There are very few people in the world who can say they’ve accomplished something like training to be a cosmonaut, trekking to the North Pole or building a satellite. But for artist Tavares Strachan, these achievements are just a few of the projects on his resume. This bizarre collection of accomplishments is complemented by the variety of his chosen mediums. He really does it all, from collage art to ice carving, to neons to encyclopedias. There seems to be no challenge or topic he isn’t game to explore. Besides his unique choice of mediums and his impressive research and commitment to them, Strachan often uses his work to highlight the achievements of others that were lost to history because aspects of their identity made them invisible. “I’m fascinated by invisibility and how we as a society get it wrong” “if there’s a place we go to find out things we know, where do we go to find out the things we don’t know?” These ideas inspired one of his most well-known works The Encyclopedia of the Invisible which is an ongoing research project in which he chronicles the achievements of many marginalized and overlooked people. Right now it is over 2,400 pages. His trek to the North Pole and subsequent art piece (which included a 14 hour video recreation of the hike, two-dimensional work, sculpture, and two identical ice sculptures, one from a block of ice from the poles and another carved to mirror its image) was in honor of the explorer Matthew Henson who was perhaps the first one to walk on the North Pole but who’s contribution to the adventure went unrecognized until recently because he was black. Strachan also launched a rocket in collaboration with SpaceX, that carried a golden bust of Robert Henry Lawrence Jr. the first black man to train as an astronaut who died before he could make it to space. Another project of his highlights the accomplishments of Mary J Bonin, the first female master diver in the US Navy.
While all of the things he’s done are incredible and unique, what I find especially fascinating about Strachan is the way he talks about his audience and his motivation. According to the artist, he isn’t creating for the art world that holds him in esteem. He would tell you instead that his audience is school children because “I think they’re me and I’m them”. While others may appreciate or resonate with his work, they aren’t his audience. He would define their interaction with his work as “observing a conversation” he is having with someone else. This definition of his audience has led to a focus on working with schoolchildren. As a part of his SpaceX project, he installed beacons on the top of schools around the world that light up when the satellite passes overhead. He also founded an organization called B.A.S.E.C. the Bahamas Air and Sea Exploration Center. He hopes it can become the Bahamas version of NASA. Besides launching rockets made of various materials found in the area (including sugar cane!) into space, the group works with children allowing them to conduct their own experiments and meet various artists and scientists. The group and Strachan’s mother also launched the Basec Project, which produces a line of bomber jackets and the proceeds from sales go to the development of teaching programs, including sewing and design courses.
But where does this fascination with merging science and art and education stem from? What motivates him to take on these impossible projects? For Strachan his unique art forms have emerged from the constraints he has overcome to be successful in the art world and a mentality that these limitations drive the creative process. Born in the Bahamas he had to overcome poverty and the “smallness” of where he was from. In a recent New York Times article, he describes a ceiling that seemed to exist in his community, the most success you might achieve was as a doctor, lawyer or engineer. Science was a way up, art was not. But he did overcome these limitations, putting himself through art school by working every campus job possible and fighting with the administration over his financial aid. He sold his art to fund each new project as he carved out a space for himself. Now, he continues to push himself with each piece he does, launching into ambitious projects with various challenges to overcome. This fascination with exploration seems to come from an underlying motivation to “get off the island” which he refers to as both the literal place of his childhood and a psychological space. In many interviews he comes back to this idea that limitations create opportunity and he sees this not only in the people he chooses to highlight with his work but in his own work and life as well. But he also derives a lot of joy from this process which is perhaps why he takes on these challenging projects. In the New York times article he expresses this saying “there’s a certain pain-to-pleasure ratio in that pursuit…and it’s why I think most artists do what they do.”. This balance of extrinsic motivation to “make it” mixes with the intrinsic joy of the process of doing so and the exploration that corresponds with it, and this has led him to create incredible works we get to observe. I for one am baffled by the fact that this creator is not even 40 years old and look forward to seeing where his career continues to go.
While I tried to give you a good overview of who this artist is, he’s been so prolific that I couldn’t even begin to cover the full spectrum of his works and insight. I highly recommend learning more about him and here are a couple good places to start.
If you have a bit of time…. This conversation about one of his exhibits: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rw8AMOBTXMI
Videos that show off some of his bigger pieces
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSYGBFdPgfs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-j0bkr4ozeE&feature=youtu.be
An overview of a lot of his pieces and links to more resources:
https://www.mariangoodman.com/artists/tavares-strachan/
Wow. The work of Tavares Strachan is so important and I am just learning about him now. I love that his motivation is to educate school children. Part of his work, as you mentioned in your first paragraph, is to bring inclusivity to the narrative of science. The scientific role models, and the role models of most academic domains, of children fit a narrow image: white and male. Strachan's "The Encyclopedia of the Invisible" shows children that people of different demographics have made significant contributions to society. Without the work and discoveries made by groups of people overlooked and misunderstood, humanity would not be the same as it is today. Children need to have role models that they can relate to, role models that look like them and that don't fit society's stereotype for significant and impactful. Older audiences of Strachan's work have to adapt their conceptual framework to understand his message, as they have already been taught society's standard for success. Children are more malleable. They can be taught that people like them have made discoveries, that they have the potential to change the world too. Tavares Strachan's work is changing the narrative and he is starting with educating the most important group of people: the next generation of future scientists, artists, and innovators.
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