For years Howard Barry knew something was wrong. He frequently struggled with bouts of sadness and anger, and found focusing on tasks difficult at best, and impossible at worst. He thought he just couldn’t get himself together, and couldn’t understand why. Then it happened. A diagnosis of traumatic brain injury stemming from an accident that occurred while he was serving in the Army. Hit while riding his bicycle, on the sidewalk, by an assailant who he would later discover (in an ironic twist), was protesting the actions of the military on base. That single event, which caused devastating physical and emotional injuries would lead him on a path to artist and activist.

Now, with considerable work, and a better understanding of how his brain functions post-injury, Barry has found his voice. Making art that reflects his feelings about events that continue to unfold with unsettling frequency in cities across America, and provides an outlet for the resulting pain and anguish. “The art for me, is learning how to respond in a way that’s not damaging for me, damaging to my surroundings, and catastrophic”.

Barry describes the machinations of his post-injury brain as a set of reels. Ones that are constantly spinning. Then something will happen. A song will play, or some coffee will spill onto a piece of watercolor paper (more on that later), and the reels will stop - lined up. And then something ethereal happens. He can see it. A piece, complete in razor sharp detail. That’s when it’s time to get to work. The result is a breathtaking portfolio of drawings and paintings that seem to jump off the paper and grab you by the arm as if to say you will listen to me, you will feel the pain, the joy, the full range of human emotion.

Oh, and about that coffee. Barry has a series of paintings done, literally, with coffee. Using the same mug he spilled onto a piece of paper, and simply building onto it with subsequent “brews”, he expertly renders a full range of tonality using nothing else but water and a brush. The pieces at scale, are awesome, including an arresting portrait of James Baldwin, and countless likenesses of other important black thought leaders whose lives were and are dedicated to the pursuit of equality. Barry knows his history, and wants you to know it as well.

Perhaps most impressive is Barry’s keen level of self-awareness. He describes himself as “broken”, but realizes that all of us are in some way broken, and that if we can just come to grips with that, then we can start working on making ourselves better.

See more of Howard Barry’s work, and order prints here.