May 8th – 11th
28 Liberty Street, New York
NY 10005
Ticket Information

Galerie Myrtis – Booth 04
Featured Artist:
Lavett Ballard
Tawny Chatmon
Monica Ikegwu

view artwork | 1-54 artist’s catalog

The 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair will feature a curated selection of galleries presenting contemporary works by both emerging and established artists from Africa and its diaspora. As always, 1-54 will collaborate with leading institutions to offer tailored programming.

VIP Preview Day
Thursday, May 8, 2025
11 am – 7 pm

Public Hours
Friday May 9th, 11 am – 7 pm
Saturday May 10th, 11 am – 7 pm
Sunday May 11th, 11 am – 6 pm

This exhibition celebrates the rich history of black religious and spiritual traditions while also challenging the ways in which these practices continue to evolve and adapt in response to contemporary social and cultural realities.

Featured artists: Tawny Chatmon, Wesley Clark, Morel Doucet, Monica Ikegwu,M. Scott Johnson, Delita Martin, and Felandus Thames.

Programming includes a book signing for “Shifting Time: African American Artists 2020-2021” on Saturday, September 16th from 5 – 7 pm. The event is in collaboration with the Petrucci Family Foundation (PFF). Claudia Volpe, the Director of PFF, and essayists Klare Scarborough and Berrisford Boothe will join featured artists for the event.

artwork
Light in the Darkness II, 2023
Oil Paint on Canvas, 24 x 18″
by Monica Ikegwu

Palazzo Michiel
Strada Nova, 4391
30121 Campo Santi Apostoli
Venezia VE, Italy

Myrtis Bedolla, Curator of The Afro-Futurist Manifesto: Blackness Reimagined exhibition, moderates a discussion with artists Tawny Chatmon, M. Scott Johnson, Delita Martin, and Arvie Smith, whose works offer discourse into African Americans’ socio-political concerns and pays tribute to the resiliency, creativity, and spirituality that have historically sustained Black people.

Blackness and the possibilities of its future are the impulses that drive the imaginations of the artists who draw inspiration from Afrofuturism, Black existentialism, spirituality, and futurist thought to construct a Black universe of tomorrow.

Experience Magazine, Issue 38, 2022 (pgs. 15-17)
Majestic Reflections by Yaniya Lee

…”while galleries, museums, and other art spaces begin to reassess their mission statements and take a serious look at how diversity can improve their environments, talents such as Chatmon lead the conversations centering on… a dramatic and sensational celebration of Black beauty.” full article

BMORE Art, May, 2022
Parallels and Meaningful Difference: Activating the Renaissance by Kerr Houston

…Arguably, the most extraordinary pairing in the entire show involves the placement of Tawny Chatmon’s haunting Covered/Vienna? next to an enigmatic oil painting by Pontormo. Both works are dual portraits, and both pair a coolly confident adult woman—embodiments, really, of sprezzatura— with a girl in a hesitant pose. full article

Washington Post Magazine, February, 2022
A painter who surrounds her Black subjects with gold by Lesile Gray Streeter

…[Chatmon’s] glittering pieces find their roots in in the works of past creators like Gustav Klimt … Chatmon who was named as one of “7 Artists You Should Know” by director Shinda Rimes’s Shondaland site and seven others Black artists are part of the exhibit curated by Myrtis Bedolla, of Baltimore’s Galerie Myrtis. full article

Culture Type, August, 2021
Latest News in Black Art: Guggenheim Hires Diversity Chief, Galerie Myrtis Presenting Exhibition at Venice Biennale, Kehinde Wiley Redesigns MTV Moonperson & More by Victoria L. Valentine

Galerie Myrtis Fine Art & Advisory of Baltimore, Md., was invited to participate in Personal Structures, an affiliate exhibition at the 2022 Venice Biennale. The Black-owned gallery founded by Myrtis Bedolla will present “The Afro-Futurist Manifesto: Blackness Reimagined” featuring eight artists—Tawny Chatmon, Larry Cook, Morel Doucet, Monica Ikegwu, M. Scott Johnson, Delita Martin, Arvie Smith, and Felandus Thames. full article

Art Critique, June 2021
In the galleries: An intimate panorama of video art’s variety and breadth by Mark Jenkins [mention of Tawny Chatmon]

The Maryland artist, a veteran commercial photographer, makes crisp pictures of cherished people and then adorns them with loosely painted jewels and flowers. The ornaments, rendered with pigment and gold leaf and sometimes three-dimensional, complement lustrous shades of Black skin and hair. full article

