Blue Jacket, 2021 (75" X 57")
Kerry James Marshall. That was my first thought on entering the gallery. The heroic presentation of the every day life of Black people with the bold design and simplification of poster art. The proud, strong, and stately figures with faces too dark to show much expression. But how could a Chicago painter affect Peter Uka ( b. 1975) a Nigerian living in Germany? Is the world really that small? Or does a Chicago painter, who is not Imagist, actually have an international following. As Uka talks about his early career:
“I just needed a sense of direction, so to say, in the sense of some sort of encouragement from somewhere. That came in the likes of Kerry James Marshall, as crazy as it might sound. There was an exhibition of his a couple of years ago, it’s been quite a while, in the Ludwig Museum here. And I saw it, and was like, whoa!”
“Whoa” indeed. That was also my reaction on first seeing Marshall’s work at the Art Institute back in the nineties. Perhaps that work is too powerful for local Chicago artists to follow in his footsteps. They would all come up short. But Uka has his own vision, power, and cultural identity. Despite their centuries long history of oppression, contemporary African American artists are notably free, inventive, challenging, and surprising in their expressions. Uka presents a world that is as proper and repressed as a church social. One piece, “Beach Life”, feels like it could be the backdrop in a taxidermy display case at the Field Museum. Another piece, “Sideburn Brothers”, looks like a casual Polaroid snapshot of friends from the neighborhood.
Sadness and emptiness are conflated with neatness, cleanliness, and perfection. None of the clothing appears worn - or expensive. It’s as if it had just arrived from a downscale mail order catalog. And none of the characters are doing or feeling anything. No happiness, no anger, no despair, no interpersonal tension. There’s a lot of blank stares. The narratives are boring - but the paintings are not. Uka is a lively and creative designer - with a special feel for how areas of strong color can impact a tight pictorial space. This is painting for those who enjoy sharpness and precision.
This selection of recent paintings, titled “Longing”, may not be representative of his best work. More stunning pieces can be found on the internet. But even those pieces also present people doing nothing. Unlike Marshall, he does not speak for a people in history - he speaks for his own memories. How the world once appeared to a curious child.
The one piece that has some narrative life is “Blue Jacket”. The brilliant blue jacket of a thin young man has become tangled in a small tree just outside the grated windows of someone’s home. He has turned his head to gaze furtively at whatever is behind him. I doubt that he lives there.
Perhaps Marshall’s narratives are more exciting because he has engaged with his country’s tumultuous changes. Many Nigerians may feel stuck - or at least Peter Uka may have felt that way when he decided to live elsewhere. Hopefully he won't always have to look backward.
Beach Life (71" X 98")
Sideburn Brothers (86" X 75")
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Peter Uka does indeed credit Kerry Marshall as a powerful influence, but Marshall paints for a people. Uka draws from personal memories to paint about himself.
