The album peaked at No. 19 on the Billboard Jazz Albums chart.[4] It has sold more than 500,000 copies.[5]Sheryl Lee Ralph sang part of "Endangered Species" during her 2022 Emmy Awards acceptance speech.[6]
Production
The album was produced by Eddie del Barrio and Terri Lyne Carrington.[7] Reeves cowrote more than half the songs on Art & Survival.[8] Due to industry and personal issues, she went into the recording studio knowing that Art & Survival could be her final album.[9]
The Los Angeles Times thought that "this multitextured experiment, with its frequent spiritual-based stories, is Reeves' most ambitious effort."[13]The Washington Post wrote: "By far her most personal and soul-searching recording, the album seems as much therapy as a musical expression for the gifted singer."[15] The Philadelphia Daily News said that, "in an incantational style sometimes reminiscent of Leon Thomas and Roberta Flack, the singer/composer evokes ancient spirits and the freeing powers of the Lord, explaining how she's come through the wringer a changed woman."[16]
Newsday deemed the album "a song cycle about self-discovery."[17]Essence called it an "album of powerfully rendered, personal yet universal compositions that run the rhythmic gamut from hard-swinging jazz to plaintive ballads to a cappella African chants."[18]USA Today wrote that "Body and Soul" is "a scat-driven, Afro-Cuban tour de force."[14]
AllMusic considered the album "neither '90s revisited bop nor overtly commercial Quiet Storm fodder ... [Reeves] is really seeking a middle ground between her two audiences."[10]
