New Paintings by Roscoe Hall” To Open at the Birmingham Public Library

Birmingham, Ala. – An exciting new exhibition of paintings by Roscoe Hall will open at the Birmingham Public Library on Friday, June 7. The show is titled Re-Ignition: New Paintings by Roscoe Hall and will be on display in the First Floor Gallery at the Central Library through Friday, July 26.

Artist and chef Roscoe Hall, who lives and works in Birmingham, was born in Chicago in 1978. He has worked as a chef for nearly 27 years, using his art “as a life force to cope with working in some of the best kitchens in the United States.” 

In an interesting combination of the culinary and fine art worlds, Hall makes pigments from dried spices and produces his own charcoal from oak and mesquite wood. He even uses kitchen utensils to apply the homemade pigments to canvas, wood panels, paper, and other textured surfaces. 

In the exhibition Re-Ignition, the “repetitive icon of the match is the figurative focus chosen to express the narrative within the series. The match is an icon of celebration. Various forms of memories of fear, romance, and change [are] in the essence of the smell of a blown-out match. The matchbook is a figurative focus that will tell the narrative of the progression of the core principles of sustainability.”

More about Re-Ignition

“The core principles of sustainability are now emotional challenges in society. All original land

seems to have been approved for redevelopment for the purpose of place, profit and unjust

change. The concept within this body of work is to look at these principles from the ground up.

Primary research focus is in the cultivated soil of Alabama, Georgia and Illinois. The narrative

sought was one of migration and settlement within these states by African Americans/my family

tree. Pigments made and used in production for these works are from agriculture within those states.” – Roscoe Hall 

More about the Artist 

To see Hall’s show, please stop by the Central Library anytime during regular business hours. It is free and open to the public.

By Margaret Splane|Library Assistant III, Community Engagement & Fundraising