The dramatic vision and delicate balance of composition found in Adona's photographic works were developed while working with painter Rozzell Sykes. Her vision was literally changed. The awareness of light, shadows, colors, textures, tones and balance had changed. Soon she began creating with paint, stark images with the feel of Japanese simplicity. [Alisa Adona]'s paintings showed a freshly textured view and an exciting new eye in the Los Angeles art world. Over time, she was compelled to capture what she saw through the lens of a camera, ultimately making photography her new love.
The Rastafarian exhibition in the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History recounts the history and reveals nuance to a movement that celebrates African liberation, global peace and "one love." A glass case at the Smithsonian exhibit displays such manuscripts as the Holy Piby, a proto-Rastafarian text that was widely circulated across the African Diaspora before being banned in Jamaica during the 1920s.
