Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Wiley exhibition at the 59th Biennale di Venezia

Kehinde Wiley and the Archaeology of Silence

Western European art history is brimming with depictions of fallen warriors, martyrs and other heroic figures. The American artist Kehinde Wiley has made this heroic epic his own and used it to create completely new portraits: black people who have been silenced take the place of the Western European ideal figures. The Fondazione Giorgio Cini in Venice is now taking them up in the exhibition.

April 21, 2022

Auctions results of Kehinde Wiley

Kehinde Wiley - Ibrahima Sacko (Study 2)
Auction
Post-War & Contemporary Art Day Sale
November 2023
Christies, New York
Est.: 60.000 - 80.000 USD
Realised: 63.000 USD
Details
Kehinde Wiley - Passing/Posing (White) No. 2
Auction
Post-War & Contemporary Art Day Sale
November 2023
Christies, New York
Est.: 150.000 - 200.000 USD
Realised: 189.000 USD
Details
Kehinde Wiley - St. Michael
Auction
20th Century & Contemporary Art Day Sale, Afternoon Session
November 2023
Phillips, New York Auction
Est.: 80.000 - 120.000 USD
Realised: 101.600 USD
Details
Kehinde Wiley - Passing/Posing (The Reluctant Messiah)
Auction
20th Century & Contemporary Art Day Sale, Afternoon Session
November 2023
Phillips, New York Auction
Est.: 100.000 - 150.000 USD
Realised: not available
Details
Kehinde Wiley - After Albrecht Dürer’s Self Portrait (Olufemi Akiwumi-Assani)
Auction
Photographs
October 2023
Phillips, New York Auction
Est.: 8.000 - 12.000 USD
Realised: 22.860 USD
Details
Kehinde Wiley - After Hans Holbein the Younger’s Portrait of Simon George
Auction
Photographs
October 2023
Phillips, New York Auction
Est.: 8.000 - 12.000 USD
Realised: 27.940 USD
Details
Kehinde Wiley - Untitled
Auction
New Now
September 2023
Phillips, New York Auction
Est.: 100.000 - 150.000 USD
Realised: 241.300 USD
Details
Kehinde Wiley - Investiture of Bishop Harold Study (Variation III).
Auction
Modern, Post War & Contemporary
June 2023
VAN HAM
Est.: 10.000 - 15.000 EUR
Realised: 21.120 EUR
Details
Kehinde Wiley - Untitled (Easter Realness II)
Auction
Post-War & Contemporary Art Day Sale
May 2023
Christies, New York
Est.: 120.000 - 180.000 USD
Realised: 138.600 USD
Details
Kehinde Wiley - St. Francis of Adelaide
Auction
Editions & Works on Paper
April 2023
Phillips, New York Auction
Est.: 8.000 - 12.000 USD
Realised: 22.860 USD
Details

On the occasion of the 59th Biennale di Venezia, the Fondazione Giorgio Cini in Venice is showing from 22 April Kehinde Wiley: An Archaeology of Silence. Kehinde Wiley's latest work illuminates the atrocities of the American and global colonial past through the metaphor of the fallen hero. The exhibition includes recent paintings and sculptures that follow on from Wiley's 2008 work DOWN. Originally inspired by Holbein's painting Dead Christ in the Grave, Wiley's idea at the time was to base an entire series of works on historical paintings and sculptures of fallen warriors or other heroic figures.

His latest series exclusively shows reclining black bodies that reshape the classical forms of representation. He turns them into contemporary versions of portraits, imbued with violence, pain and death, but also ecstasy. Through these central elements, he reflects on the global murder of young Black men, allowing viewers to witness depictions of violence on Black bodies that were previously silenced. As Wiley explains: »That is the archaeology I am unearthing: The spectre of police violence and state control over the bodies of young Black and Brown people all over the world.«

Wiley's reinterpreted portraits show the subjects in vulnerable poses. He lets them tell the story of survival and resilience, bringing to light the beauty that emerges in the terrible - all motifs borrowed from Western European art history. They go beyond the purely physical and enter the realm of spiritual icons, martyrs and saints. The exhibition can be visited until 22 July.

Kehinde Wiley (*1977, in Los Angeles) is best known for his portraits of African Americans and people of the African diaspora. In 2018, Wiley was the first African-American artist to paint an official portrait of the US president for the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery.Art.Salon

Dive deeper into the art world

Paris, Musée National Eugène-Delacroix reopens

A journey into the personal worlds of two famous artists: the Musée National Eugène-Delacroix presents objects owned by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres and Eugène Delacroix, two competing art stars of the 19th century. Ingres and Delacroix. Artists' Objects offers insights into their creative processes from March 27 in Paris.

March 27, 2024
Musée d'Orsay: 150th anniversary of the first Impressionist exhibition

This exhibition went down in history and is considered the beginning of modern art: the first Impressionist exhibition took place in Paris on April 15, 1874. The Musée d'Orsay in Paris is commemorating this event with a major exhibition that begins on March 26.

March 26, 2024