LINEAGE

*Mr. Oscar Gardner (Composed)*, 2026
Graphite, charcoal, Conté pencil, and watercolor on paper
70 1/8 x 70 1/8 x 2 3/4 inches / 178.1 x 178.1 x 7 cm

Lineage follows Thomas’s family from emancipation through Reconstruction and into the Jim Crow era. Through her methodical drawing practice and deep genealogical inquiry, Thomas brings monumental portraits into direct relation with drawn and printed primary-source records. Together, these works trace her ancestors’ acts of self-determination through military service, marriage, legal testimony, education, and claims upon the state, recovering a family history of perseverance and aspiration that is at once familial, civic, and national. Rooted in the history of one American family, Lineage reveals how generations of Black Americans claimed and exercised the rights of citizenship after emancipation. At a moment when accounts of Black life are being written out of this nation’s history and anti-Black caricature and denigration are again being amplified by the state, Thomas brings the dignity, agency, and self-regard of her ancestors’ self-fashioned images into public view and draws her family into American history.

LINEAGE installation views, Jessica Silverman, San Francisco