textile art by aminah robinson

Aminah Robinson

Robinson was born in 1940 and raised in Columbus, Ohio. She continued to live and work in Columbus and graduated from the Columbus Art School cum laude in 1960, then studying art history and philosophy at Ohio State University (1960 to 1963) Franklin University, and Bliss College.

Robinson was christened "Aminah" (derived from Aamina, mother of the Islamic prophet Muhamad) by an Egyptian cleric during her visit to Africa in 1979. She changed her name legally to include the forename in 1980.

Her art was shown at the Columbus Museum of Art, the Tacoma Art Museum, and the Brooklyn Museum. She died in 2015.
Her diverse body of work ranges from drawings and woodcuts to complex sculptures made from natural and synthetic materials, such as twigs, carved leather, music boxes, and "hogmawg," her own material composed of mud, grease, dyes, and glue. The artist's "Memory Maps" (multi-media constructions of appliquéd cloth panels) contain "the idea and symbols of Africa—as a reservoir of culture, as the abode of spirits and inspiration for form and meanings that have traversed the great transatlantic African Diaspora to the Americas.
Robinson had been the subject of nearly two hundred solo and group exhibitions before the 2002 retrospective, Symphonic Poem: The Art of Aminah Brenda Lynn Robinson at the Columbus Museum of Art.