“Yellow Turtleneck” (2018) by Amoako Boafo AFTER MOVING TO VIENNA, Amoako Boafo began a new portrait series. The work grew less out of inspiration and more out of motivation. Ghanaian-born Boafo found the Austrian capital generally unreceptive to black people and the art scene was just as challenging. The portrait series served as a means of self preservation—a celebration of his identity and blackness. The Black Diaspora portraits center black subjectivity. He paints real people. Most of them he knows, others he knows of and holds in high regard. Roberts Projects in Los Angeles is currently presenting the series. In describing his work, the gallery states that Boafo seeks to “create a new vernacular, reframing his own experience and that of his subjects to include a more variegated understanding of the black experience.” “I See Me” is Boafo’s first show with Roberts Projects. The gallery said “a friend of the gallery” brought the up-and-coming artist’s work to its attention. It turns out the friend was Kehinde Wiley. Roberts Projects is one of the galleries that represents Wiley, the critically recognized artist who painted President Barack Obama’s official portrait for the National Portrait Gallery. Boafo said Wiley found him […]
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