There's something really cool about taking oily coloured paste and pushing it around with these hairy sticks and making something that looks like you. That's the magic of painting.
Kehinde WileyRead
The ability to be the first African-American painter to paint the first African-American president of the United States is absolutely overwhelming. It doesn't get any better than that.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Kehinde Wiley expresses the significance and emotional impact of being the first African-American painter to portray the first African-American president.
This quote captures the profound honor and emotional weight that comes with Kehinde Wiley's achievement of painting President Barack Obama, who represents a historic milestone in American history. Wiley conveys the sense of triumph and fulfillment in breaking barriers within the art world as well as in politics, emphasizing that such an accomplishment is unparalleled and profoundly meaningful.
Themes
ArtPaintingHistoryAchievementRepresentation
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in an art exhibition to highlight the importance of representation in the art community.
More from Kehinde Wiley
All quotes →This idea that my work is about hip-hop is a little reductive. What I'm interested in is the performance of masculinity, the performance of ethnicity, and how they intermingle across cultures.
Kehinde WileyRead
What is portraiture? It's choice. It's the ability to position your body in the world for the world to celebrate you on your own terms.
Kehinde WileyRead
Painting is about the world that we live in. Black men live in the world. My choice is to include them.
Kehinde WileyRead
What I try to do is defy expectations in terms of boundaries, whether it is high or low art, pop culture, or fine-art culture. My work is about reconciling myriad cultural influences and bringing them into one picture.
Kehinde WileyRead
There is something that always will be true about painting and sculpture - that in order to really get it, you have to show up. That is something that is both sad and kind of beautiful about it. It remains analog. It remains special and irreducible.
Kehinde WileyRead
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