WALTHAM, Mass. — In 2020, when the world tripped face-first into confinement, Danielle Mckinney began to color. Skilled as a photographer, the New Jersey-based artist started articulating lush interiors — first in acrylics, then oils — populated by solitary Black ladies in states of unrestrained rest. On view on the Rose Artwork Museum at Brandeis College, Mckinney’s first solo American museum exhibition, Inform Me Extra, charts the artist’s five-year journey. It renders a very female model of freedom — one which exalts relaxation as a type of magnificence by enshrining personal moments of ease inside small, intimate canvases.
Painted a muted pink and lit low, the only room that homes Inform Me Extra just isn’t not like one among Mckinney’s interiors, with deeply tufted blue benches providing areas to lounge. Have been one to take action, they may soak up the entire of the house directly, making the intelligent curatorial selections extra obvious. The present just isn’t, for instance, hung chronologically; slightly, the work are grouped by the topic’s specific method of repose, by no means greater than three to a wall. On one, figures are sprawled on couches; on the following, they’re ensconced in white beds. Whereas Mckinney’s figures sometimes have their eyes gently closed, their consideration turned inward, right here, two works from 2021, “Reading Room” and “Secret Garden,” break the fourth wall to make eye contact instantly with the viewer, making a jarring second of disruption that breaks the spell of the room. One feels as if somebody has slammed a door. In reality, in just one different work on view, “Shelter” (2023), are the topic’s eyes open in any respect. Snuggled right into a thick cream sweater, chin resting on palm, she stares softly off previous the butterfly poised on her poppy-painted fingertips like a cigarette.
Danielle Mckinney, “Shelter” (2023), oil on canvas
Mckinney determines the composition of her work by making a template with clippings from classic magazines, and works like “Shelter” — together with the opposite two on what I’ll dub the “smoking wall,” “Moth” (2021) and the titular “Tell Me More” (2023) — are nice examples of how she employs the extra conventional components of magnificence discovered within the vogue sphere: the shut cropping, lithe our bodies, and flashes of decoration (reminiscent of her trademark cadmium nails) emanating from hazy, darkened areas.
In newer works, together with two created expressly for this present, “From Square One” (2025) and “Fate” (2025), she seems to be drawing extra from the artwork historic references that additionally encourage her work, notably modernist masters reminiscent of Picasso and Matisse, with free, vibrant strokes reflecting the abandon exhibited by her topics. Right here, Mckinney gestures with higher confidence, orchestrating more and more opulent areas that maintain — however don’t confine — Black ladies luxuriating in unguarded time alone. Her canvases, very like the exhibition itself, determine contemplation as the last word decadence, arguing that moments of beautiful magnificence, lavished upon oneself, are each a luxurious and a lifeline.
Danielle Mckinney, “From Square One” (2025), oil on linen.
Danielle Mckinney, “Fate” (2025). Oil on linen.
Danielle Mckinney: Inform Me Extra continues on the Rose Artwork Museum (415 South Avenue, Waltham, Massachusetts) by way of January 4, 2026. The exhibition was curated by Henry and Lois Foster Director and Chief Curator Dr. Gannit Ankori.
