


Kehinde Wiley
b. 1977
Kehinde Wiley is known for creating opulent large scale portraits of everyday people against Baroque and Rococo decorative patterns. When he started the style of painting he is most known for today, he selected men off of Harlem streets, captured them in photographs standing in poses from classical paintings by Old Masters, and painted their images on large canvases with ornate backdrops. Wiley has been known to recreate the images of Michael Jackson, LL Cool J, Ice T, and Big Daddy Kane. Part of Wiley’s appeal is his ability to render his subject in an almost photo realistic capacity, but what makes him great is his ability to fluidly transpose the essences of traditional European paintings with contemporary urban life and place them on one canvas. In a way, he places “the other” inside of Western Art culture, allowing space for these bodies in Western art museums where he has been quite celebrated.