Pythagore 2016

Amy Sherald made "Pythagore" with oil paint and a clear sense of purpose. The yellow jacket, that hat, and the half-tone greyscale skin…it's like a set of decisions about how to represent someone. I’m thinking about Sherald in her studio, mixing those skin tones, trying to get them just right, that light grey contrasting with the bold, almost cartoon-like blocks of color. How do you make a person pop off the canvas, but also hold back, maintain a certain cool distance? The way the yellow bounces against the blue of the shirt creates this vibrant tension. There's something about the hat too, how he holds it out, offering it, but also holding it back. It reminds me of Barkley L. Hendricks who also painted black figures with a similar compositional construction. It’s like a conversation between painters, each one pushing the possibilities of portraiture. And that’s what painting is all about for me, that ongoing dialogue. We are all trying to make sense of the world through color, line, and form.