Preview our FALL 2025 catalog, featuring more than 500 new books on art, photography, design, architecture, film, music and visual culture.
ROBERTS PROJECTS
Kehinde Wiley: Saint Louis
Text by Simon Kelly, Hannah Klemm.
Published for the artist's solo exhibition at the Saint Louis Art Museum, this new series of paintings by Brooklyn-based painter Kehinde Wiley (born 1977) reenvisions the museum's holdings as a starting point for succinct observations about representation throughout the history of art. Through a process of street casting starting in 2017, Wiley invited residents he met in the neighborhoods of north St. Louis and Ferguson to pose for his paintings. The artist then created portrait paintings inspired by carefully chosen artworks in the museum's permanent collection. Wiley specifically chose Ferguson, Missouri, after the city became a flashpoint for nationwide protests touching on much larger issues of race, injustice and police violence. This catalog features 11 new paintings by Kehinde Wiley and essays by Simon Kelly, Curator and Head of Department of Modern and Contemporary Art at Saint Louis Art Museum, and Hannah Klemm, Assistant Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at Saint Louis Art Museum.
"Jacob de Graeff" (2018) is reproduced from "Kehinde Wiley: Saint Louis."
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
New York Times Book Review
Lauren Christensen
Wiley, now famous for his official portrait of Barack Obama, has a solo exhibition at the Saint Louis Art Museum melding artworks from the museum’s collection with paintings of local residents from North St. Louis and Ferguson — all featured in this catalog.
This week, we can think of no better artist to feature than Kehinde Wiley, whose bronze monument, Rumors of War, is currently on view in Times Square, en route to Richmond, Virginia, where it will stand among a group of problematic Confederate statues that it was designed to address. Pictured here is a detail from Charles I (2018), from the catalog to Wiley's recent exhibition at Saint Louis Art Museum, the models for which were cast from residents of north St. Louis and Ferguson, Missouri. "Wiley's conceptually ambitious portraits encourage us to question the hisories of domination adn exploitation within the discourses of empire, nation, state and city," curator Simon Kelly writes. "Ultimately, in reinscribing a sense of authority wihtin the hands of those historically marginalized, they affirm a hope for change. In the term used by the noted postcolonial theorist, Gayatri Spivak, they give power back to the 'subaltern.' In focusing on the African American population … Wiley offers a message that art can have an important role in redeeming historical injustices and encouraging greater inclusiveness in the future." continue to blog
FORMAT: Hbk, 10 x 13 in. / 60 pgs / 40 color. LIST PRICE: U.S. $40.00 LIST PRICE: CANADA $55 GBP £35.00 ISBN: 9780991488995 PUBLISHER: Roberts Projects AVAILABLE: 1/22/2019 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Out of stock indefinitely AVAILABILITY: Not available TERRITORY: WORLD
Published by Roberts Projects. Text by Simon Kelly, Hannah Klemm.
Published for the artist's solo exhibition at the Saint Louis Art Museum, this new series of paintings by Brooklyn-based painter Kehinde Wiley (born 1977) reenvisions the museum's holdings as a starting point for succinct observations about representation throughout the history of art. Through a process of street casting starting in 2017, Wiley invited residents he met in the neighborhoods of north St. Louis and Ferguson to pose for his paintings. The artist then created portrait paintings inspired by carefully chosen artworks in the museum's permanent collection. Wiley specifically chose Ferguson, Missouri, after the city became a flashpoint for nationwide protests touching on much larger issues of race, injustice and police violence. This catalog features 11 new paintings by Kehinde Wiley and essays by Simon Kelly, Curator and Head of Department of Modern and Contemporary Art at Saint Louis Art Museum, and Hannah Klemm, Assistant Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at Saint Louis Art Museum.
