Text by Amanda Renshaw. Interview with Katy Hessel.
Critchlow’s portraits of Black women transform Western portraiture and conflate kitsch with tradition
Only three years after her graduation from the Royal Drawing School in London, British painter Somaya Critchlow (born 1993) has already soared to worldwide acclaim for her figurative portraits of women that explore nuances of race, sexuality and culture. After learning art history through a white, Western lens and being encouraged to only paint white figures, Critchlow turned to self-portraiture as a way of reclaiming the craft. She then began to paint other women of color, ranging in scale from intimate miniatures to life-sized illustrations, each representing their self-possessed subjects with evocative brushstrokes in rich shades of bronze and puce. They subvert conventional representations of Black women throughout art history even as Critchlow draws upon traditional techniques of thinned oils and watercolors. Critchlow’s visual lexicon necessarily draws from the distinctions of race and class that form our contemporary visual landscape. This is the first monograph on her work.
Featured image is reproduced from ‘Somaya Critchlow'.
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FORMAT: Hbk, 9.5 x 11 in. / 144 pgs / 100 color. LIST PRICE: U.S. $40.00 LIST PRICE: CANADA $56 ISBN: 9788857244815 PUBLISHER: skira AVAILABLE: 3/30/2021 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Forthcoming AVAILABILITY: Awaiting stock TERRITORY: NA LA
Critchlow’s portraits of Black women transform Western portraiture and conflate kitsch with tradition
Published by skira. Text by Amanda Renshaw. Interview with Katy Hessel.
Only three years after her graduation from the Royal Drawing School in London, British painter Somaya Critchlow (born 1993) has already soared to worldwide acclaim for her figurative portraits of women that explore nuances of race, sexuality and culture. After learning art history through a white, Western lens and being encouraged to only paint white figures, Critchlow turned to self-portraiture as a way of reclaiming the craft. She then began to paint other women of color, ranging in scale from intimate miniatures to life-sized illustrations, each representing their self-possessed subjects with evocative brushstrokes in rich shades of bronze and puce. They subvert conventional representations of Black women throughout art history even as Critchlow draws upon traditional techniques of thinned oils and watercolors. Critchlow’s visual lexicon necessarily draws from the distinctions of race and class that form our contemporary visual landscape. This is the first monograph on her work.
