Renee Stout facts for kids

Renée Stout (born in 1958) is an American artist. She is famous for creating unique artworks called assemblages. These artworks are like 3D collages made from different objects. Renée Stout's art often tells stories about her own life and her African-American heritage.

She was born in Kansas and grew up in Pittsburgh. Later, she moved to Washington, D.C.. Her art also connects to New Orleans. This shows her interest in the spread of African culture and people across the United States, which is called the African diaspora. Renée Stout was the first American artist to have her own show at the Smithsonian's National Museum of African Art.

Early Life and Inspiration

Renée Stout was born in Junction City, Kansas. Her family loved being creative. Her mother enjoyed needlework, and her father, who was a mechanic, liked to build and fix things. One of her uncles was even a painter.

When Renée was one year old, her family moved to East Liberty in Pittsburgh. As a child, she took art classes on weekends at the Carnegie Museum of Art. She says these classes helped her discover African art. Two special objects at the museum really inspired her: shrunken heads from South America and nkisi.

Nkisi are sacred objects from Central Africa that people believed had spiritual power. When Renée was ten, she saw an nkisi nkondi covered in nails. She later said, "I saw a piece there that had all these nails in it... I found that I started going back to the pieces like that." This early experience deeply influenced her artistic journey.

Becoming an Artist

Elegba (Spirit of the Crossroads) (2015) at the Phillips Collection in 2022

Renée Stout went to Carnegie-Mellon University. There, she studied to become a photo-realist painter. This means she learned to paint things so realistically they looked like photographs. She earned her art degree in 1980. She was inspired by artists like Edward Hopper and Richard Estes.

After college, she worked as a professional sign painter. She was very skilled at making textures like glass or cardboard look real in her paintings.

In 1985, Stout moved to Washington, D.C. Her art began to explore her African-American heritage. She finds ideas from the African diaspora and her surroundings. Her goal is to create art that helps people think about themselves, feel strong, and heal. She uses ideas from African belief systems.

Renée Stout also creates imaginary characters for her art. She uses many different art forms, including painting, mixed-media sculpture, photography, and installations. She has received awards from important art foundations. Her work has been shown in many exhibitions across the United States and in other countries like England and the Netherlands.

In 1993, Renée Stout made history. She was the first African American artist to have a solo exhibition at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of African Art. Her show was called The Eyes of Understanding: Kongo Minkisi and The Art of Renee Stout.

Renée Stout's Artistic Style

Headstone for Marie Laveau (1990) at the National Gallery of Art in 2022

Renée Stout's art mixes old African American customs with street culture. She also adds elements that feel like theater or a carnival. Her artworks include handmade assemblages, which are sculptures made from various objects. She also creates installations, which are art pieces that fill a space. Her paintings, prints, and photographs are also very colorful. All these pieces tell complex stories through characters she invents.

Her art is influenced by Yoruba sculpture. She is also inspired by the nkisi (sacred objects) from the Central African Congo Basin. She first saw these at the Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh when she was young.

Mannish Boy Arrives (For Muddy Waters) (2017) at the Phillips Collection in 2022

Other topics in her work often include Haitian Vodou, which is a spiritual practice. She also explores the culture of New Orleans and the famous Voodoo practitioner Marie Laveau. Renée Stout says she wants to open conversations about African American culture's history. She does this by using themes from African spiritual beliefs and Vodou.

Stout often uses materials found in Voodoo practices in her sculptures. These can include handmade potions, roots, herbs, bones, and feathers. She combines these with painted and sculpted parts. Her work also looks at different meanings of things like blood, fire, and guns. Examples are Bellona (Roman Goddess of War) and Baby’s First Gun.

Stout's art also shows influences from other American artists. These include the photorealist painter Richard Estes and the sculptor Joseph Cornell. She also learns from installation artist Edward Kienholz and assemblage artist Betye Saar. You can see their impact in her use of trompe l'oeil painting, which tricks the eye into seeing 3D. She also uses found objects in her art. Her early work as a sign painter also shows up in her pieces.

Exhibitions

Renée Stout has had many solo art shows in the United States and other countries. Some of her important solo shows include:

• Astonishment and Power: Kongo Minkisi and the Art of Renée Stout (1993) at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC.
• Readers, Advisors, and Storefront Churches (2005) at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans.
• Renée Stout: Tales of the Conjure Woman (2013-2016), which started at the Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art in Charleston, South Carolina.

She has also been part of many group exhibitions. These include Afro-Atlantic Histories and Spirit in the Land. The Spirit in the Land show traveled to different museums, including the Nasher Museum of Art in North Carolina and the Pérez Art Museum Miami in Florida.

Notable Works in Public Collections

Many of Renée Stout's artworks are held in public collections, meaning museums own them. Here are some examples:

• The Grandfather (1983), at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC
• Ceremonial Object (1990), at the National Museum of African American History and Culture, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC
• Headstone for Marie Laveau (1990), at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
• The Old Fortune Teller's Board (1993), at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC
• Elegba (Spirit of the Crossroads) (2015), at the Phillips Collection, Washington, DC
• Mannish Boy Arrives (For Muddy Waters) (2017), at the Phillips Collection, Washington, DC

Awards

Renée Stout has received many awards for her art, including:

• Pollock-Krasner Foundation Award (1991, 1999)
• The Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award (1993, 2018)
• Anonymous Was A Woman Award (1999)
• Joan Mitchell Award (2005)
• High Museum of Art David C. Driskell Prize (2010)
• Carnegie Mellon University Alumni Achievement Award (2015)
• Women's Caucus for Art Lifetime Achievement Award (2018)