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.

Kehinde Wiley: Saint Louis

Arts & Photography

Kelly, Simon

Klemm, Hannah

History & Criticism

Roberts Projects

An investigation into Saar's lifelong interest in Black dolls, with new watercolors, historic assemblages, sketchbooks and a selection of Black dolls from the artist's collection This volume features new watercolor works on paper and assemblages by Betye Saar (born 1926) that incorporate the artist's personal collection of Black dolls. These watercolors showcase the artist's experimentation with vivid color and layered techniques, and her new interest in flat shapes. While Saar has previously used painting in her mixed-media collages, this is the first publication to focus on her watercolor works on paper. "Watercolor is something that children use, so I decided, maybe I'll paint something about children, maybe I'll paint the dolls," Saar says. Referencing the underrepresented history of Black dolls through Saar's artistic lens, this catalog distills several intersecting themes, imagery and objects in Saar's oeuvre, highlighting her prominent usage and reinvention of Black imagery. It contains 90 color images, including early assemblage works that feature Black dolls, such as Gris-Gris Box (1972) and Mti (1973), plus early sketchbooks and a curated selection of Saar's Black doll collection. It also includes original essays by Rachel Federman, Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Drawings at the Morgan Library & Museum, and Katherine Jentleson, Merrie and Dan Boone Curator of Folk and Self-Taught Art at the High Museum of Art, and an interview with the artist by her granddaughter, Maddy Inez Leeser.

Betye Saar: Black Doll Blues

The first monograph on the sinuous, exhilaratingly colorful and pattern-filled portraiture of Amoako Boafo 
Ghanaian painter Amoako Boafo has built a practice synthesizing the ways that art both reflects and perpetuates the power of representation. Amoako Boafo is the first monograph to comprehensively examine the artist's career to date. Heavily illustrated and featuring original contributions by Osei Bonsu, Rachel Cargle, Mutombo Da Poet and Aja Monet, the book also presents an insightful and expansive conversation with the artist by Paul Schimmel. 
Exclusively portraying individuals from the diaspora and beyond, Boafo invites a reflection on Black subjectivity, diversity and complexity. His portraits, notable for their bold colors and patterns, celebrate his subjects as a means to challenge portrayals that objectify and dehumanize Blackness. As Boafo has stated, “the primary idea of my practice is representation, documenting, celebrating and showing new ways to approach Blackness.” 
Amoako Boafo (born 1984) studied at the Ghanatta College of Art and Design in Accra, Ghana, in 2007, before attending the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna, for his MFA. His first solo exhibition in the US, entitled I See Me, opened at Roberts Projects in 2019. That same year, Boafo was the first artist-in-residence at the new Rubell Museum in Miami, Florida. In 2020, he collaborated with Kim Jones, Dior Men’s creative director, for Dior’s Spring/Summer 2021 Men’s Collection. In 2021, Boafo was selected by the Uplift Art Program to create the inaugural “Suborbital Triptych” on the exterior panels of a Blue Origin New Shepard rocket, launched August 2021.

Amoako Boafo

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the Roberts Projects publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Roberts Projects

See the best price to sell, buy or rent books by the Roberts Projects publisher. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Kehinde Wiley: Saint Louis

Betye Saar: Black Doll Blues

Amoako Boafo