MUSE: Diana Ross

Photograph: Skrebneski

Diana Ross is celebrated worldwide for her magnetic talent and presence. The influence of the Motown recording legend permeates the furthest reaches of popular culture -- her  distinct elegance and style are referenced by creative people from singers to music producers, dj's to drag queens, fashion designers to doll manufacturers, makeup artists to photographers and of course visual artists.  With this in mind, BlackArtistNews curated a collection of inspired imagery by visual artists which -- like Miss Ross -- expands racial, gender, geographic and generational boundaries:

GENESIS: William Henry Johnson / March 18, 1901

William Henry Johnson. Self Portrait with Pipe. Painted circa 1937. Image via NegroArtist.com

"When art reaches a certain point, you see, it returns to the more primitive, and what ever it has achieved, it will use that to move forward -- for one day once again to return to the primitive, and I think that is the way it will always be with art...it is a constant circular dance...what is modern today, is actually primitive."

~William Henry Johnson 

GENESIS: Marlon Riggs / February 3, 1957

Marlon Riggs by Shane Evans

GENESIS: Beauford Delaney / December 30, 1901

Portrait of Beauford Delaney, 1943, Georgia O'Keefe

"His goal was bringing together rich and poor, city and country, old and young, male and female; he also  combined a form in which abstraction and realism coexisted, a contemporary idyll that brought together people of different races and sexual identities." ~ Ann E. Gibson