Bantering back and forth like two old friends, Leonardo Drew and Jordan Schnitzer recollect old memories and riff off of each other as they saunter through the heavy metal doors of the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art on campus. Led by museum staff, the pair are escorted up a daunting flight of marble stairs. At the top, Drew’s mouth spreads into a wide smile as he is confronted with his work, “215B.”
“215B” is the first visible work of art in the exhibition Strange Weather, which opened at the JSMA on Oct. 21. Sprawling across three museum walls, the work appears to extend an arm and invite the viewer in for a better taste.
“I believe these works should act as mirrors,” Drew said of his art. “There’s no way you won’t find some through-line that we all are part of.”
Drew is a Brooklyn-based artist best known for his large-scale, abstract work. Born in Tallahassee, Flo. but raised in the projects of Bridgeport, Conn., Drew knew he was an artist at a young age.
“Even though I’m named Leonardo and my mother says she knew for whom she named me, she did not,” Drew said to a captivated audience in a lecture held at PLC on campus. “Only sometime later, after many beatings for being named Leonardo in the projects, the nuns told me, ‘Oh, like Leonardo Da Vinci?’ and I was like ‘There’s another Leonardo?’”
Despite his mother unknowingly bestowing him an artist’s name, she did not encourage his early artistic endeavors. “My mother is a strong spirit, definitely an influence, but she did not understand,” Drew said. “You got to understand that if you’re growing up in the projects and someone in school gives you a test paper and you start drawing all over it, it’s time to stop you from doing that.”
But Drew didn’t stop. He was scouted by DC and Marvel Comics as a teenager, the result of having his drawings published at age 13.
“When Marvel and DC approached me, it seemed like the correct thing to do, to use your talent to get out of the projects,” Drew said. “Once I saw Jackson Pollock though, that was canceled.”
Pollock’s work inspired Drew to transition from drafting and two-dimensional art into a world of visceral three-dimensional art. Drew attended Parsons School of Design in New York for two years before transferring to The Cooper Union School of Art in New York City. At Cooper Union, Drew met Jack Whitten, a professor who he describes as both a father and mentor figure.
“What he brought to the table was this undying curiosity to continue,” Drew said. “That even though you were not accepted in the mainstream, there was still a connection to a larger world. It seemed to not be inclusive but actually, there are no barriers when it comes to art.”
The year was 1985 and Black artists like Drew and Whitten were given few avenues of representation. At the time, the expectation was that they would teach or travel, but rarely find success in the mainstream.
“If you’re a Black artist, there’s a door that you have to go through,” Drew said. “I never really believed that. It was a different kind of work that I was determined to change and challenge.”
“Great art grabs you and shakes you and makes you think,” Schnitzer said, gazing up at “215B” in his gallery. “So he’s already won half the battle.” Schnitzer went on to cite Drew’s “genetic predisposition towards aesthetic” as the other half of his triumph in surviving the world of professional artists.
Drew has made a name for himself in the art world and proven that his bold and abstract art has a place in the mainstream. His works have been shown across the globe, and in notable museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Solomon R. Guggenheim in New York and the Tate in London.
Recently, Drew has spent time traveling in Peru and China, which has influenced him to utilize new techniques, such as the inclusion of color, in his works. “This planet is full of so much,” Drew said. Travel informs his artistic vision, and he acts “as an antenna receiving new information” in the places he visits.
Drew is constantly working and reworking his art, taking things that are “finished” and creating the next piece. “When you get comfortable, tie your hands and try again,” Drew said of his experience making art. “There is no such thing as a mistake.”
As far as legacy, Drew is not concerned with his impact on the world, so much as his desire to make art and his purpose as an artist. “These works can go on to disintegrate,” Drew said. “But for me they were important.”
At age 62, Drew is approaching a phase of life in which most people contemplate retirement, though he has no plans of seizing to make art. “I am absolutely an addict,” Drew said. “Making, making, making to the point where my hands and everything are starting to give problems.”
Despite his extensive career and the physical implications of being an aging artist, Drew prevails. “I need to continue to challenge myself,” he said. “That’s what keeps life interesting for me.”
Drew’s work “215B” is available for viewing at the JSMA until April 7.
