Tone Deaf

Donald Medley’s work focuses on representing African Americans; figurative subjects that render themselves through an abstract space. Medley explores the ways that a space can inform and simultaneously hide how someone is seen. The environment that the subjects exist in overlap in certain places within the composition conveying the influence or imposing nature of a space.

Medley's work speaks to the larger context of black identity. This is in regards to how one expresses themselves considering the different spaces they have to enter and engage with. His work highlights the monolith in which black individuals are often contextualized, and depicts a surreal experience around their identity.