Artist Tiffany Lawson tells stories through found, recycled materials
From humble materials such as brown paper bags, plastic onion sacks, pillow stuffing, twigs and newspaper and magazine clippings, Tiffany Lawson creates collage works that tell stories.
One piece pays homage to the south
Columbus neighborhood where she grew up. One retells the Exodus story. And another pays tribute to her mother as well as a dozen other strong women.
All are on view in “Contemporary Coloured: Paintings, Mixed Media Art and Assemblages," Lawson’s solo exhibit of 28 works at Ohio State University’s Faculty Club. The exhibit is curated by Art Coordinator Lisa Craig Morton, who has been following the young artist’s works for about 10 years.
By day, Lawson works as a judicial assistant in the Franklin County Municipal Court but at night in her East Side home, the self-taught 39-year-old makes art.
When she was a child, Lawson’s mother ran an art program for children at the Ohio Avenue United Methodist Church, bringing in African American artists such as Aminah Robinson, Queen Brooks, Richard Duarte Brown and Gilda Edwards — all of whom, Lawson said, inspired her.
The same sort of color, vibrancy and storytelling qualities that are prominent in the works of those artists can be seen in Lawson’s pieces, especially her large, three-panel collage, “Around the Way, USA.” This lively street scene captures the neighborhood where she grew up with a variety of materials — magazine clippings, doll fabrics, tree twigs, acrylic paint and a base of brown paper bags whose handles can be seen at each end.
“A Coogie Dream” (referencing a sweater worn by late rapper The Notorious B.I.G.) is a dream catcher made from scraps of her mother’s handmade dolls and paired in the exhibit with a poem by Columbus writer Scott Woods.
From a distance, “Quilts Are for People” looks like three panels from a real quilt but close up, can be seen to have been made with discarded papers from the courthouse where Lawson works.
She created “The Fruit Bearers” for an exhibit at the Roy G Biv gallery in which each artist was given a banker’s box to begin a work. In a style paying homage to Gustav Klimt (“The Kiss”), Lawson filled hers with positive portraits that reference the fruit bearers from Colossians 1:10.
The collage “What Da’ Manna” is a play on the Exodus story with contemporary characters and a pun in its title.
After a romantic breakup, Lawson used pillow stuffing and crumpled pages of Baptist hymns to create the hair and clothing of her diptych-like portraits “Grace + Mercy,” a work she said that reminded her not to become hardened.
In “Ruth’s Easter Pageant,” threads connect the figures of a dozen women, including Lawson’s mother. The piece honors the strong women’s commonalities and connections, qualities that Lawson said are important and consistent themes in her work.
She also knows how to have fun with her subjects and materials. “Nickel Bags of Funk,” as in the hip-hop song, is one of the few abstract pieces in the exhibit — a colorful assemblage of dryer sheets folded around shredded paper and mesh vegetable bags.
And Lawson’s only oil painting here is “Time Capsule,” a rear view of a male torso with bare back, underwear and jeans hung below the waist.
“I’m hoping to see the end of sagging pants,” Lawson said. “If we put it on display, maybe we can just leave it there.”
Lawson was the first artist chosen for the Columbus Cultural Arts Center residency where she worked for several months in 2021. These days, she continues to work at her home studio, using found and recycled items that include, of course, the brown paper bags.
Such materials, she said, “enliven my work with a sense of practicality” and help her to “capture the spirit of black life.”
negilson@gmail.com