In Full Bloom, Janet Taylor Pickett celebrates women, black diasporic culture, and beauty, showcasing selected works from the AKIMBO EXOTICA series produced from 2013 – 2018.  A dress form is ubiquitous in these works, structuring her female-centric narratives and histories writ large.  A metaphor for Black memory and a symbol of identity, Taylor Pickett’s often-ornate works defy linear timeframes and geographic or cultural relationships.  Africa and Europe, past and present, coexist in Taylor Pickett’s work and continue to explore the eternal black female empowerment through beauty and self-possession.  AKIMBO EXOTICA is a portal to the past that declares its story while retaining a patina of mysticism and abstraction—the ownership of Black beauty.