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Jacqui Palumbo, CNN
Three years after the official portraits of Barack and Michelle Obama were presented at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery, the paintings arrived at the Art Institute of Chicago, where the former president had his first date.
On display through mid-August, the works of Kehinde Wiley of Brooklyn and Amy Sherald of Baltimore, the first black artists included in the National Portrait Gallery, attracted millions of visitors, with Michelle Obama’s inspiring portrait of Sherald. that year.
To commemorate chicago’s homelines, the former First Lady and Sherald participated in a virtual verbal exchange organized through the Institute and moderated through Thelma Golden, director and chief curator of the Studio Museum in Harlem. On public visits to the Oval Office to speak with the couple, Obama said he’ll have to be “a little intimidating. “
She and the president kept an open mind about who would paint their portraits, “until Amy came along,” she said. The artist and the First Lady clicked almost immediately.
“The more she talked, the more she and I started to connect. . . Barack has almost disappeared from the conversation,” he said with a smile. “His presence, his aura is anything I connect with right away,” he explained. , also highlighted the strength of his talent, creativity and purpose.
Although Sherald and Barack’s portraitist, Wiley, deals with the depiction of black figures in a tradition of traditionally white portraits, Wiley’s depiction of the president was filled with greenery and colorful tones, while Sherald’s vision of the First Lady was duller. blue background, painted her skin tones in gray or grayscale; it is known for the strategy of “excluding the concept of color as race”, as has been quoted.
“Honestly, I had never thought about playing Barack. In my mind, it’s like I’m going to paint Mrs. Obama,” Sherald said in the recorded conversation. “I think I’ve never been so in a position for Right now I feel like everything I did in my life prepared me for that moment.
When it came time to opt for the get dresseded that Obama would use for the photo shoot that Sherald used as the basis for the painting, the artist and First Lady’s stylist, Meredith Koop, opted for a black and white dress by Milly. grid trend with accents of pink, yellow, and red. Although there is no direct connection, Sherald saw a visual resemblance to the famous Gee’s Bend quilts made through a network of black women in rural Alabama.
“I learned that I had the opportunity for everyone to portray to tell a story, and I sought to be to anchor them, not only in the history of art and in the history of America, but also in the history of blacks. “, Said Sherald. Obama.
Since portraying the portrait, Sherald has become one of the most prominent fresco figurative painters, though his effect extends beyond the art world.
“I was visiting a school in Baltimore and walked into the art room, and the point of excitement was amazing,” Sherald recalls. “It could also have been Jay-Z when I walked into this classroom. “
During the virtual conference, the former First Lady also spoke about her connection to global art and what portraiture meant to her and her family.
“Few other people know that my father was an aspiring artist and that he had the opportunity to take courses at the Art Institute,” Obama said of his late father, Fraser Robinson. “Now, like many black men his age, he didn’t have the resources to invest and build a career in this field. He had to leave his paintings and clay and supplies for his family.
He also revealed that one night, after the National Portrait Gallery closed, the Obamas took their daughters and Michelle’s mom to see the paintings in the empty museum. “(I was) calm and (I looked) at my mom, Marian Robinson, at the base of my portrait and looked at it with such a point of admiration,” he recalls. And for me, seeing her see me that way meant the global thing to me. “
The portraits adopted a national tour in five locations until May 2022 and, after leaving the Art Institute of Chicago, moved to the Brooklyn Museum, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Atlanta Museum of Superior Art, and the Museum of Fine Arts. in Houston.
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