Untitled (Studio) 2014

Curator: At first glance, it feels almost staged, you know? Like a hyper-real movie set. Editor: Well, let's set the scene. This acrylic on canvas is titled "Untitled (Studio)" and was completed by Kerry James Marshall in 2014. It currently resides here at the Met. It's teeming with symbols... How does that "movie set" resonate, though? Curator: There's this feeling of performance and preparation—almost like actors getting ready, but instead of actors, it's... artistic archetypes? And it really captures how Black figures have often been absent or misrepresented. He’s creating a world where they’re the central protagonists, reclaiming agency. Editor: Absolutely! The skull on the table, for example. Memento mori. Constant reminder of mortality. But is it also nodding to art history and how Black artists were previously absent? Is he perhaps alluding to the “death” of the old art world and ushering in a new artistic narrative? Curator: Love that. It is layered in these complex reflections. And look at the very deep, deliberate blackness of the figures! Almost hyper-real in its intensity. It pushes against historical erasures of Black identity within visual culture. There is no way that skin color can be construed as anything else. Editor: I see the figures here are rendered in a way that feels intentionally flattened, like silhouettes. And the artist's touch… deliberate, not trying to hide the medium or brushstrokes. Like calling attention to the constructed nature of the image, like theater. Is he suggesting race itself is performative? Curator: I think so! There is a certain construction inherent. This “studio” feels very much a space of art-making and the space where cultural narratives are built and unbuilt, and remade. Editor: I like that you see it that way. It pushes us to confront representations and our own complicity as viewers and cultural gatekeepers, asking difficult questions. I walk away seeing an invitation for reflection. Curator: Yeah. To consider what kind of stories are given space and what new stories need to be built. Like building a new world in this painting.