Events
Fundraiser
Artist Plate Project 2022
Coalition for the Homeless
Launching May 22, 2023, 10am edt
Limited-edition bone china plates produced by Prospect and featuring artwork by more than forty artists—including Virgil Abloh, Derrick Adams, Harold Ancart, Georg Baselitz, Amoako Boafo, Mark Grotjahn, Takashi Murakami, Albert Oehlen, Ed Ruscha, Anna Weyant, and Jonas Wood—will be sold through Artware Editions to raise funds for the Coalition’s lifesaving programs. The funds raised by the sale of the plates will provide food, crisis services, housing, and other critical aid to thousands of people experiencing homelessness and instability. The purchase of one plate can feed one hundred homeless and hungry New Yorkers.
Takashi Murakami, Gargantua on Your Palm, 2018 © 2018 Takashi Murakami/Kaikai Kiki Co., Ltd. All rights reserved
Exhibition
Amoako Boafo
what could possibly go wrong, if we tell it like it is
May 25–July 6, 2023
dot.ateliers, Accra
www.dotateliers.space
Amoako Boafo: what could possibly go wrong, if we tell it like it is—an iteration of the artist’s debut solo exhibition at Gagosian—will be presented at dot.ateliers in Accra. It includes a selection of paintings from the New York presentation as well as new portraits. Boafo’s subjects return the gaze of the viewer, asserting their presence and identity, and conveying the artist’s interest in charisma and individuality. Painted by the artist with his fingertips, the figures occupy domestic interiors, their casual grace reinforced by the settings’ familiarity.
Boafo opened dot.ateliers in December 2022 to strengthen and advance the cultural ecosystem of Accra. Housed in a three-story structure designed by architect David Adjaye, it features a gallery, studios, an art library, and a café, and offers exhibitions and residencies that encourage creative expression and experimentation.
Amoako Boafo, Shower Song, 2023 © Amoako Boafo
Performance
aja monet
With Weedie Braimah, Jeremiah Edwards, Craig Harris, Jehbreal Jackson, and Samora Pinderhughes
Saturday, March 18, 2023, 4pm
Gagosian, 980 Madison Avenue, New York
Join Gagosian for a live performance by blues poet, musician, and organizer aja monet inside the exhibition Amoako Boafo: what could possibly go wrong, if we tell it like it is at Gagosian, 980 Madison Avenue, New York. Through an immersive interchange of spoken word and song, monet will share new poetry composed in response to the large-scale portraits on view, which blend themes of Black love, resistance, joy, and community building. Supporting monet will be pianist and composer Samora Pinderhughes and percussionist Weedie Braimah—both collaborators on monet’s forthcoming album, when the poems do what they do—as well as trombonist Craig Harris and bassist Jeremiah Edwards, with vocals from Jehbreal Jackson.
aja monet. Photo: Fanny Chu
Museum Exhibitions
On View
Some Dogs Go to Dallas
Through May 12, 2024
Green Family Art Foundation, Dallas
www.greenfamilyartfoundation.org
Some Dogs Go to Dallas presents a selection of works from the collection of Pamela and David Hornik. Ardent dog lovers, the Horniks have a penchant for acquiring pieces depicting canines across eras, locations, and techniques from throughout the art historical canon. The diversity of this collection underscores the universality of the human connection with animals and the profoundly enduring love that those bonds create. Work by Amoako Boafo and Andy Warhol is included.
Installation view, Some Dogs Go to Dallas, Green Family Art Foundation, Dallas, February 10–May 12, 2024. Artwork, left to right: © Amoako Boafo, © Maggie Ellis. Photo: Evan Sheldon
On View
Amoako Boafo in
Singular Views: 25 Artists
Through October 6, 2024
Rubell Museum, Washington, DC
rubellmuseum.org
Singular Views: 25 Artists is drawn entirely from the Rubell Museum’s collection and encompasses over 120 artworks in a range of mediums. The exhibition features solo presentations of twenty-five artists from across the United States and around the world. Work by Amoako Boafo is included.
