As Kevin Beasley drove down the long, twisting driveway up to a farmhouse in Valentines, Virginia, for a family reunion back in 2011, he was just getting started on a journey that has finally culminated in a solo show at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. What triggered the artist’s years-long project was encountering fields planted, as far as the eye could see, with cotton. The plant is more than just a crop. It has infiltrated every aspect of capitalism, social interaction, cultural history, and identity in America. When Beasley saw the white-tufted stalks, it was a moment of reckoning. [More]
