Latoya Hobbs’ Artwork Celebrates Black Women's Bodies & Souls

LATOYA HOBBS

Fine artist Latoya Hobbs is inspired by the ordinary yet remarkable happenings of Black women’s lives. Whether it’s the tender silence surrounding a mother cradling her child in bed, or the exhausted gaze of a pregnant woman, full-term and aching from being on her feet all day, Hobbs sees these living snapshots of Black life as worthy of immortality — so she chisels the seemingly mundane onto massive wood slabs for display. 

A painter and printmaker by trade, Hobbs carves still life into wood, turning the entire piece into a giant stencil of sorts that can then be painted or printed onto canvas. The enormity of Hobbs full-scale projects is intentional. (One of her pieces, The Birth of a Mother, stretches 4 ft by 6 ft ). The size is meant to be striking — a visual call for Black women to take up space in a world that often benefits from our shrinking. 

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