Tina Knowles-Lawson is already a certified legend for blessing the world with Beyoncé and Solange, two of contemporary music's most creative and talented forces. But in a new interview with Surface magazine, Solange revealed a piece of the Knowles family puzzle of success: art history lessons, which Solange says her mother hosted for her, Beyoncé and Kelly Rowland, who moved to live with the Knowles clan at age 11.
Solange specifically attributed her love of black painter, sculptor, and mixed media artist Radcliffe Bailey to her mother, who was (and likely still is) an avid art collector. According to Surface, Knowles-Lawson decorated her home and beauty salon with a nearly 100-piece collection of works by African and African-American artists, and taught the girls about the significance of the art.
When explaining why she chose to teach the girls so young, she explained that it was ultimately about self love. "I think it was just to teach them that beauty comes in all different colors and forms and for them to feel regal and strong and powerful," Lawson said. "It really had a resonating effect on all three of them, because they’ve always been really secure in their beauty and grace."
Elsewhere in the interview, Solange talks about how she turned painful experiences and overwhelming emotions into A Seat at the Table, both an album and a foundation for a performative art experience. "For me it was about [asking], 'How can I exist with all of this rage and all of this pain and all of this anger? How can I possibly exist every day out here in the world with that? How do I turn that into glory? How do I turn that into power? How do I transcend with all of that facing me so closely?'"
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