ArtArtistsKehinde Wiley

Kehinde Wiley

Kehinde Wiley
Kehinde Wiley, a 2015 recipient of the U.S. Department of State-Medal of Arts, before a ceremony at the U.S. Department of State in Washington, D.C., on January 21, 2015. [State Department photo/ Public Domain]

ARTIST BIOGRAPHY

Kehinde Wiley was born in 1977 in California. His mother enrolled him in art classes when he was 11, and he later attended the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts. In 1999, he completed his BFA at the San Francisco Art Institute. He received his MFA in 2001 from the Yale School of Art and became an Artist-in-Residence in 2002 at the Studio Museum in Harlem.

Most recently, Wiley received the Medal of Arts in 2015 from the U.S. Department of State. In 2018, his portrait of President Barack Obama was added to the permanent installation of presidential portraits in the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery. In the same year, he was also awarded a W.E.B. Du Bois medal for his significant contributions to African and African-American history and culture and his advocacy for intercultural understanding and human rights. Wiley lives and works in Beijing and New York.

A contemporary descendant of portraitists such as Reynolds, Titian, Ingres, Gainsborough, and Constable, Wiley initially created portraits based on photographs of young men in Harlem. Over time, however, his work adopted a more international view and featured models from Mumbai, Senegal, Dakar, and Rio de Janeiro. His figurative paintings and sculptures combine traditional and contemporary modes of representation and present young, urban, black and brown men as heroic, powerful, majestic, and sublime to critique notions of masculinity and physicality that are attributed to them.

Kehinde Wiley, Memling: After Memling's Portrait of a Man with a Coin of the Emperor Nero, 2013, oil on wood panel in artist designed hand-fabricated frame with 22k gold leaf gilding, Museum purchase with funds provided by The Marshall Bequest, Contemporary Forum, Dr. Eric Jungermann, Ann and Michael Wall, Mr. and Mrs. James G. Bazlen, BMO Private Bank, Dr. and Mrs. Marshall Block, Iris Cashdan-Fishman, Mr. and Mrs. Richard N. Goldsmith, Clark Olson and Nick Butler, Norman McLash, Mr. and Mrs. Charles G. Watts and others.

Featured Works in the Collection

Vagner Rodrigues Gomes (from The World Stage: Brazil series) (Vagner Rodrigues Gomes [del Escenario mundial: Serie de Brasil])

Kehinde Wiley, American, born 1977, 2008, oil wash on paper, Gift of Adam and Iris Singer in honor of the Museum's 50th Anniversary

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Memling: After Memling’s Portrait of Maarten van Nieuwenhove (Memling: tras el retrato de Memling de Maarten van Nieuwenhove)

Kehinde Wiley, American, born 1977, 2013, painting, oil on wood panel in artist designed hand-fabricated frame with 22k gold leaf gilding, Museum purchase with funds provided by The Marshall Bequest, Contemporary Forum, Dr. Eric Jungermann, Ann and Michael Wall, Mr. and Mrs. James G. Bazlen, BMO Private Bank, Dr. and Mrs. Marshall Block, Iris Cashdan-Fishman, Mr. and Mrs. Richard N. Goldsmith, Clark Olson and Nick Butler, Norman McLash, Mr. and Mrs. Charles G. Watts and others.

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Memling: After Memling’s Portrait of a Man with a Coin of the Emperor Nero (Memling: tras el retrato de Memling de un hombre con una moneda del emperador Nerón)

Kehinde Wiley, American, born 1977, 2013, painting, oil on wood panel in artist designed hand-fabricated frame with 22k gold leaf gilding, Museum purchase with funds provided by The Marshall Bequest, Contemporary Forum, Dr. Eric Jungermann, Ann and Michael Wall, Mr. and Mrs. James G. Bazlen, BMO Private Bank, Dr. and Mrs. Marshall Block, Iris Cashdan-Fishman, Mr. and Mrs. Richard N. Goldsmith, Clark Olson and Nick Butler, Norman McLash, Mr. and Mrs. Charles G. Watts and others.

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Resources

Art Guides for Educators

Kehinde Wiley, Marechal Floriano Peixoto (from The World Stage: Brazil Series)

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