Jae Jarrell
Individual Works
Installation Views
b. 1935, Cleveland, Ohio Lives and works in Cleveland, OH
Jae Jarrell(b. 1935), née Elaine Annette Johnson, is and American artist and fashion designer, and a cofounder of AFRICOBRA. Jae was raised in Cleveland, Ohio, in a family steeped in fashion knowledge. Her grandfather was a professional tailor, and her uncle was a haberdasher, selling the notions needed for sewing. Jae and her mother would frequent vintage clothing stores together and admire the way the outfits were made. Jae taught herself how to make her own clothing, and reveled in the fact that her fashion was unique, and had a secret, vintage past.
AFRICOBRA’s goal was to understand and express the visual principals that defined black culture. As an artist adept at fashion design, Jae created groundbreaking wearable artworks that interpreted the core ideas of the group. She also expanded on those ideas, developing abstract, idiosyncratic methods of translating black positivity into fashion objects.
Exhibition History
2019
AFRICOBRA: Nation Time, Venice Biennale (official collateral exhibition), Venice, Italy
Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power, The Broad, Los Angeles, CA (upcoming)
2018
AFRICOBRA: Messages to the People, Museum of Contemporary Art North Miami, Miami, FL(upcoming)
Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY (upcoming)
The Time is Now! Art Worlds of Chicago’s South Side, 1960-1980, Smart Museum of Art, Chicago, IL
We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women, 1965–85, ICA Boston. Boston, MA
AFRICOBRA:Now, Kravets Wehby Gallery, New York, NY
Heritage: Wadsworth and Jae Jarrell, The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
2017
Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power, Tate Modern, London, UK
We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women, 1965–85, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY
Art of the Rebellion: Black Art of the Civil Rights Movement, Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, MI
2016
The Freedom Principle: Experiments in Art and Music, 1965 to Now, ICA Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA
How to Remain Human, Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
2014
Witness: Art and Civil Rights in the Sixties, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY
2013
AFRICOBRA: Philosophy, Logan Center Gallery, Chicago, IL
AFRICOBRA: Art and Impact, The DuSable Museum of African American History, Chicago, IL
1977
AFRICOBRA/Farafindugu, Afro-American Historic & Cultural Museum, Philadelphia, PA
1973
AFRICOBRA III, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, MA
AFRICOBRA III, Howard University, Washington, D.C.
1972
AFRICOBRA II, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL
AFRICOBRA II, Howard University, Washington, D.C.
AFRICOBRA II, Malcolm X College, Chicago, IL
AFRICOBRA II, Hati Gallery, Rochester, NY
AFRICOBRA II, Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, NY
1971
AFRICOBRA II, Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY
AFRICOBRA II, Langston Hughes Center for Visual & Performing Arts, Buffalo, NY
AFRICOBRA I, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL
1970
AFRICOBRA I, Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY
AFRICOBRA I, Museum of the National Center of Afro-American Artists, Roxbury, MA
AFRICOBRA I, Black Expo, Chicago, IL