Hype Hair

Hype Hair is a solo exhibition of vibrant, wearable hair sculptures by South Florida artist Peppermint Sandy, on view at the Atrium Gallery in the Orange County Administration Center in downtown Orlando. The work treats Black hair as both art and language, drawing on the artist's own relationship with her hair and offered as a dedication to Black women and girls. Born in Miami to Haitian immigrant parents, Sandy makes work rooted in her upbringing and in the way beauty rituals carry meaning across generations. In Hype Hair she frames braiding and styling as a form of communication, from braids that identified tribes to cornrowed escape routes during slavery to hair set in rollers the night before Easter Sunday. The exhibition takes its title from a magazine she read in childhood, one of the few publications that celebrated Black hair. The collection of sculptures remains on display through June 25. The exhibition is free and open to the public, and the Atrium Gallery is open Monday through Friday, 8am to 5:30pm, at 201 S. Rosalind Ave.