Reclamation, the spectacular exhibit of portraits at the Helen Day Art Center in Stowe this summer, closed last weekend. As a parting shot, Margaret Bowland, one of the exhibiting artists, gave a wonderful talk — easily one of the most engaging I’ve ever attended.

Bowland’s piece in the show, a young African-American girl covered in white paint, spurs difficult questions, especially as our country continues to struggle with its racial history and its ongoing disparities — open sores that show little sign of permanent healing. Could she really be depicting this youngster in white face?

The Artist     ©2010 Margaret Bowland, Oil on linen, 74 x 54 inches

But as is often the case, there is a greater narrative that lies below the surface. This quote from the Helen Day’s Gallery Guide of the exhibition clarifies Bowman’s self-imposed directive.

Margaret Bowland’s large-scale portraits attempt to untangle power. As the artist explains, “when making works I have often covered my subject in paint to make this point. I feel that I am doing what the world does to my subjects, tries to obliterate them or turn them into people they are not. For me, the victory is that my people stare back at you completely themselves. No matter the costume or the make up you are looking at an individuated and very real, human being. They have, or are learning to survive through what the world has thrown at them.”

The depth of Bowland’s art, careful layers of insight portraying questions of identity and ‘self’ through the lens of social and political mores, encompasses both her personal history growing up in North Carolina and her deep understanding of art history. She is a dynamic teacher, and her talk last week shed light on her brilliant ability to synthesize difficult and diverse questions of what it is like to be “other” through a portal of empathy, all the while rooting her work within the realities of history, both the history of art and history in general. I am envious of her students’ access to her theoretical and practical knowledge.

Please take some time to study the paintings on her website and to read her artist’s statement, which is an abridged version of the talk she gave. You too will be impressed.