Rooted in Resilience: Seitu K. Jones’s First Solo Museum Retrospective Excavates History and Humanity

October 24, 2026 6 Min Read

At the Minnesota Museum of American Art (the M) in St. Paul, a quiet revolution is taking root. In his first-ever solo museum exhibition, “The Smell of Earth: Seitu K. Jones Working in the Elements,” multidisciplinary artist Seitu K. Jones invites viewers into a sensory and historical landscape where the humble collard green serves as both a literal subject and a metaphorical anchor.

Running from October 22 through July 25, 2027, the exhibition is a profound excavation of the Black experience, landscape design, and the vital necessity of archival preservation. It is a homecoming of sorts for the fourth-generation Minnesotan, whose work has long defined the public artistic identity of the Twin Cities, yet until now, had never been granted the singular, sustained focus of a museum retrospective.

The Connecting Cord: Collard Greens as Cultural Narrative

Throughout the galleries, the collard green emerges as a recurring motif. It appears in charcoal sketches, meticulous paintings, and even a sculptural form housed within a hand-carved Minnesota basswood box. For Jones, this vegetable is far more than an agricultural staple; it is a conduit to the past.

“I keep coming back to collard greens as a way of accessing Southern cuisine,” Jones explains. “And then exploring these African American culinary traditions—this line that connects us all to Africa.”

By elevating the collard green to the level of high art, Jones forces a dialogue about the relationship between the Black body, the soil, and the forced migrations that define African American history. The work is technical and intimate, showcasing a range that surprises even those familiar with his large-scale public installations. Archivists Ego Ahaiwe Sowinski and Alexandra Nicome, who curated the selection from Jones’s extensive personal collection, noted that the drawings—some pulled from forgotten rolled-up tubes in the artist’s studio—reveal a level of technical virtuosity that challenges the public’s perception of Jones’s practice.

A Chronology of Soil and Struggle

To understand the depth of “The Smell of Earth,” one must look at the lineage of the man who created it. Jones is a fourth-generation Minnesotan, born from a history of resilience that is woven into the very fabric of his art.

His great-grandfather, having liberated himself from the shackles of slavery, served in the Union Army during the Civil War. Seeking a new life, he eventually settled in Red Wing, Minnesota, where he worked as a porter at the St. James Hotel. The meager wages from that labor were saved, meticulously and purposefully, to purchase land.

Seitu K. Jones explores soil, culture and African American history in solo show

“They rented land in Rochester, and that’s where my grandmother was born,” Jones recalls. His grandmother eventually moved to the historic Old Rondo neighborhood in St. Paul over a century ago. It was there that she transformed her backyard into a functional farm—a defiant, radical act for a woman whose father had been denied the right to own his own labor.

“I can clearly still remember the plum trees that were there,” Jones says. Those memories of the kitchen on Fuller Avenue—the sounds of his aunties and grandmother fussing, the smell of the earth, and the cycles of growth—formed the foundational aesthetic of his career. This upbringing led him to pursue a degree in landscape design from the University of Minnesota’s School of Agriculture and later an advanced degree in environmental history, cementing his identity as an artist who works with the elements rather than just representing them.

Supporting Data: From Public Service to Public Art

Jones’s career is a testament to the idea that art is a community service. As a co-founder of Frogtown Farms, a nonprofit organization that centers on food justice and community agriculture, Jones has spent decades using his skills to feed the soul and the stomach of his city.

His public art career is equally distinguished. In 2019, he collaborated with his longtime friend, the artist Ta-coumba T. Aiken, to install “Shadows of the Crossroads” in the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden—a series of relief sculptures that honor the history and movement of people. More recently, his “ocean-blue” portraits of George Floyd, which appeared across the Twin Cities following the 2020 uprising, became a critical visual anchor for a city in mourning and protest.

Despite winning the prestigious ArtPrize Grand Juried Prize and being a Joyce Award recipient, the delay in receiving a solo museum exhibition highlights a systemic issue within the American art establishment: the chronic under-recognition of Black artists.

The Imperative of Archival Preservation

Jones’s work today is as much about the future as it is about the past. Through his initiative, The Black Gate, he is working to digitize and preserve the work of Black artists who might otherwise be lost to history. This mission is driven by a sobering reality he has witnessed throughout his career.

“I’ve lost so many friends, collaborators, mentors—people who I looked up to—who passed on and whose work has literally ended up in a dumpster,” Jones says. “Unfortunately, what happens more and more to African American artists and Indigenous artists and other artists of color is that after a generation, their memories are gone.”

This sentiment is echoed in the exhibition’s layout. The curators at the M have not only displayed Jones’s work but have placed it in conversation with his heroes, such as George Morrison. In one poignant section, the museum includes an unfinished painting by Jones’s own father, depicting a young Seitu. The work is a masterclass in latent potential—the training is evident, but the unfinished edges speak to a life consumed by the demands of survival and labor. It is a silent tribute to the generations of Black creators whose full artistic brilliance was never allowed the space to flourish.

Implications: A Mirror to the Black Experience

The exhibition serves as a mirror, with self-portraits forming a core component of the gallery space. Jones uses his own likeness to stand in for the broader, often harrowing, 400-year history of Black men in America.

In the museum’s atrium, large-scale charcoal drawings depict figures in states of transcendence—floating, enlightened, and detached from the gravity of oppression. Yet, this serenity is countered by more visceral, painful works. “Street Scene (Self portrait)” depicts the artist lying in the street with his eyes closed, accompanied only by a pair of abandoned boots. It is an unflinching meditation on police brutality and the fragility of Black life.

Elsewhere, the imagery is even more stark: dangling feet framed against a beautiful, lush landscape. It is a jarring juxtaposition, linking the horrific legacy of lynching with the natural beauty that remains indifferent to human cruelty. By refusing to shy away from these contradictions, Jones demands that the viewer engage with the totality of the Black American experience—a history of intense beauty, profound sorrow, and an unyielding connection to the land.

Final Reflections

“The Smell of Earth” is more than an exhibition; it is an act of reclamation. It asserts that for artists like Seitu K. Jones, the museum is not just a place for display, but a vault for collective memory. By preserving the technical evolution of his own work—from his early landscape studies to his later, more politically charged charcoal pieces—the M is helping to ensure that the “connecting cord” Jones describes remains unbroken for future generations.

The exhibition is a must-see for anyone interested in the intersection of environmental justice, family history, and the power of the visual arts to bear witness. It is a soulful, necessary, and ultimately hopeful contribution to the cultural landscape of St. Paul, reminding us that even in the face of erasure, what is planted with intention will eventually find its way into the light.

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