[prak-sis] contemporary art association

[Bio]

Artist Terry Dixon is a interdisciplinary artist from Washington, DC.
He has composed new art perspectives by integrating various visual art techniques through painting, photography, computer art, video, and electronic music.

Dixon received his masters of fine arts degree from the Art & Technology Department

at the School of The Art Institute of Chicago and began to explore his use of technology with art.

Terry explores kinetic connections with his abstract line style and vivid colors. His imagery has been noted to be complex and somewhat musical in its flow across the surface of his creations, and this is all fueled by his passion for Jazz and electronic music. Currently Terry is exploring various jazz music from the late 1800’s to the mid 1900’s, as he is creating his body of work based on re-enslavement.

Dixon’s artwork is owned by various private collectors in the United States, Europe and a part of the very prestigious Sandor Collection in Chicago.

[statement]

Body of Work: Re-Enslavement

Terry Dixon was inspired to create this series, based on author Douglas A. Blackmon’s subject matter of re-enslavement and segregation. Re-Enslavement is based on the slave labor camps of the south, from the Civil War up until World War 2. Mainly African American men were arrested in rural southern towns and brought up on false charges, mostly due to deep seeded racism in various communities. Large American corporations would purchase inmates from the county jail system and force them to work in labor camps. After slavery was abolished, the practice of purchasing someone and forcing him or her to work for you is a form of re-enslavement.

He explored the use of color, lines and raw materials in his paintings. The line patterns and color juxtaposed with various photographic faces, add life to each figure, on the surface of each mixed media structure. The images express the life of being trapped, segregated, and ridiculed by racist individuals. This body of work will hopefully educate viewers and recognize one part of hurtful American history.