Amy Sherald

Sherald is acclaimed for her paintings of Black Americans that have become landmarks in the grand tradition of social portraiture—a tradition that for too long excluded the Black men, women, families and artists whose lives have been inextricable from public and politicized narratives. As Sherald says, ‘Sharing these paintings in Europe is an opportunity for me to reflect on how the tradition of portraiture finds continuity as one of several lineages alive in my work.’

Sherald humanizes the Black experience by depicting her subjects in both historically recognizable and everyday settings, at once immortalising them and reinserting them into the art historical canon. In this new body of work, she continues this practice while confronting the Western canon through allusions to significant historic works or images. This includes the painting ‘For love, and for country’ (2022), a recreation of the iconic photograph ‘V-J Day in Times Square’ (1945) by Alfred Eisenstaedt showing a US Navy sailor kissing a woman in Times Square, New York City as Imperial Japan surrendered in the Second World War.

This approach is also exemplified in the painting ‘As soft as she is…’ (2022), which references Giorgio de Chirico’s ‘Lady in Leopard Coat’ (1940), a painting of his wife, Isobella, who is positioned in a three-quarter pose and looks submissively at the viewer. Instead, Sherald challenges de Chirico’s male gaze by depicting a Black female figure in a frontal and confident stance, wearing a similar animal skin coat and looking just beyond the viewer’s gaze, unwatched.

As soft as she is... 2022 Oil on linen 137.2 x 109.2 x 6.4 cm / 54 x 43 x 2 1/2 in

In this exhibition, Sherald plays with traditional American symbology through the portrayal of vehicles such as motorbikes and tractors to engage with the currents of masculinity that underlie the work. As Sherald says, ‘The tractor and motorbike paintings explore different expressions of self-sovereignty in our communities, and how these expressions might carry into the future. Vehicles become a literal metaphor here for forward momentum, for movement and potential movement’.

In line with this sentiment, Sherald is interested in the idea articulated by artist Alice Neel that ‘art is two things: a search for a road and a search for freedom.’ In a large-scale diptych over 3-metres tall entitled ‘Deliverance’ (2022), inspired by the bike culture that is local to Baltimore in Maryland where Sherald has lived, the artist reflects on the sense of freedom that is part of riding. This work shows two bikers in mid-air, as if suspended in time, in a space free from oppression. For Sherald, the imminent danger of riding and anticipation of death contained in this moment offers a reflection on the ultimate source of temporality.

To tell her story you must walk in her shoes

2022 Oil on linen 137.2 x 109.2 x 6.4 cm / 54 x 43 x 2 1/2 in

The first widely available monograph on Amy Sherald will accompany this exhibition, published by Hauser & Wirth Publishers. Newly commissioned texts include an art historical analysis of Sherald’s work by Jenni Sorkin, a meditation on the poetics of the Black ordinary by cultural scholar Kevin Quashie and a conversation between Sherald and author Ta-Nehisi Coates.