A colonial-style dollhouse with a teal roof and gabled windows anchors Isaiah Lee\u0019s current paintings, where childhood toys slip from familiar playthings into uncanny, animate presences. Working in Chicago, Lee stages scenes in the scaled-down rooms and surrounding landscape of the miniature home, channeling the wonder and theatrics of adolescent imagination while tracing how early experiences continue to permeate adult life.<\/p>\n
Born into a fundamentalist Christian family in Missouri, Lee grapples with the contradictions of those teachings alongside the lived reality of being a Black man in the U.S. The tension animates his imagery and tone. \u001cThey arrive at a moment when it feels necessary to return to childhood as a way of uncovering who we are and what good we are still capable of bringing forth,\u001d he adds. He also writes that \u001cfaith cannot simply be abandoned but must be understood as an inheritance wrought into the body and the imagination.\u001d<\/p>\n
In Shepherd I<\/em>, a tiny green astronaut evokes Moses as he leads livestock through the house, while an enormous skull and a concealed man loom in the shadows. The stark disparities in scale point to the outsized impact of formative encounters and the way memory can exaggerate scope. Narrative ripples across the work, too: Romeo and Juliet<\/em> and Juliet<\/em> capture two different points of view of the same scene, a world-building strategy that extends the story beyond any single frame. Lee\u0019s heavy use of shadow positions each composition as an illuminated nook amid a larger, unknowable expanse. Darkness pervades many of the pieces, not as a strictly sinister note but to signal the omnipresence of the unknown and a subtle, underlying fear.<\/p>\n Among the titles he has shared are Parable of the Sower I<\/em>, Weapons<\/em>, On the Threshold of Liberty I<\/em>, An Old Friend<\/em>, Scaredy Cat<\/em>, and Courage<\/em> \u0014 a constellation that underscores his blend of parable, play, and disquiet.<\/p>\n Lee is preparing a solo exhibition this fall at crosswalk in Chicago. Titled A Thief in the Night<\/em>, the show nods to the Biblical notion that people need to repent in order to be \u001cright with the Lord.\u001d \u001cFor many, this warning creates a persistent sense of unease, fostering the belief that no amount of faithfulness is truly enough,\u001d the artist says. \u001cLife becomes a race against time, a race that cannot be won.\u001d If you\u0019re in Chicago, you can see some of Lee\u0019s works through November 1 in an exhibition celebrating the city\u0019s emerging artists at Hyde Park Art Center, and A Thief in the Night<\/em> opens on October 16.<\/p>\n Across these works, the dollhouse becomes both stage and mirror, where scale, shadow, and story test what we think we know\u0014and what we carry forward.<\/p>\nChicago exhibitions<\/h2>\n