Complication
2013
Oil on canvas
200 x 250 cm (78 3/4 x 98 7/16 in.)
British artist Lynette Yiadom-Boakye mainly paints portraits of black men and women from her imagination in a free and expressive style.
The fictional characters are usually shown alone, but this painting features a group of partially nude black men. On a dark green background, the same colour as their top, they hold each other by the shoulder. They look distracted or absorbed, perhaps indicating a deep bond on the order of fraternal camaraderie. The corresponding colours and interacting gazes attest to a subtle spirit of composition recalling works by the great masters of painting from Velasquez to Manet. The artist paints nothing but black figures in order to give them their rightful place in art history.
Complication, which is in the Pinault Collection, was exhibited at the "Debout !" ("Stand Up!") show at the Couvent des Jacobins in Rennes in 2018.
The fictional characters are usually shown alone, but this painting features a group of partially nude black men. On a dark green background, the same colour as their top, they hold each other by the shoulder. They look distracted or absorbed, perhaps indicating a deep bond on the order of fraternal camaraderie. The corresponding colours and interacting gazes attest to a subtle spirit of composition recalling works by the great masters of painting from Velasquez to Manet. The artist paints nothing but black figures in order to give them their rightful place in art history.
Complication, which is in the Pinault Collection, was exhibited at the "Debout !" ("Stand Up!") show at the Couvent des Jacobins in Rennes in 2018.
Exhibitions
Photo: Marcus Leith, London
Courtesy of Corvi-Mora, London and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York.
