Alma Roberts

"I am honored to wear the mantle of elder, accepting the charge to convey messages through my art that translate society, culture, faith, values, and relationships for those who follow after me."

Alma Roberts is a second-generation abstract expressionist artist. At the age of 62, she picked up a paintbrush and began producing fully formed, energetic abstract compositions. Her works provide an insight into her viewpoints on life and the issues that impact it. Her father was a portraitist, yet her work often deals with similar expressions and desires.

She uses a broad palette of colors to grab the viewer's attention and then employs splattering, markings, pours, and layering to get her messages across. She relies heavily on the use of circles and dots to represent humanity, both living and past. Conveying messages in a culturally grounded manner is often all a person of color can do in the struggle to undo racism and its traumatic generational impact.

Roberts is a self-taught artist who considers artists Alma Thomas, Jack Whitten, Norman Lewis, Joan Mitchell, and Mark Rothko as major influences on her work. She has had numerous exhibits in the ten years she has been painting.