Sharrod Hosten Study I 2010

Kehinde Wiley painted this portrait of Sharrod Hosten, but when or with what materials I couldn’t tell you. What I can tell you is Wiley’s got such a distinct approach. It’s like he’s sampling from the history of portraiture, but with a really contemporary eye. The way he builds up the skin tones, it's all about layering and glazing. There's this real attention to detail, like he’s trying to capture not just a likeness but also a feeling, an essence. And then you’ve got this hyper-ornate background, this explosion of red floral patterns that both clashes and harmonizes with the figure. It’s interesting, right? That background is so flat, so decorative. It kind of throws the figure forward, makes him pop. The way Wiley handles the brush, it's like he's having a conversation between different styles, different ways of seeing. It reminds me of Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, how she uses color and composition to create these really compelling, enigmatic figures. Art is all about that conversation, that back-and-forth, across time and between artists. It's an ongoing exploration, a quest for new ways of seeing and feeling.