collaborative philosophy — especially when it comes to highlighting the Black experience: “It takes a village.”
“Irrepressible Soul” opened June 1, and will be on view through July 1 at Urban Arts Space, which occupies the Lazarus building in downtown Columbus and hosts free galleries and events, according to its website.
Hill, a seventh-year in African American and African studies and photography, said her exhibition consists of a gallery of artwork with pieces from 27 artists as well as community programming events allowing audiences to interact with the gallery’s overarching themes, including Black culture.
“I believe that for ‘Irrepressible Soul,’ yes, the exhibition is outstanding,” Hill, who is also pursuing a minor in arts entrepreneurship and certification in diversity, equity and inclusion, said. “But ‘Irrepressible Soul’ doesn’t exist without the programming. The programming is how we’re able to really collaborate and be within the community, which is beautiful.”
Terron Banner, co-curator of the exhibition and manager of community learning and experience at Urban Arts Space, said the team behind “Irrepressible Soul” worked with numerous community partners — such as Ohio State’s African American and African Studies Community Extension Center, the Maroon Arts Group, Sole Classics and several more philanthropic and community-based organizations — to make the exhibition possible.
“We are creating this kind of arts and cultural ecosystem, and all of these organizations have a common goal of benefiting the community,” Banner said. “So we’re partnering with them to make sure this program is comprehensive and responsible. So that’s a little bit different than a lot of, you know, general art exhibitions that don’t take those things into account.”
Hill said programming events span over the course of the exhibition’s month-long stay at Urban Arts Space and incorporate activities like spoken word performances, workshops and immersive technology experiences.
Banner, an Ohio State graduate with a Ph.D. in arts administration, education and policy and is a current university lecturer, said “Irrepressible Soul” is one of many projects created through Urban Arts Space’s internship program, which aims to provide interns with creative opportunities catering to their personal skill sets and make them more competitive in the professional world. But “Irrepressible Soul,” Banner said, is unlike any other exhibition he’s seen at Urban Arts Space.
“This is very impressive for a student to do this,” Banner said. “To go and network and organize support and resources for this. This show has raised — in grant funding, in donations and in kind gifts — $44,000.”
With “Irrepressible Soul” being Hill’s first exhibition as a curator, she said collaboration was a critical component of her vision. Reflecting nearly a year of planning and curating, Hill said, the exhibition showcases artwork from 27 Black artists of different gender identities, ages and nations of origin.
“When it comes to artists, if we’re talking about the Black experience, there’s so many walks of life and intersectionalities within that,” Hill said. “I wanted to be able to encapsulate all of that in this space.”
Banner said “Irrepressible Soul” not only gives Black artists a platform to share their stories and spark conversation but also a chance to feel validated as creators by a large institution like Ohio State.
“Oftentimes in art museums, historically, they are elitist,” Banner said. “They sustain this master narrative of who is a fine artist. And most of the time, you know, if I asked you, ‘Who comes to mind as a fine artist or master artist?’ he’s probably going to be an old, white guy. That’s just how it works, to put it plainly. And again, that’s not always intentional, but it is perpetuated in the art field.”
Arris’ Cohen, a featured artist in the exhibition, said “Irrepressible Soul” benefits both the artists themselves and the Columbus community as a whole.
“Someone said to me recently that we used to pick cotton, and now we are the cotton,” Cohen said. “A lot of Black culture has, you know, just kind of touched different aspects of our society. And so I just think that in a lot of ways, that can be utilized to get the point across that we all need to work together at a point of confluence, if you will. Where people understand that although we’re different, we’re the same in a lot of ways.”
Banner said it was important the artists contributing to the exhibition were paid for their work, which is all too uncommon in the modern art world. This concept of ensuring both the artists and the community benefited from the exhibition is at the heart of “Irrepressible Soul,” Banner said.
“From the creation of the exhibition, it was all about reciprocity,” Banner said. “It was all about providing a platform for the artists to change the way art museums, art institutions and the university approach exhibitions and think about artists and think about art, and then to create a safe space for dialogue and conversation, where everyone can benefit from having this opportunity to take in different perspectives to talk about discrimination, joy, pain, whatever it is.”
More information about “Irrepressible Soul” can be found on the event website, including the programming calendar with featured community events.
