Monday the Obamas made history again when they had their official portraits unveiled at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery. The portraits, which will join a complete presidential portrait collection, are the first to be painted by black artists for the museum.
Smithsonian Magazine says Kehinde Wiley’s past work has touched upon issues of race and identity. It’s no doubt part of the reason why former President Obama chose him.
Brooklyn-based Wiley is known for his large-scale paintings of black men and women, which blend street culture with the stylistic traditions of European and American masters. His subjects, clad in hoodies and adorned with tattoos, reference works by famed portraitists like 16th-century German artist Hans Holbein the Younger and 19th-century American artist John Singer Sargent.
The woman behind Michelle’s portrait, Amy Sherald, also has a history of tackling race in her work.
Sherald, a Baltimore-based artist, is a more surprising choice. A “relatively unknown,” according to Smith of the Times, she has garnered acclaim for her arresting portraits of black subjects, whom she paints in grayscale against colorful backdrops. In 2016, “Miss Everything (Unsuppressed Deliverance),” Sherald’s oil on canvas portrait of a black woman drinking from an oversized teacup, won the National Portrait Gallery’s prestigious Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition.
Congratulations to the artists on this amazing milestone! And huge thanks to the Obamas for making the historic decision to hire black artists.
Watch the unveiling below: