Overview

Praise Shadows is honored to present Roberto Lugo’s first solo exhibition in New England, featuring the celebrated potter’s idiosyncratic take on ceramics, which infuses the medium’s deep cross-cultural history, his past as a graffiti artist, and his upbringing in the Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia to working-class Puerto Rican parents. Titled Boston Tea Party Remix, the exhibition features portrait-based sculptural works that weave together a narrative of important African American cultural figures. Icons such as James Baldwin, Maya Angelou, and Nina Simone, whose creative legacies center activism to address racial and economic injustice, are featured alongside significant contemporary figures who inspire Lugo. The sculptural portraits are Lugo’s own form of activism, highlighting the faces of heroes whose likenesses are the most unlikely to be depicted on fine porcelain of the European traditions.

Works
  • Roberto Lugo Self Reflection, 2023
    Roberto Lugo
    Self Reflection, 2023
  • Roberto Lugo What Had Happened Was: Jackie Robinson, 2024
    Roberto Lugo
    What Had Happened Was: Jackie Robinson, 2024
  • Roberto Lugo Nina Simone, 2024
    Roberto Lugo
    Nina Simone, 2024
  • Roberto Lugo Maya Angelou, 2024
    Roberto Lugo
    Maya Angelou, 2024
  • Roberto Lugo James Baldwin, 2024
    Roberto Lugo
    James Baldwin, 2024
  • Roberto Lugo Butterfly (Muhammad Ali), 2024
    Roberto Lugo
    Butterfly (Muhammad Ali), 2024
  • Roberto Lugo Victory (michael Jordan), 2024
    Roberto Lugo
    Victory (michael Jordan), 2024
  • Roberto Lugo Freestyle (The Notorious B.I.G), 2024
    Roberto Lugo
    Freestyle (The Notorious B.I.G), 2024
  • Roberto Lugo Nas, 2021
    Roberto Lugo
    Nas, 2021
  • Roberto Lugo Self-portrait, 2024
    Roberto Lugo
    Self-portrait, 2024