CORY REYNOLDS | DATE 2/4/2023

Black History Staff Pick: 'Jack Whitten: Cosmic Soul'

Featured spreads are from Jack Whitten: Cosmic Soul, Richard Shiff's definitive exploration of the important American painter's artistic and spiritual practice. If you want to understand Whitten, this deeply personal art historical deep-dive is literally essential—both a gorgeously designed and produced labor of love and a complete, searching excavation. A sample passage reads, Whitten "received verbal instruction from a coded soundtrack originating not in a jazz club or a recording studio but somewhere in the cosmos, coming from an 'unknown voice from the universe.' Imaginary or real, it hardly matters. Whitten had a way of turning from one field of human endeavor to another, from one mentality to another, without resorting to any customary devices of transition. In his thought, disparate concepts converged. If he had been a poet, we would have called his verbalizations poetry; but he was describing the manipulation of materials in a painter’s studio. 'I practice thought experiments in abstract painting. Thought experiments save time and allow me to do celestial navigation, i.e., I can travel anywhere I want without the encumbrance of matter.'"