Oil Baby
- Patricia Renee' Thomas
- Undergraduate Program in Fine Arts and Design, Weitzman School of Design
-
Independent Creative Production Grant
Labyrinth by Patricia Renee' Thomas, 2021. Courtesy of the Artist.
Patricia Renee’ Thomas is building a body of work entitled Oil Baby which explores the incredible true story of Sarah Rector, known more commonly as the “Richest Colored Girl in America” after inheriting oil-rich land in the Osage Nation (Missouri) in 1913. Oil Baby will comprise of paintings, preparatory drawings, and figurative sculpture with found dolls narrating the tale of Sarah’s instantaneous wealth, the systemic and institutional gatekeeping of her resources, her uniquely monitored Black girl youth, and reimagining the end of her saga. While working with Sarah Rector’s narrative, Thomas will combine historical and contemporary issues of Black autonomy, capitalism, including that of Philadelphia’s own Black Wall Street, and her own girlhood to bridge conversations of the past to the present. Several of the works will be displayed at the Colored Girls Museum in the Germantown neighborhood of Philadelphia.