The Scollay Square Gallery

Self Mastery: Breaking Beyond The Spectacle

By Brandon Breaux

Self Mastery is an exhibition that invites viewers to encounter breakdancing beyond the spectacle, not as performance, but as practice. Through quilts, paintings, photography, and new media, Brandon Breaux examines the art form as a structured pathway to personal growth, tracing five interconnected dimensions of self mastery: self awareness, self control, values, discipline, and reflection.

Breakdancing or breaking emerged from working-class Black and Latinx communities in the Bronx, NY in the early 1970s as a tool for self-expression, conflict resolution, and cultural exchange. By the late 70s, tapes of jams and famous battles were already circulating throughout Boston, and the city became one of the first places hip-hop culture spread beyond New York. In 1981, Floorlords established their crew, dancing throughout Boston in local meets, battles on the streets and underground events. At the time, schools and community centers provided important stages for Boston-area practitioners at a time when few formal venues existed. In 1985, Massachusetts Rock Against Racism filmed and produced a documentary titled Breakin’ Rappin’ Poppin’ and Graffin’: A Rockumentary, filmed on the grounds of Madison Park High School in Roxbury, an early record of a scene that “had been quietly thriving in Boston’s neighborhoods for years.”

Breaux draws on this lineage to make visible the interior life of the practice: the invisible labor of repetition, the daily commitment to craft, and the community structures that sustain it. Its practitioners are, in many ways, children of laborers, inheritors of a tradition that understands the body as an instrument of both survival and artistry. Presented in collaboration with the Boston Urban Archive and including photographs by local artist Jaypix Belmer, the works in Self Mastery reframe breaking as a form of civic and social contribution. Together, they build a portrait of a practice that builds character, cultivates community, and demands of its practitioners an undermined rigor.

Brandon Breaux is a multidisciplinary artist and designer from Chicago, IL. His work explores the impact that environment has on identity and world view through the image. Breaux uses various mediums to explore narratives that provoke deep questioning and healing. Coming from a 10 year background as an art director, he often incorporates type and image to build tension in his work, using the language of advertising in a fine arts context to encourage dialogue in public and private spaces. In 2022, he was one of Ebony Magazine's Power 100 and included in Theaster Gates and Dorchester Industries' inaugural Experimental Design Lab cohort supported by the Prada Group.



To learn more about the artist please visit brandonbreaux.com. This exhibition is funded through the Un-Monument Initiative program. To purchase an artwork please email mariana.rodriguezrey@boston.gov.