African American Artist Research- Brogdon Film & Photo: Kehinde Wiley

Kehinde Wiley, a fresh new artist, is crossing boundaries and creating a buzz in the art world. His use of old, infused with new, creates what is being called "Hip-Hop Portraiture". Wiley's process is simple. He combs the streets for young African American men as his models. He then gives them art history books to view, and ask them to chose a painting they like. He then poses them in position that resemble the subject in the book. From there, Wiley creates a life size painting, and a life image transformed.

Three Graces
Kehinde Wiley, 2005
Oil and enamel on canvas
182.9 x 423.8 cm (72 x 96 in)
Hort Family Collection, courtesy Roberts & Tilton, Los Angeles, California
© Kehinde Wiley

"For most of Kehinde Wiley’s very successful career, he has created large, vibrant, highly patterned paintings of young African American men wearing the latest in hip hop street fashion. The theatrical poses and objects in the portraits are based on well-known images of powerful figures drawn from seventeenth- through nineteenth-century Western.-- art"-http://www.npg.si.edu/exhibit/recognize/paintings.html

NPR Interview
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4674694

http://current.com/items/76335342_kehinde_wiley

Ice T

Kehinde Wiley, 2005
Oil on canvas
243.8 x 182.9 cm (96 x 72 in)
Private collection, courtesy Rhona Hoffman Gallery
© Kehinde Wiley

Big Daddy Kane
Kehinde Wiley, 2005
Oil on canvas
243.8 x 182.9 cm (96 x 72 in)
John Morrissey,
courtesy of Roberts & Tilton,
Los Angeles, California