When she was a little girl in North Carolina, on the cusp of the 20th century, Minnie Evans began to have strange dreams. The visions were so vivid and overpowering that they often kept her awake all night. At 13, Evans stopped going to school. Opportunities for Black women were limited back then, and in 1916 she found work as a domestic servant, later becoming a gatekeeper at the hunting estate Pembroke Park—a job she held until her death at 82, in 1974. In 1935, after Evans made two pen-and-ink drawings, she began to draw in earnest. Soon after, she heard a voice that said, “Why don’t you draw or die?” She spent the rest of her life translating those voices into surreal, psychedelic visions on paper—something like Shaker “Spirit Drawings,” but more colorful and baroque. In 1975, Evans became one of the first Black artists to have a solo show at the Whitney Museum. This exhibition presents works covering 40 years of creativity. —Elena Clavarino