Black History Month: Artist Spotlight
Cassandra Jennings Hall
Cassandra Jennings Hall, born 1947 in Orangeburg, SC, is an abstract artist and collage artist. She studied with Michel Dillon, Jerry Samuels, Tsuigo Hattori, Dale Meyers, Lucia A. Salemme, Jack Henderson. Jennings Hall studied at the Art Students League, Fashion Institute of Technology, Meyer School of Fashion Design, and the Art Center of New Jersey.
Jennings Hall's current body of work, Eephus, is based on works on paper that she created many years ago during a painting block. These works on paper have accumulated over the years. In the past, she recycled those paintings on paper into collages by cutting them into two inch squares. She reused them to create a new composition as a collage. Currently she is renewing the collage as the Eephus paintings. This current body of work allows the artist to recycle, reuse, and therefore renew her work.
A diagnosis of cancer made her appreciate the impermanence of life and come to treasure every day. Her resolve and commitment to her art strengthened and changed the course of her work. Initially, she worked in a hard edge geometric style but became dissatisfied with the constriction of the linear form. After meeting Tsugio Hattori, who became her teacher and mentor until his death in 1998, her work was transformed. Her art reflected both African and Asian influences in color and style.
Jennings Hall has exhibited her work in museums, galleries, universities and corporations as well as in private and corporate art collection in the New York metropolitan area. Jennings Hall continues to live and work in New Jersey.
Elton Tucker
Elton Tucker, b. 1954, Bronx, New York, is a full-time artist and teaches arts and crafts to children of all ages at New York City After School Programs. Tucker is a graduate of the High School of Art and Design and earned an Associate Degree at the Fashion Institute of Technology. He also studied at the Art Students League of New York.
Tucker’s paintings are vibrant and full of bold patterns, high energy, and movement. As a native New Yorker, he travels around the city constantly looking out for “interesting colors, textures, shapes and life's emotions.” Through his artwork, Tucker feels he fervently expresses his innermost feelings on a visual and emotional level. “I feel my mission is to produce work people can relate to, get inspiration from and utilize in their everyday lives.”
Tucker's work has been shown in numerous solo and group shows, some of which include Audubon Artists, Taller Boricua Gallery, UFA Gallery, Savacou Gallery, Chashama Film Festival, The Hudson Guild Gallery, Noho NY Artwork, Leslie Lohman Museum, New York City Public Library and the West Side Arts Coalition. His work has been published in the New York Daily News as well as in various greeting cards, calendars, and books covers. He has also illustrated for Women’s Wear Daily. Tucker’s painting “Believe in Yourself” was featured as part of the set design on “The Whoopi Goldberg Show.” Some of his many awards include The NYC Metropolitan Transportation Authority Award, the Noho Business Improvement District Award, Artists Fellowship, Inc., and The Harlem Renaissance Cultural and Living Legend Award. He is also a member of the West Side Arts Coalition, the Audubon Artists and the Harlem Arts Alliance.
Earlene Hardie Cox
Earlene Hardie Cox’s career as a sculptor began later in life after a 23-year career as an international lawyer and corporate executive. As she got older, she became aware of how art can be one of many tools that can be used to combat Alzheimer's. Sculpting became a medium for her personal battle against this disease which has occurred with some frequency in her family. Sculpting not only allows Cox to use different parts of her brain but it also unleashed the creativity of her hands. Earlene Hardie Cox sculpts the human figure and is largely self-taught; the models for her work are the many people she has met over the course of her life. They are the church ladies with their hats from her childhood, the memories from having been a mother, the people she has met during her years of international travel and people from the many experiences she has had as an African American in this country. Cox states, “They are the faces of every person I have ever seen, Although, I don't always remember their names.”
Since 2008, Earlene has advocated using clay art as therapy to combat Alzheimer’s. Through her affiliation with the Westchester (NY) County Chapter of the Links, Inc. and the Clay Art Center, she created a clay art program for Alzheimer’s and dementia patients at the Wartburg Nursing Home in Mount Vernon. NY. In 2017, in recognition of her work, the Hudson Valley Chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association named Earlene an Alzheimer’s Champion. She is a juried artist at the Clay Art Center (CAC), in Port Chester NY where she has a private studio. She is also a board director and was previously treasurer of the CAC.
Isaac Paris
Isaac Paris was born in Trenton NJ and studied Graphic Arts & Design at Pratt Institute then later received a BFA with Honors, in Communications Design from Parsons School of Design. Paris has enjoyed making his living as a graphic designer, art director, and teaching in the communication design department at Pratt Institute, Parsons School of Design, and the Fashion Institute of Technology.
In an effort to be more environmentally aware and having a desire to do something creative and useful with discarded materials, Isaac Paris has combined his love for collecting African masks with creating masks mainly from plastic containers and other recycled materials. Most recently specializing in creating masks that resemble familiar animal forms, and possible extinct ones. Isaac Paris is also a skilled painter. His hyperrealist portraits are often superimposed on a solid sky-blue or black background, and at times include tree branches that inform the outline of the figure. Paris’ diptych from his mask series, entitled Long Ears, as well as a portrait of Michelle Obama, entitled First Lady, will be featured in the exhibition Go Figure!, on view from February 17 – March 16, 2022.
