"Published on the occasion of the exhibition Kehinde Wiley: A New Republic at the Brooklyn Museum, February 20-May 24, 2015." Includes bibliographical references (pages 182-188).
Contents:
Foreword / Arnold L. Lehman -- Preface and acknowledgments ; Introduction / Eugenie Tsai -- Kehinde Wiley: the artist and interpretation / Connie H. Choi -- Plate and commentaries / texts by Lee Ambrozy, Elizabeth Armstrong, Richard Aste, Naomi Beckwith, Kirsten Pai Buick, Beth Citron, Sara Cochran, Jeffrey Deitch, Latasha N. Nevada Diggs, Kevin D. Dumouchelle, Quincy Flowers, David J. Getsy, Lewis R. Gordon, Rujeko Hockley, Christine Y. Kim, Venus Lau, Thomas J. Lax, Catharina Manchanda, Kobena Mercer, Valerie J. Mercer, Tumelo Mosaka, Steven Nelson, Molly Nesbit, Tavia Nyong'O, Annie Paul, Megha Ralapati, John B. Ravenal, Joanna Montoya Robotham, Franklin Sirmans, Claire Tancons, ToureĢ, Murtaza Vali, Nicola Vassell, Rebecca Walker, and Deborah Willis.
Summary:
The works presented in Kehinde Wiley: A New Republic raise questions about race, gender, and the politics of representation by portraying contemporary African American men and women using the conventions of traditional European portraiture. The exhibition includes an overview of the artist?s prolific fourteen-year career and features sixty paintings and sculptures. Wiley's signature portraits of everyday men and women riff on specific paintings by Old Masters, replacing the European aristocrats depicted in those paintings with contemporary black subjects, drawing attention to the absence of African Americans from historical and cultural narratives. The subjects in Wiley's paintings often wear sneakers, hoodies, and baseball caps, gear associated with hip-hop culture, and are set against contrasting ornate decorative backgrounds that evoke earlier eras and a range of cultures. Through the process of "street casting," Wiley invites individuals, often strangers he encounters on the street, to sit for portraits. In this collaborative process, the model chooses a reproduction of a painting from a book and reenacts the pose of the painting?s figure. By inviting the subjects to select a work of art, Wiley gives them a measure of control over the way they're portrayed.
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