Lynette Yiadom-Boakye

CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE

First Flight may at first seem to be a collection of highly individual portraits, yet they have no specific models or sitters; Lynette Yiadom-Boakye’s prints depict fictional characters. A painter who has explored etching in recent years, Yiadom-Boakye makes striking images of invented, predominantly black figures with candid, unreadable expressions. Here, ten men in various profile and three-quarter views are depicted wearing feathered ruffs, a fixture of the artist’s repertoire. Although her work has inspired comparison to various historical masters—and the ruffs evoke the fashion of 16th and 17th century European paintings—First Flight has no direct or singular art historical source material. Instead, it toys loosely with the Western canon’s motifs and methodology. Using complete invention, Yiadom-Boakye’s prints ask: What makes a portrait a portrait? Who is represented? How do we react to the bodies we see in art, and why?