Interviews From Yale Radio / Artists, Curators And More

Jammie Holmes in his Dallas studio, 2024. Photo by  Daisy Avalos Morning Thoughts takes its title from a 1981 Gil Scott-Heron song by the same name. Throughout the song’s soft, spoken-word lyrics Scott-Heron meditates on the magical potential felt in the moment when night quietly turns to day—on the possibilities that radiate in the first light of morning, as the morning glory and daylily buds open. With his newest body of work, Holmes captures this moment of possibility alongside the inevitable moments of loss that follow as flowers wilt, as color seeps away—the dichotomy of morning and mourning. Underneath all of this,Morning Thoughts embodies the resilience of Holmes, of his community: morning glory and daylily flowers may wilt and die by dusk, but the plants and their roots remain. With Morning Thoughts, Holmes reminds us that hope and loss go hand-in-hand—but beauty remains for those willing to see it, that flowers bloom again in the morning. Jammie Holmes’s first solo museum exhibition, Jammie Holmes: