Rico Gatson
A reinterpretation of the Stars and Stripes, a “freedom rainbow,” a target-slash-kaleidoscope painted in the red, black, orange, yellow, and green of African-American power and solidarity. These and other arrangements of color and hard-edged geometry evoke the immediacy of posters designed by Emory Douglas, the Black Panther Party’s 1960s and 70s-era minister of culture, as well as the influence of more polite art world sources such as Agnes Martin, Sol LeWitt and Hilma af Klint. Black history and art history merge in Rico Gatson’s painted panels. The fact that his compositions are largely abstract does not diminish the straightforward potency of his pictures one iota.
Made entirely during quarantine in his Brooklyn studio, these three artworks serve as abstract icons that help define, through the artist’s use of quilt-like pattering and vivid color, an immensely fraught period in American history. It’s often said of journalism that it is the first rough draft of history. Few instances exist where the same can be said of abstract painting. The pictures Rico Gatson has selected for Life During Wartime are different—they constitute an important contribution to a visual history that has yet to be fully scripted.
— CVF, USFCAM
“Life during the pandemic has been difficult; only heightened now with the civil unrest following the murder of George Floyd by police. Tough times indeed.”
— Rico Gatson
Artist Rico Gatson.
About Rico Gatson
(Augusta, Georgia, 1966)
He lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.
Rico Gatson is a multimedia visual artist whose work explores themes of history, identity, popular culture, and spirituality through sculpture, painting, video, and public art projects. His work has been shown nationally and internationally, including in exhibitions at The Studio Museum (Harlem, NY), The Whitney Museum of American Art (New York, NY), The Essl Museum (Austria, Vienna), and The Smithsonian American Art Museum (Washington, D.C.). In 2019, Gatson completed Beacons, a large commission for New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority Arts and Design Program, consisting of eight permanent large-scale mosaics of prominent African-American and Latino figures installed inside a subway station in the Bronx. His work is featured in the permanent collections of The Smithsonian American Art Museum, The Studio Museum in Harlem, The Denver Art Museum, The Cheekwood Museum (Nashville, TN), The Kempner Museum (Kansas City, Missouri), and The Yale University Art Gallery. Gatson is also a faculty member at the School of Visual Arts (NYC) and at New York University.
Artist website: ricogatson.com
Artist Instagram: @rico_gatson
Gallery website: milesmcenery.com