Madden’s Career Soars in Artistic Rebirth

Like most artists pursuing their talent professionally, Tamara Natalie Madden is no exception to any number of struggles artists face. And as each artist’s struggle is specific to him or her, Madden’s is unique in that she realized success after getting a second lease on life at the age of 25.

Born in Manchester, Jamaica, Madden says she was the little girl “climbing ackee and orange trees,” reflecting on her upbringing in rural Jamaica. Though she could often be found with a pencil and sketchpad in her hands during her youth, Madden says she took a hiatus from drawing from the age of 17 to 21.

Madden says a move with her mother to Milwaukee, WI, as a pre- teen and the birth of her daughter were life occurrences and detractors from becoming more serious about her work early on. With regard to her work, Madden often found herself drawn to imagery of what she could remember from her youth in Jamaica.

“My (earlier) work was influenced by the everyday people, or who I thought was the everyday person, from my childhood memories of Jamaica,” she says.

However, shortly after her daughter’s birth Madden learned she had IGA Nephropathy, a rare kidney disease causing failure of those organs, which would eventually lead to dialysis three days a week, for up to four hours per day. Not only was the dialysis restrictive, it diminished her ability to be self sustaining, thereby boxing her in, notes Madden.

With an upcoming return home to Jamaica, Madden thought to reach out to a long lost half-brother she’d been out of contact with for many years.

“The trip to Jamaica was already planned when I thought of finding my brother. I just happened to remember him as I was thinking about going home and decided I wanted to meet him,” she says.

Her search was fruitful as he turned up by the aid of a popular Jamaican website. Within no time she was making arrangements to visit him while in Jamaica, around the same time she became inspired to take her talents more seriously—making a commitment to herself that if she were able to overcome the disease, she would work to become a professional artist.

As fate would have it, her brother showed concern and compassion for his sister whose sickness showed desperately in her face and frail body. After learning of her condition, he selflessly offered up one of his own kidneys to save her life. The following year Madden received the transplant, which put her life on a whole new course. She was the phoenix arisen from the ashes, reborn to fulfill her destiny.

Madden says she wasted no time pursuing her talents professionally. Reaching out to the small collective of Black artists, now known as ABEA, and the supporting community in Milwaukee, she placed her work in a show at the local arts and music gallery. Though her first show didn’t produce any sales, Madden remain undeterred raising enough money from a solo exhibition in 2004 allowing her to set out for new horizons in Atlanta.  

“It has a nice country feel; I can see the stars at nighttime and it’s really peaceful,” Madden describes of her relocation to Snellville.

She says most of her professional growth came after her move to Atlanta. Shortly after moving her she became affiliated with the , representing her work at the Black Fine Arts Show in New York City along with other shows and their patrons since 2004. Madden acknowledges the need to ‘step up her game’ in a city bursting at the seams with some of the country’s top African American artists.

“Being here (in Atlanta) I feel I’m around a new breed of artist, there are many different types of artists who are very masterful,” Madden adds.

Madden says after her relocation to the city, other successful local artists challenged her work as they were “more focused” both creatively and in their business acumen. And, while here she has been able to gain mentorship from such renowned artists as Charly Palmer and Kevin “Wak” Williams, who’ve helped usher her into more disciplined business practices as well. Madden now produces as many works as five per month, with her work showcased in galleries across the country as well as international markets.

Supported by local galleries in one of the largest markets for African American art—though prints are the prevailing preference—Madden admits she actually sells more of her work, originals, outside of Atlanta. She attributes this to an abundance of incredible artwork, unlike many other urban cities, in the local marketplace as well as a possible lack of artistic education in the Black community, which occasionally misses the value with investing in original fine art.

“There seems to be a disconnect that people don’t realize this is someone’s livelihood, and these are people who take their craft very seriously,” Madden passionately explains. “Any and all people can feel art, art is life where every human being can feel something for the work.”

Avisca Fine Art is featuring an exhibit of Tamara Natalie Madden’s work Full Circle from Oct. 7 through 28, where they invite you to come out and discover her talent for yourself.

Tamara Madden can be reached at www.tamaranataliemadden.com for commissioned works and inquiries.