Titus Kaphar: From a Tropical Space, West 21st Street, New York, October 1–December 19, 2020

Installation Views

Installation video. — Installation video

Installation view. Artwork © Titus Kaphar. Photo: Rob McKeever — Installation view
Artwork © Titus Kaphar. Photo: Rob McKeever

Thumbnail - Installation view. Artwork © Titus Kaphar. Photo: Rob McKeever

Works Exhibited

Titus Kaphar, Not My Burden, 2019. Oil on canvas, 66 × 60 ¼ inches (167.6 × 153 cm) © Titus Kaphar — Titus Kaphar
*Not My Burden*, 2019
Oil on canvas, 66 × 60 ¼ inches (167.6 × 153 cm)
© Titus Kaphar

Titus Kaphar, The distance between what we have and what we want, 2019. Oil on canvas, 108 × 84 ¼ inches (274.3 × 214 cm) © Titus Kaphar. Photo: Alexander Harding — Titus Kaphar
*The distance between what we have and what we want*, 2019
Oil on canvas, 108 × 84 ¼ inches (274.3 × 214 cm)
© Titus Kaphar. Photo: Alexander Harding

Titus Kaphar, Analogous Colors, 2020. Oil on canvas, 66 × 60 inches (167.6 × 152.4 cm) © Titus Kaphar. Photo: Christopher Gardner — Titus Kaphar
*Analogous Colors*, 2020
Oil on canvas, 66 × 60 inches (167.6 × 152.4 cm)
© Titus Kaphar. Photo: Christopher Gardner

Titus Kaphar, From a Tropical Space, 2019. Oil on canvas, 92 × 72 inches ((233.7 × 182.9 cm) © Titus Kaphar — Titus Kaphar
*From a Tropical Space*, 2019
Oil on canvas, 92 × 72 inches ((233.7 × 182.9 cm)
© Titus Kaphar

Titus Kaphar, Twins, 2020. Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm) © Titus Kaphar. Photo: Alexander Harding — Titus Kaphar
*Twins*, 2020
Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm)
© Titus Kaphar. Photo: Alexander Harding

Titus Kaphar, The Aftermath, 2020. Oil on canvas, 114 × 180 inches (289.6 × 457.2 cm) © Titus Kaphar — Titus Kaphar
*The Aftermath*, 2020
Oil on canvas, 114 × 180 inches (289.6 × 457.2 cm)
© Titus Kaphar

Titus Kaphar, Braiding possibility, 2020. Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm) © Titus Kaphar — Titus Kaphar
Braiding possibility, 2020
Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm)
© Titus Kaphar

Titus Kaphar, Beneath an unforgiving sun, 2020. Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm) © Titus Kaphar — Titus Kaphar
*Beneath an unforgiving sun*, 2020
Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm)
© Titus Kaphar

Titus Kaphar, Expecting (From a Tropical Space), 2019. Oil on canvas, 66 × 66 ¼ inches (167.6 × 153 cm) © Titus Kaphar — Titus Kaphar
*Expecting (From a Tropical Space)*, 2019
Oil on canvas, 66 × 66 ¼ inches (167.6 × 153 cm)
© Titus Kaphar

Titus Kaphar, Intravenous, 2020. Oil on canvas, 60 × 60 inches (152.4 × 152.4 cm) © Titus Kaphar — Titus Kaphar
*Intravenous*, 2020
Oil on canvas, 60 × 60 inches (152.4 × 152.4 cm)
© Titus Kaphar

Titus Kaphar, Final Chapter, 2020. Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm) © Titus Kaphar — Titus Kaphar
*Final Chapter*, 2020
Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm)
© Titus Kaphar

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, Not My Burden, 2019. Oil on canvas, 66 × 60 ¼ inches (167.6 × 153 cm) © Titus Kaphar

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, The distance between what we have and what we want, 2019. Oil on canvas, 108 × 84 ¼ inches (274.3 × 214 cm) © Titus Kaphar. Photo: Alexander Harding

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, Analogous Colors, 2020. Oil on canvas, 66 × 60 inches (167.6 × 152.4 cm) © Titus Kaphar. Photo: Christopher Gardner

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, From a Tropical Space, 2019. Oil on canvas, 92 × 72 inches ((233.7 × 182.9 cm) © Titus Kaphar

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, Twins, 2020. Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm) © Titus Kaphar. Photo: Alexander Harding

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, The Aftermath, 2020. Oil on canvas, 114 × 180 inches (289.6 × 457.2 cm) © Titus Kaphar

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, Braiding possibility, 2020. Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm) © Titus Kaphar

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, Beneath an unforgiving sun, 2020. Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm) © Titus Kaphar

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, Expecting (From a Tropical Space), 2019. Oil on canvas, 66 × 66 ¼ inches (167.6 × 153 cm) © Titus Kaphar

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, Intravenous, 2020. Oil on canvas, 60 × 60 inches (152.4 × 152.4 cm) © Titus Kaphar

Thumbnail - Titus Kaphar, Final Chapter, 2020. Oil on canvas, 83 ¾ × 68 inches (212.7 × 172.7 cm) © Titus Kaphar

About

Gagosian is pleased to present From a Tropical Space, an exhibition of new paintings by Titus Kaphar. This is Kaphar’s first exhibition with the gallery and inaugurates his representation.

