![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/ezgif-84f79be13d1e04-446x300.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n
photo by: Julie Denesha\/KCUR 89.3<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Kansas City, Kansas, artist Harold Smith\u2019s new body of work at the Mulvane Art Museum in Topeka reimagines celebrated works from art history.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n
On a recent August morning, the artist Harold Smith was starting on his first painting of the day in his home studio, just off State Avenue in Kansas City, Kansas. He picked up a brush full of metallic pearl-tinted paint and started mixing it on his palette.<\/p>\n
\u201cGotta be careful in the morning,\u201d Smith said. \u201cMore than once I\u2019ve accidentally taken a sip of my paint water instead of my coffee, not paying attention.\u201d<\/p>\n
Smith works quickly and within the hour, two men began to take shape on his canvas set against an electric blue background. One wears a blue tie and grips a coffee mug in his hand.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou ever seen \u2018Apocalypse Now?’\u201d Smith asked. \u201cYou know that line, \u2018There\u2019s nothing like the smell of napalm in the morning?\u2019 I say there\u2019s nothing like the smell of acrylic in the morning.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/ezgif-82355f5fc11b27-1100x676.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
photo by: Harold Smith<\/p>\n
Smith\u2019s \u201cBlacktacularized Girl with a Pearl Earring,\u201d left, and his \u201cBlacktacularized American Gothic\u201d are on view at the Mulvane Art Museum on the campus of Washburn University in Topeka.<\/p>\n
The self-taught artist has a new series of paintings now showing at the Mulvane Art Museum on the campus of Washburn University in Topeka. Titled \u201cAround the Way Folk, Saints in Uncommon Places,\u201d the exhibit lets Smith put a personal spin on well-known works from art history.<\/p>\n
\u201cBasically, it\u2019s an exploration of people I consider saints and things like that,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s also a look at Black, blue-collar communities. I still live in the same one I grew up in, and it\u2019s an examination of the culture that still exists there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Smith takes familiar works of art like Grant Wood\u2019s \u201cAmerican Gothic,\u201d Vermeer\u2019s \u201cGirl with a Pearl Earring\u201d and Leonardo da Vinci\u2019s \u201cThe Last Supper,\u201d and recasts them with people from his Kansas City, Kansas, neighborhood.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll these paintings have stories and narratives that we can relate to, and not just we, but the community I grew up in and people that are around me, can relate to,\u201d Smith said. \u201cSo that\u2019s how I kind of started on this path.\u201d<\/p>\n
Smith uses high-voltage hues and expressive brushstrokes to convey his ideas.<\/p>\n
\u201cI chose, just like all painters choose, to reflect the times in their own particular style,\u201d he said. \u201cI used a palette knife primarily for them, color schemes that people normally may not think of and I often call it Blacktacularization.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a nod to his feelings about the state of Black America, Smith said his \u201cBlacktacular\u201d style is his attempt to make the most out of what he calls a bad situation \u2014 to make lemonade out of lemons.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe rapper Tupac, in his song \u2018Dear Mama,\u2019 said \u2018Mama took the little she was given and created miracles every Thanksgiving,’\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd to me, Blacktacularization is when you apply Black culture to different things,\u201d he said. \u201cLike you apply it to food, you get soul food, you apply it to popular music, you had the blues.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the Mulvane Art Museum, Smith\u2019s three large panels of \u201cThe Last Supper: Blacktacularized\u201d take up an entire wall. Many of the apostles\u2019 faces are based on his friends and neighbors. The museum\u2019s interim director, Sara Stepp, said she was drawn to Smith\u2019s bold reframing of familiar works.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/ezgif-830a3b89811e27-1100x740.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
photo by: Julie Denesha\/KCUR 89.3<\/p>\n
The Mulvane Art Museum\u2019s interim director and curator Sara Stepp takes a closer look at Smith\u2019s \u201cThe Last Supper: Blacktacularized (It\u2019s a Post-Black Thang Ya\u2019ll).\u201d Many of the apostle\u2019s faces are based on the artist\u2019s friends and neighbors.<\/p>\n
\u201cHarold has always been interested in Black representation and Black experience and he is asking a really, I think, interesting question,\u201d Stepp said. \u201c\u2018What would these works look like if instead of the traditional white protagonists, they instead had Black subjects?’\u201d<\/p>\n
Stepp said Smith\u2019s paintings shine a spotlight on people who\u2019ve often been excluded from art.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis works are about Black American identity, usually Black American male identity, and he wants you to witness that experience in full color,\u201d Stepp said. \u201cHe wants you to see the good and the bad, the painful and the hopeful in those stories that he shares.\u201d<\/p>\n
Stepp said Smith offers a pointed perspective in his paintings.<\/p>\n
Smith\u2019s work has received both local and national acclaim. He received a Charlotte Street Visual Arts Award and a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant in 2022. He was selected for the Art Omi International Artists Residency Program in 2023. Locally, he\u2019s exhibited at The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art and the Lawrence Arts Center.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe just very forcefully inserts Black figures into those works,\u201d Stepp said. \u201cHe also really transforms the style. So it\u2019s mostly the original composition that remains, and I found that to be really moving and poignant and important for this moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/ezgif-8d9518e872c515-1100x815.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
photo by: Harold Smith<\/p>\n
Harold Smith\u2019s acrylic painting \u201cBlacktacularized Caravaggio (Self Portrait of the Artist with the Head of Goliath)\u201d is also a part of the show in Topeka. The work is based on a painting by the Italian artist Caravaggio, created between 1606-1607.<\/p>\n