Kimowan McLain

Practicing Contemporaries
Studio Art Faculty at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Kimowan McLain evokes an enigmatic history in his painting of a wall in an old cotton dyeing factory in Saxapahaw, North Carolina. Silhouettes of heads above the door evoke the laborers who worked there years ago. The translucent windows suggest a lighted interior while McLain's dense surface of greens and blues forms a sensuous ground for the dark heads and the artist's layers of lettering and drawing. Like other recent work by McLain, Saxapahaw commemorates a vanishing community and its workers.

Kimowan McLain, Saxapahaw, 2007; paper, acrylic, digital photographs, rust, and tobacco on canvas. © 2007 Kimowan McLain.

Artist Statement

Saxapahaw is a small town in North Carolina. There is a defunct cotton mill, which used to dye cotton, on the banks of the Haw River. People downstream could tell what color the mill workers were using because the river would change colors from one day to the next. I became attracted to the industrial marks and color of the mill’s walls. It was like a forensic history. I photographed the interior and reconstructed its image, part photo, part painting. I am glad that I did. That was 2003. Now the walls have been sandblasted and lacquered, the buildings converted into condominiums.I see the heads as shadow silhouettes of the many workers over the years. The little window up high is for the gods. So they can see, too.