ABC Entertainment, 2021
Tawny Chatmon’s Artworks Featured in Soul of a Nation on ABC

Soul of a Nation, a six-episode series, presents viewers with a unique window into authentic realities of Black life and dive deeper into this critical moment of racial reckoning. Tawny Chatmon’s artworks were featured in episode 4, titled Black Joy, which was referenced in the coda of poetry by Boston Globe Journalist, Jeneé Osterheldt who spoke on what defines Black Joy. abc – soul of a nation

Focus, February, 2021
10 Black Photographers on Instagram You Should Be Following by Brendan Mitchell [features Tawny Chatmon]

February is Black History Month, so we’ve taken the opportunity to profile some of our favorite Black photographers on Instagram. The artists featured below are masters of their trade. Their Instagram profiles are filled with visually striking imagery, from captivating portraits to surrealist visual art. full article

Whitewall, October, 2020
Myrtis Bedolla is Deploying Art to Address Political and Social Issues by Katy Donoghue

Galerie Myrtis presents “Women Heal through Rite and Ritual” through the end of the year. The show’s focus was conceived prior to this year’s health crisis, and yet its timing could not be more fitting. Work by artists Lavett Ballard, Tawny Chatmon, Oletha DeVane, Shanequa Gay, Delita Martin, Elsa Muñoz, and Renée Stout look to non-Western traditions of the women’s role as nurturer, both physically and spiritually. full article

Musée Magazine, September, 2020
Tawny Chatmon’s “The Redemption”

…The models who are mostly children all have an array of hairstyles — braids with beads, locs, plaits embellished with ornate hair jewelry, Bantu knots, and “ afro puffs.” Some wear crowns, regalia that is representative of reclaiming the power of being Black with “ Black hair” and are dressed in the splendor of gold outfits befitting kings and queens. full article

FastCompany, February 2020
Fotografiska New York is a photo museum for the Instagram era (video features Tawny Chatmon at 2:10)

Fotografiska New York is now open in the historic Church Missions House in Manhattan. The photo museum for the modern world emphasizes experience—it’s open late and guests can stay for a glass of wine—while enjoying more current work than is available in traditional museums. full article

Architectural Digest, December 2019
Fotografiska Makes Its New York Debut in a Historic Landmark Building [featuring Tawny Chatmon] by Liddy Berman

…Self-taught talent Tawny Chatmon’s dreamy, intimate portraits of children of color, woven through with elements of digital collage, gold leaf, and painting, shine with Klimt-ian beauty. full article

Bella Magazine, 2019
An Art Aficionado’s Haven: Fotografiska New York Debuts In The Flatiron District by Rose Aljure

Now set to open in the Flatiron District, Fotografiska New York, announced today its expanded inaugural season. The exhibition space will open on October 18th, 2019 with solo presentations of photography by Ellen von Unwerth, Tawny Chatmon. full article

FORBES, August 2019
From Ellen Von Unwerth’s Bathing Supermodels To Lars Tunbjörk’s Everyday Absurdity, Fotografiska Sets Its Gaze On New York by Natasha Gural, Contributor

The diverse inaugural exhibition will include: Tawny Chatmon, a self-taught artist who combines paint, digital collage, illustration, and gold leaf… full article

New York City Guide August 2019
Fotografiska New York Set for Fall Opening in Flatiron with Unwerth, Chatmon by Merrill Lee Girardeau

The inaugural exhibition schedule at Fotografiska New York will feature the photographers Ellen von Unwerth, Tawny Chatmon, Helene Schmitz, and Adi Nes. full article

Omenka Online, July 2019
Tawny Chatmon on Rcclaiming Black Identity by Oliver Enwonwu & Oyindamola Olaniyan

In this ninth part of our continuing series on artists in the diaspora who promote Black identity and pride through their work, we present African American artist Tawny Chatmon. full article

Professional Photographer Magazine, April 2019 Issue
TAWNY CHATMON FINDS FULFILLMENT IN DRIVING CULTURAL CHANGE by Robert Kiener

“My heart wasn’t in it anymore.” That’s how Tawny Chatmon remembers feeling about her commercial photography career after her father died. Sitting in her spacious studio, the basement of her Upper Marlboro, Maryland, home, she chokes back a tear as she remembers the self-selected assignment that changed her life.. full article