Never Free to Rest

The exhibition brings together works by six artists who utilize the radical language of abstraction to destabilize black representation and systems of control, conjuring new possibilities of perception, imagination and liberation.

Works by Mark Bradford, Julie Mehretu and Rodney McMillian mark a new school of ‘American’ abstraction that is conceptual and physical, formal and impetuous. Interrogating figuration, works by Kara Walker and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye defy systems of racialization and the certainty of representation through pure painting. Manifestos and musical scores serve as material for Charles Gaines’ consideration of systems of communication, order and control. Here, rigorously worked surfaces, disrupted historical documents and fantastical juxtapositions rescue the marginal and repressed to secure their right to ascend in full, visceral complexity.