CAAM Courtyard Series: From Women's Hands features the art of five women of color who address female presence and agency. These artists have filled our Courtyard with large installations that, though disparate in materials and approach, have in common metaphorical references to the female body and experience.

Castillo and Kristine Mays focus on traditional sources of female power: hair and clothing. Castillo incorporates actual human hair into imposing wall-hung mounds as a tribute to her ancestors, while Mays creates airy, metal-knitted garments that express female strength despite their apparent fragility. Other works subtly convey womanhood: Michelle Robinson paints geometrical figures and feathery lines on the wall and onto a large wooden structure that evokes the female body; and Bre Gipson's mantra-like, gestural paintings incorporate undulating organic shapes reminiscent of natural forms. Raksha Parekh's stitched canvases encode symbols of slavery and forced labor into deceivingly appealing fields of warm colors and delicate tone gradations. These works are crafted from sugar, a sweet substance associated with happiness and domesticity, that Parekh turns bitter through a burning process.