Hit Words

Lady Bird and Chinese Food

March 2nd, 2009

On a cold winter night in Newark, NJ my friend Flo Johnson took me to see an exhibt at the WBGO radio station. All Flo, said was “You have to see her work”, I was curious so agreed to go. I met an artist named Lady Bird Strickland who paints about the deep south and black history. Her paintings can be described as “social consciousness.” Her paintings can depict a montage of Martin Luther King to jazz great Dizzy Gillespie to her latest installment of the first black family, the Obamas.” I got to talking with her and her advice to me was, “do what you like, and do it well.” How can you beat that! Lady Bird was fascinating as she took me down memory lane with her through her days at Pratt to how much she loves Chinese food. She also never studied the piano, but there I found her tinkering the ivory’s of a Steinway at WBGO and she just made up the notes as she went along. Talented. Thank you Ladybird, It was a pleasure meeting you!

I also got the chance to meet Lady Bird’s daughter Pat Cleveland. To my amaze I found out only afterwords that she was one, if not the first, black couture supermodel working for the likes of Yves Saint Laurent and Halston. The daughter of a white jazz musician father and a black painter mother she ruled the catwalk in the early seventies.

What a night at WBGO in Newark, NJ!

Go to http://www.ladybirdsart.com/ to view her art.

Entry Filed under: Rant & Rave