A Deep Conversation With Rebekah Danae At Positive Space

While completing her BFA at Baylor University, Rebekah Danae’s fourteen year painting practice was stylistically and thematically influenced by formative experiences in Belgium, studying Rene Magritte’s surrealist blend of comedy and peril, and in Texas, learning from Sedrick Huckaby’s metaphoric expressions offaith, community, and heritage.Sculpturally— through leatherwork and interior design— Danae’s work has been influenced by the cowboy boot making community in Beggs, Oklahoma and the design firm of Christopher Murphy in Tulsa, Oklahoma. In practice, Danae draws inspiration from Virgil Abloh, who blurred the lines of art and commerce through the tools of contemporary culture; Rebecca Belmore’s ability to elicit intimate moments of reflection while tackling tremendous contemporary issues; the liberatory mysticism of Afrofuturism philosophy; the fiber artists of the wearable art movement in the 70s; and from the community-based relational practice of Rick Lowe.Through her work, Rebekah Danae and A Creative House orchestrate a movement in the middle of the country, made up of a diverse creative choir. Far from a lone ranger, Danae works collaboratively across a curated network of Oklahomans— from the punk underground, homegrown rappers and producers, luxury interior designers, rodeo cowboys, rural bootmakers, to philanthropic, political, and educational leaders. Her approach, while whimsical and surreal, has the intended impact of critical regional culture-shaping from the current white supremacy that is prevalent regionally today and toward a co-created futurist Oklahoma, the liberated West.