Atlanta artist not only claims a seat at the table, he created the chair

He’s also preparing for a solo show this spring in New York City.

Credit: Photo by Dustin Chambers

Credit: Photo by Dustin Chambers

For Awake, the chair is a meaning-laden object, symbolic of rest, a stand-in for the human body, a reflection of historical power dynamics. “You can go into a decorative arts museum and look at the armrest of a rocking chair and see the patina from human hand oils over generations. There’s just something so powerful about that,” he said.

The accumulation of honors and accomplishments might seem like a sea change from Awake’s questing youth. Raised in Marietta by Ethiopian immigrant parents who came to America in the 1970s, Awake after high school went on to Howard University but dropped out after his first semester.

“It just wasn’t for me. I liked moving around, working with my hands, it was hard for me to sit still, concentrate. I just wish there were more opportunities to learn a craft or a trade,” he said of all the creative, bright kids who aren’t cut out for a conventional college education.

In his 20s Awake was a bike messenger, one of a legion of gonzo working cyclists dodging cars and navigating the frenzied streets of downtown Atlanta. His youth was steeped in punk rock and hip-hop, intellectual debate and challenging the status quo, said his longtime friend Alex Acosta, executive director of Soul Food Cypher, the Atlanta nonprofit that advocates for the positive impact of rap.

He remembers Awake in his 20s as very much like he is today: politically engaged, interested in Black history, a natural storyteller and a maker.

Credit: Photo by Dustin Chambers

Credit: Photo by Dustin Chambers

Awake taught himself to weld to make tall bikes and double decker bikes (all meant for riding). He made furniture in his spare time. Before he was married and a devoted father to two small children, Awake worked as a bartender, a construction framer and project manager.

But with his wife’s encouragement, Awake left his construction job during the COVID-19 pandemic, determined to spend time with his first child and nurture his own creativity.

“He’s always kind of gone against the grain,” said Acosta. “And I appreciate that about him, especially when we talk about what is expected of Black males and Black male identity. I think he’s very secure in his identity, but he’s also willing to push people’s expectations about who he is.”

Working with his hands and creating something real in an increasingly digital, terminally distracted world spills over into Awake’s desire to tap into woodworking’s rich, complicated history.

He works in the labor-intensive, ancient green woodworking tradition, in which domestic hardwoods — oak, ash, hickory, maple — are meticulously crafted and assembled with hand tools rather than machinery.

“What really drew me to green woodworking, which is very different than, like, 90% of the furniture that gets made and used, is that you start from a log,” Awake said of a process of furniture-making that maintains the inherent strength and integrity of the wood.

In 2022 Awake received a grant from the Center for Craft in Asheville, North Carolina, to research artisans such as the enslaved Tennessee green woodworker and inventor Richard Poynor, who elevated the common ladder-back chair into a coveted, desirable object in the 19th century.

“He really pioneered what we think of as a modern ladder-back, even though he doesn’t really get acknowledged,” Awake said.

For Awake, the chair is also a symbol of the incredible Black craftspeople such as Poynor who have been overlooked.

“I think that Robell’s larger project is about finding erasure, identifying makers who haven’t been known to history for various reasons, said Monica Obniski, the High Museum of Art’s curator of decorative arts and design. “This strategy implies a more democratic, inclusive approach to understanding a broader sweep of decorative arts from our past. In terms of his own making, he infuses his objects with this more expansive knowledge.”

Atlanta filmmaker and photographer Dustin Chambers is making a short film about Awake and his many fascinating contradictions. Chambers was drawn to the artist’s soft-spoken, relaxed demeanor that coexists with a more radical sensibility.

“He comes from this very anti-authoritarian mindset,” said Chambers, something you’d probably never imagine lurking behind Awake’s chill, scholarly energy and gentle manner.

Awake is currently finishing a Baltimore fancy chair, a design created in the 1700s and inspired by ancient Greek klismos chairs, for the Baltimore Museum of Art. The chair sits at eye level like a patient on a doctor’s exam table, in the 1945 Cascade Heights home that serves as his studio. Awake has created an intricate caning pattern for the seat, of delicate, Nabisco thin slats of white oak arranged in a herringbone pattern — a tribute to a technique that Poynor originated.

His interest in Black craft is rooted in an anti-establishment perspective that questions power structures others assume are natural or inevitable. While Americans might see their own heritage in the elaborate silver tea sets and Windsor chairs that populate museum decorative arts collections, in reality, Awake points out, they are the material culture of another generation’s 1% and, at heart, a limited view of America’s creative achievements.

High Museum curator Obniski lauds Awake’s “dedication to research that he has undertaken to understand cultural context, maker histories and everything in between.

“He then uses that knowledge to create works that are unparalleled in the field today.”