Seven years ago, Hopeton St. Clair Hibbert Jr. took a walk down the railroad tracks in his Grant Park neighborhood with his sons. Salvaged metal pieces and wood fragments caught his eye and imagination. What grew from those walks is now on view at Chastain Arts Center in Buckhead, where Hopeton Hibbert’s solo exhibition “The Weight and the Witness,” curated by Kevin Sipp, brings together two of his most ambitious bodies of work.
Two series, one conversation
The exhibition’s title does double duty. “The Weight” refers to Hibbert’s Ode to John Henry sculpture series, assemblages built from salvaged railroad metal, Brazilian hardwood, rebar, and concrete, bound together with a 3,000-PSI liquid weld epoxy. The works draw on the folk tale of John Henry, the railroad worker who challenged a machine to a contest of strength, won, and died from the effort.
“It’s a heavy concept,” Hibbert said. “It’s the weight of effort. In this era where we’re trying to make everything easier with the computer, I wanted to specify that even though literally lifting can be burdensome at times, it’s necessary for the human experience.”
“In this era where we’re trying to make everything easier with the computer, I wanted to specify that even though literally lifting can be burdensome at times, it’s necessary for the human experience.”
ARTIst Hopeton St. Clair Hibbert Jr.
“The Witness” portion of the exhibit centers on Hibbert’s London Plane Tree Study. Hibbert began the photo series with macro photography of tree bark, which he then mirrored to create Rorschach-like compositions. The images are printed on 285-gram watercolor paper and layered with acrylic. The work draws on W.E.B. Du Bois’s concept of double consciousness, the experience of seeing oneself through the eyes of others.
“Many cultures around the world have experienced that idea of double consciousness,” Hibbert said. “It’s not just an idea for Black African Americans in oppressed America at the time of W.E.B. Du Bois. It’s something felt by anybody who has other people looking at them a certain kind of way.”
From the kitchen to Chastain Arts Center
Hibbert’s path to fine art ran through the culinary world. He graduated from Johnson & Wales’s now-closed Charleston campus in 1998 and spent years cooking in Atlanta restaurants, including the kitchens of Buckhead Life Restaurant Group. The discipline of that work, Hibbert said, never left him.
“In the kitchen, your medium is literally dying in the refrigerator,” he said. “You have days to utilize it. So creativity is just always there.” The patience required for repetitive kitchen tasks translated directly into the slow, deliberate process Hibbert’s creative practice demands. “It’s very repetitive, it’s very slow, it’s very deliberate and painstaking, just like peeling a case of potatoes.”
A launch pad
“The Weight and the Witness” is Hibbert’s second solo show presented by the Mayor’s Office of Cultural Affairs, and he’s clear-eyed about what these opportunities represent. “It’s my task to help this show be a launch pad for my career,” he said, “and to take my artistry outside of Atlanta.”
That next move is already in motion. In October, Hibbert begins a residency at McColl Center for Art + Innovation in Charlotte. If opening night of “The Weight and the Witness” is any indicator, he’ll arrive there with momentum.
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“People were saying, ‘I’ve never seen anything like this,'” Hibbert said. “There’s nothing better than seeing people staring at your art for more than a minute.”
“The Weight and the Witness” is on view at Chastain Arts Center, through Aug. 22. Hopeton Hibbert leads an art talk 2–4 p.m. July 25.
