The Magnificent Tau Lewis

I think there's a few different portals through which I feel like I'm in direct communication with artists like Lonnie Holley, or the quilt-making community of Gee's Bend, or any artist really involved in the Souls Grown Deep Foundation collection. People like Thornton Dial, Mary T. Smith, Bessie Harvey. I get asked sometimes how my work or my experience correlates with theirs, and it has to do with making out of necessity and a real, not desire, but need to create an environment and take a departure. Outside art, yard shows, especially in the deep (American) South, they really developed as a secret language. These objects, which were expansive and immersive, took up entire properties. They had to be created mainly out of debris and environmental refuse so that they were undetectable as things of value, otherwise they were at risk of being destroyed or vandalized. I'm really engaged in this transformation of materials and using what's available to you and not feeling limited. If you look at African communities, but also the Black Atlantic and the Caribbean, all of these communities of makers, Black people are inventors. The way that we create culture is through a process of upcycling, not just materials but also circumstance and sound, and words.

It's all about love. It was my way of trying to put some kind of order to the chaos of questioning what morality is. The world that I'm creating, there's a system where everything makes sense. The flowers grow so that they can collect data, they collect intel. They listen to people and things. They communicate. They grow everywhere, and all of that information goes to one source that disperses the information back out so everybody's unified. The souls that exist inside of those blossoms, they're incarnated from beings that have lived to the best of their ability. "Ability" was an important word for me because it's like, how do you measure someone's moral compass? We don't give ourselves enough credit for how much triumph it takes to get up every day, to commit to something, and have conviction for something.

I've been thinking a lot about mamas and babies lately. I see people having new babies and I feel heartbreak because I want a better world for babies. I feel heartbreak because it's outstandingly inspiring that mothers continue, and that new people come into the world every day. Imagine how much belief and trust you have to have in your heart to do that.

I remember as a kid being worried about global warming, and having a conversation with my dad like, "Why are people having kids? The earth is on fire," and him just being like, "No. Look what people have come through. Look what Black people have come through. Look at the way that we keep going on, and not just going on, but with magnificence. That's what people do. They continue. They find a way."

I've been feeling really emotional lately. In really difficult times, my brain does this thing where I default into feeling like things are over, things are going to end, the world is over. I'm like, "If an asteroid's coming straight for my apartment, get the wine."

I'd be okay with it, like, "We're at the finish line. It's okay. Everybody exhale because it's over now. It can't get any worse." There's always more work. We're always at the beginning. Once I get through those thoughts, I start to feel really happy again, and then I start to feel inspired and I want to work.

It's interesting because, obviously, evolution is actively happening every second. With things like trauma that get passed down or anxiety or these kinds of emotional tremors that do become generational, who's to say that all of the power and resilience and strength doesn't also manifest concurrently with what's happening in the world?

[Poems] usually start as something like love letters, a way to communicate with the work or remain connected to it. For me, they're not just sculptures, and they're not just portraits; they're often portals through which we're trying to appreciate and pay retribution to ancestors, spirits, stories, and allegories. When you're navigating those portals, you want to be respectful and kind, and show that your space is a welcoming one, and that you are accepting. Those poems, they're little notes that I'm trying to put back through the portal. I'm trying to communicate, and I'm also thinking of my sculptures as being open vessels that I invite to house those spirits. I want to give something back and one way to do that is through words. I can give that piece of paper to the sculpture as well. I can embed it inside. I can keep it with me and it helps me remember the time and the place that I was at, the moment that we had together, the things that we talked about, the things that we shared or that I felt.

It's about being a conduit. I have different archives of things that I keep in the studio, like a bucket of seashells, and then I've got metal things that I work with, pieces of tree bark. Clothes, so many clothes. Various found objects: jewelry and things like that. There are things that hang around for years because it's just not right. I was having a conversation with someone recently about how, in a practice like this, sometimes you just have to let go and be super intuitive and not think about it. It's the opposite: you have to be so aware and open with all of your senses in order to work with found materials.

For example, I had a friend donate their dreadlocks to me. That was two years ago, and I still haven't been able to even open up that bundle because it's very stimulating. You're holding so much information in your hands. There's a very sticky, pulling, yearning feeling. Sometimes people come to the studio and can be patronizing when you try to tell them that things do talk. It's a very real thing that life emanates off of objects. Why wouldn't it? It's very draining sometimes working with materials like that. Sometimes I forget why I'm tired.

Probably the idea of happiness. Happiness is maintenance. The feeling of being secure, and having two feet on the ground. I feel like the world is going through a really difficult transition that's riddled with growing pains. Big things get ripped from underneath me in some ways. Those are all painful, but I have to just keep remembering it's for the good. I feel like consistent happiness is becoming more attainable, but I have to go through this bullshit in order to get there. I feel like the vibration is shifting. When things get so bad that they can't get any worse, they have to come back up. Along with those little vibrations, there's a bigger one that happens at the same time. Then hopefully, in time, you get to a place where it's a little bit more steady, and then working becomes easier. Breathing becomes easier. Getting up becomes easier.