PREVIEW
TAURUS BURNS
ZEBRA INTELLIGENCE
Opening Reception:
Friday, May 15th | 6 - 9 PM
Exhibition on view May 15 - June 13, 2026
My work explores how racial hierarchy and binary thinking shape identity and mental health.
Working in black and white, I use allegorical imagery to confront colorblindness and the expectation that people of color must continually justify their value in a society that centers whiteness. Panthers and zebra striping recur as symbols of vigilance, protection, and early labeling, drawn from both personal history and collective struggle.
These paintings reflect a lifelong and ongoing experience, focusing on moments of solitude and emotional weight shaped by systems that do not easily loosen their hold.
TAURUS BURNS
About Exhibitions Available Work Press
Photo: CJ Benninger
Taurus Burns is a graduate of The College for Creative Studies (Fine Arts ‘02). His art explores the psycho-social impact of systemic racism in America today. Lifelong introspections on race and society come together in oil paintings that evoke our nation’s continued struggle for racial equity, while narrative works filled with allegory and imagined, hybrid creatures, reveal Taurus’ own journey toward self-actualización as a biracial man in an anti-black society.
Taurus paints almost exclusively in black and white, symbolically defying the stigma of race-mixing while highlighting the depressive effect of looking at the world in black and white. His museum-quality work is in numerous private and corporate collections.