Open studio

Art

This is the studio, not the museum. The paint is still wet and the tape is still up — illustrators, photographers, and printmakers making this community visible, shown where the work gets made.

Amber Randall

Acrylic underpainting, finished in oil, on canvas — worked up from a projector-transferred sketch or reference photo.

“It wasn't a direct decision to only honor full-figured bodies — I'm not skinny myself, and the purpose of my art is to express myself. It's rare that I see people like me honored through art, especially growing up as a little girl, so I decided to do it myself. I try to honor most body types through my artwork because it's important to me that people in the Black community can relate to it no matter what body type they have.”

Step into the studio

Surrealist oil-and-acrylic painting of two oversized golden hands cradling a cracked, hourglass-shaped globe against a cloud-filled sky with a crescent moon and a bursting sun. Sand pours from the crack onto a small elderly man standing below — grey curly hair, a green sweater, tan trousers, a cane in one hand, an acoustic guitar slung on his back — as he stands ankle-deep in the falling sand.

Time Waits For No One — acrylic and oil on canvas

Portrait of a plus-size Black woman from the chest up, in a red top, resting her cheek against her raised hand with her eyes closed and her head tilted back. Two monarch butterflies rest near her face, and a bright sunburst radiates behind her head against a pale blue and lavender cloudy sky.

Portrait of an elderly Black woman standing in a wildflower field at sunset, wearing a blue bonnet tied under her chin and a matching blue button-front dress, with wire-rimmed glasses. She holds a foil-wrapped sandwich in one hand and a bag in the other; sunbeams and small floating lights cross the field behind her beneath an orange sky.

Split-style portrait of a young Black woman with braided, beaded hair pulled into a bun, her face rendered half in full color and half as a black-and-white line drawing. Inside the shape of her upswept hair is a painted landscape — evergreen trees, a waterfall falling into a pool, and a full moon in a purple night sky — set against a solid magenta background.

Want to Be Spotlighted?

Illustrator, photographer, printmaker — if your work belongs in this community, show us. You keep your copyright; we publish with your credit and your links.

Start your submission

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