Amoako Boafo, Hudson in a Baby Blue Suit, 2019 © Amoako Boafo
On View
Revolutions
Art from the Hirshhorn Collection, 1860–1960
Through April 20, 2025
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC
hirshhorn.si.edu
Revolutions is a major survey of 270 artworks by 126 artists from the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden’s permanent collection. Celebrating the museum’s fiftieth anniversary, the exhibition aims to capture the shifting cultural landscapes of a century defined by new currents in science and philosophy and ever-increasing mechanization. Shown alongside these historic works are contributions from nineteen contemporary artists whose practices demonstrate how many revolutionary ideas from a hundred years ago remain critical today. Work by Francis Bacon, Amoako Boafo, Alexander Calder, Willem de Kooning, Helen Frankenthaler, Rick Lowe, Sally Mann, Man Ray, Henry Moore, Pablo Picasso, Nathaniel Mary Quinn, and Cy Twombly is included.
Rick Lowe, Fire #4: This Time Athens, 2023, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC © Rick Lowe Studio
Closed
Amoako Boafo
Soul of Black Folks
July 13–September 10, 2023
Seattle Art Museum
www.seattleartmuseum.org
Soul of Black Folks, the first solo museum exhibition of Amoako Boafo’s work, presents more than thirty paintings created by the artist between 2016 and 2022. Curated by Larry Ossei-Mensah, the exhibition originated at the Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco, and traveled to the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston. Boafo uses vibrant colors and textured paint—often applied with his fingertips—to create intimate and potent portraits centering Black subjectivity, Black joy, the Black gaze, and radical care.
Amoako Boafo, White on White, 2019 © Amoako Boafo
Closed
Together in Time
Selections from the Hammer Contemporary Collection
March 26–August 20, 2023
Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
hammer.ucla.edu
Presented in conjunction with the unveiling of the Hammer’s building expansion, Together in Time highlights acquisitions made since 2005—the year the institution began collecting contemporary art. Organized around a sequence of discrete installations that highlight varied groupings of artists, the exhibition presents the tendencies and sensibilities at the forefront of contemporary art by Los Angeles–based and international artists. Work by Amoako Boafo, Chris Burden, and Jonas Wood is included.
Jonas Wood, Brian and Ana, 2014 © Jonas Wood
Closed
Strike Fast, Dance Lightly
Artists on Boxing
June 16–August 11, 2023
FLAG Art Foundation, New York
www.flagartfoundation.org
Copresented with The Church, Sag Harbor, New York, Strike Fast, Dance Lightly: Artists on Boxing, is a two-venue group exhibition that centers on the psychology, ethos, and spectacle of boxing. It explores the sport as both theme and metaphor, together with its complex and multifaceted cultural meanings. The exhibition includes ancient, modern, and contemporary artworks, as well as newly commissioned pieces and boxing-related ephemera. Work by Amoako Boafo and Ed Ruscha is included.
Installation view, Strike Fast, Dance Lightly: Artists on Boxing, FLAG Art Foundation, New York, June 16–August 11, 2023. Artwork, left and right: © Rosalyn Drexler, center: © Amoako Boafo. Photo: Steven Probert
Closed
Amoako Boafo
Soul of Black Folks
May 27–October 2, 2022
Contemporary Arts Museum Houston
camh.org
Soul of Black Folks presents over thirty works created by Amoako Boafo between 2016 and 2022, including a site-specific wall painting made for Contemporary Arts Museum Houston. The exhibition is a timely exploration of the various strategies that Boafo employs to capture the essence of the Black figure. Issues such as COVID-19, resistance to systemic oppression, and the commodification of Black bodies in the media heighten the exhibition’s urgency. The featured works center the viewer’s gaze on Boafo’s subjects, who represent all walks of Black life. This exhibition originated at the Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco.
Installation view, Amoako Boafo: Soul of Black Folks, Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, May 27–October 2, 2022. Artwork © Amoako Boafo. Photo: Sean Fleming
Closed
Amoako Boafo
Soul of Black Folks
October 20, 2021–February 27, 2022
Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco
www.moadsf.org
Soul of Black Folks, Amoako Boafo’s first solo museum show, presents over twenty works created between 2018 and 2021. The exhibition is a timely exploration of the various strategies that Boafo employs to capture the essence of the Black figure. Issues such as COVID-19, resistance to systemic oppression, and the commodification of Black bodies in the media heighten the exhibition’s urgency. The featured works center the viewer’s gaze on Boafo’s subjects, who represent all walks of Black life.
Installation view, Amoako Boafo: Soul of Black Folks, Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco, October 20, 2021–February 27, 2022. Artwork © Amoako Boafo. Photo: courtesy Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco