Deborah Roberts discusses her latest exhibition, "Deborah Roberts: The Evolution of Mimi," on view at the Spelman College Museum of Fine Art January 25 - May 19, 2018.

In part one of this two-part conversation, Deborah Roberts shares how the music of Mariah Carey and Ms. Lauryn Hill influenced her earlier work, the ways in which her Austin, TX roots informed her earliest ideas of Blackness, and why she shifted her focus from painting to collage. She is joined by exhibition curator and Spelman College Museum of Fine Art director, Andrea Barnwell Brownlee, Ph.D.

Image: Deborah Roberts by Shannon McCollum