A painter, sculptor, filmmaker, and installation artist, Kaphar reexamines American history by deconstructing existing representations and styles through his own formal innovations. His practice seeks to dislodge history from its status as “past” in order to understand its continuing impact on the present. Using materials including tar, glass, and rusted nails—together with highly refined oil painting—and employing techniques such as cutting, shredding, stitching, binding, and erasing, he reworks canonical art historical codes and conventions. And by uncovering the conceptual and narrative underpinnings of certain source images, he explores the manipulation of cultural and personal identity as a central thematic concern while inventing new narratives.

While much of Kaphar’s work begins with an exhaustive study of pre-twentieth-century master painting techniques, From a Tropical Space sees him wield these various methods to create an emotionally saturated visual landscape that is entirely contemporary. Just as artists, through time, have translated the fraught and mercurial sociopolitical contexts in which they operate into new and often radical aesthetic modes, so do the pervasive social and cultural anxieties of the world in which we find ourselves resonate throughout Kaphar’s new work.

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Titus Kaphar

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From the Quarterly

Titus Kaphar: From a Tropical Space

Join the artist in his studio in New Haven, Connecticut, where he speaks about his latest paintings.

Black Futurity: Lessons in (Art) History to Forge a Path Forward

Jon Copes asks, What can Black History Month mean in the year 2024? He looks to a selection of scholars and artists for the answer.

Titus Kaphar and Derek Cianfrance

Titus Kaphar and director Derek Cianfrance spoke on the opening night of Titus Kaphar Selects, a film program curated by the artist as part of a series copresented by Gagosian and Metrograph in the spring of 2023. The pair discussed their respective practices, including Cianfrance’s film Blue Valentine (2010) and Kaphar’s film Exhibiting Forgiveness, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival on January 20, 2024.

NXTHVN: Curatorial Visions

Jamillah Hinson and Marissa Del Toro, recent curatorial fellows of Titus Kaphar’s nonprofit community arts hub NXTHVN, address their curatorial praxes.

In Conversation
Titus Kaphar and Zoé Whitley

Join Titus Kaphar and Zoé Whitley as they discuss the artist’s recent exhibition New Alte̲rs: Reworking Devotion, featuring paintings and sculptures in which Kaphar examines the history of representation by altering the work’s supports to reveal oft unspoken social and political truths.

NXTHVN

NXTHVN is a new national arts model that empowers emerging artists and curators of color through education and access. Through intergenerational mentorship, professional development, and cross-sector collaboration, NXTHVN accelerates professional careers in the arts. Join Titus Kaphar and Jason Price on a tour of the organization’s headquarters in New Haven, Connecticut. They discuss the founding and vision for this singular arts space.

Titus Kaphar: Can Beauty Open Our Hearts to Difficult Conversations?

In this TED talk, presented during the sweeping protests against racism and police violence following the killing of George Floyd, Titus Kaphar describes how the beauty of a painting can draw the viewer in and allow difficult conversations to emerge. Kaphar discusses his own work and shares the idea behind NXTHVN, a new national arts model he founded to empower artists of color through education and access.

Seeing the Child: Braiding possibility

Titus Kaphar and Tochi Onyebuchi present an excerpt from their short story “Seeing the Child,” a poetic rumination on Kaphar’s latest body of work, From a Tropical Space (2019–).

Titus Kaphar: In the Studio

Jacoba Urist reports on a recent trip to the artist’s studio in New Haven, Connecticut, to see his new body of work, From a Tropical Space (2019–). She writes on the emotional and sensory impact of these paintings and considers their singular place in Titus Kaphar’s oeuvre.

Titus Kaphar: Intricate Illusion

Bridget R. Cooks investigates the aesthetic and narrative conventions deployed by the artist, demonstrating how his paintings force provocative confrontations with history through complex modes of depiction.

Titus Kaphar: Can Art Amend History?

Join Titus Kaphar as he talks about making paintings and sculptures that wrestle with the struggles of the past while speaking to the diversity and advances of the present. Working onstage, he points to the narratives coded in the language of art history as he creates a new painting, demonstrating how shifting our focus can prompt us to ask questions and confront unspoken truths.