Lex Marie is confronting the complexities of Black motherhood through art and even Spike Lee is on board

 In this interview, the multidisciplinary artist on the rise opens up about the themes in her work, her virality, motherhood, and more.

There is a tremendous amount of joy to be found in Black motherhood, but there can also be generational curses to navigate, grief at times, a fair share of fear, anxiety, and so much more that can make the experience difficult to capture fully. However, Lex Marie, a multidisciplinary artist on the rise and mom of a nine-year-old son, is certainly trying her best. 

In November, the 33-year-old Maryland artist is bringing these anxieties to life at New York’s Bishop Gallery in a new exhibition, exploring corporal punishment, childhood, and the complicated history of discipline in Black households.

“I’m not interested in critiquing anyone’s parenting choices,” the artist made clear in an interview with theGrio on Thursday. “I’m just using my art as a way to help me through parenting, really.”

Marie, who studied painting at the University of Maryland, has works made from everything from hospital baby blankets to leather belts and even classic school supplies. With themes exploring the Black maternal health crisis, public education, and the Black family, her art has repeatedly gone viral, even catching the attention of Spike Lee, who purchased not one but two of her pieces this summer. And as her audience continues to grow, so too does her ability to spark conversations about the uncomfortable realities of Black life today.

For the artist, the growing attention has been, in a word, surreal. 

“It’s overwhelming in the best way,” she said. 

Her work has reached millions online, sparked conversations about childhood experiences that many adults are still reckoning with, and moved some viewers to tears. 

“I’ve had people come up to me and like cry in my face, like, ‘Thank you for making this work,’” she said. “Because the work is personal to me, but I mean, it is personal to them as well.”

“It makes me want to keep doing the work,” she told theGrio. “It does help when you hear a lot of people saying, ‘Girl, keep going.’”

Long before she was approaching the limelight, Marie was a self-described shy little girl growing up in Prince George’s County, Maryland, with big feelings and few ways to express them. That is, until she discovered art.

“I was a bit shy, and I had a lot of big feelings to be so small,” she recalled. “I felt like when I created, my mind got quieter.”

By high school, Marie was taking every art class she could get her hands on. For years, she primarily painted portraits of other people, including celebrities, until becoming a mother changed her perspective on whose stories were worth telling.

She began painting herself and her son, capturing him smiling in his Spider-Man costume and enjoying the everyday pleasures of childhood. 

“I felt like our stories were important enough to be in galleries, to be in museums,” she explained.

But as he grew older and started school, Marie found herself confronting a whole new set of anxieties about raising a young Black boy in America. Like when he came home from preschool at just four years old and told her about participating in an active shooter drill, and she was stunned. Unsure how to even begin discussing something so frightening with him, she turned to her art, creating “School Supplies,” an AK-47 sculpted using pencils. As her son watched her make it, he began asking questions, allowing Marie the opportunity to have the conversation she initially struggled to find the words for.

Other works of hers that have sparked meaningful dialogue include a Black maternal health flag she fashioned from strips of hospital baby blankets in the design of the American flag. 

“I thought it would be interesting to use the stripes in that blanket as the stripes in the American flag, and to create this symbol for something that we don’t have a symbol for,” she explained. 

“If someone sees a flag, an American flag, and they’re like, ‘Why is it these colors?’ They’re just asking a question, and you can kind of get into why it is that color, and that could make someone aware of something they weren’t previously aware of.”

She added, “If someone sees a flag, an American flag, and they’re like, ‘Why is it these colors?’ They’re just asking a question, and you can kind of get into why it is that color, and that could make someone aware of something they weren’t previously aware of.”

Created to highlight the fact that Black mothers face a maternal mortality rate of three to four times that of their white counterparts and the many health disparities driving those rates, the piece has caught the attention of maternal health advocacy groups interested in displaying it at conferences, while nurses have even inquired about turning the design into pins.

“Everyone wants to use the symbol,” she gushed, adding, “I’m like, wow, like it’s working.”

With her latest series exploring corporal punishment in Black households gaining traction, using leather belts as both material and tool, including one piece where she repeatedly strikes a canvas, she is confronting the legacy of physical discipline in Black families, tracing its roots to slavery. The series was inspired by her own questions about what role corporal punishment should play in raising her son, as she, like many millennial parents, reconsiders the practices she grew up with.

Videos of her creating the pieces went viral, most likely bringing the work to Lee’s attention. In July, he reached out to inquire about purchasing some of her pieces, and as luck would have it, she already had the first two works from the series, collectively titled “Hard Head, Soft Ass,” at a gallery in New York. He meant business, purchasing both that very afternoon, ultimately helping her finance the rest of the series.

As she gears up for her exhibition at New York’s Bishop Gallery in November, Marie is already dreaming bigger. Currently pursuing her MFA at American University, which she expects to complete in spring 2027, the artist hopes to create monumental installations and permanent public works that reach even larger audiences.

“I want to tell our stories,” she said. “And that’s whether the story’s coming from outside the house or inside the house.”