Danielle Mckinney

Above my sofa hangs a print of Danielle Mckinney’s Sandman. In it, a nude Black woman reclines across a couch, her arms folded under her half-covered head. A cigarette balances loosely between her limp fingers, a central motif to many of Mckinney’s works. The mood is quiet. Dark mahogany walls. An olive green sofa. A shadowless black vase almost indistinguishable from the table it sits upon, filled with pastel flowers that conceal the lower half of our sleepy lady’s body. Above her repose hangs Mckinney’s rendition of Picasso’s Le Rêve, a cubist painting of his once-young mistress in slumber, as though it were the dream unfolding behind her closed eyes. The vivid colors in Le Rêve hover like an invisible thought bubble, the mistress’s lavender breast peeking out of a mint green blouse, a vivid contrast to our sleeper’s earth-toned reality. Two very different women suspended in their own quiet interior. And sometimes on a Sunday afternoon, I’ll sprawl myself beneath them, and let my eyelids grow heavy alongside theirs—allow the Sandman to bring me a little dream, too.

Speaking with Mckinney for this interview felt a bit like that. Her voice is as serene and soft as her paintings. Her words are a mix of tender love and care. It is obvious that she is unaware of her warmth, which in turn makes her allure even greater. On the heels of her exhibition, Shelter, at the Norton Museum of Art, Mckinney and I spent a morning discussing how tough life can be. We talked about the uncertainties, disappointments, and tragedies that are beyond what we can often prepare for—and why we continue to dream, anyway.