Inside the Rubell Museum’s Artist-in-Residence exhibition
Kennedy Yanko, “I am flower” (2021) PHOTO COURTESY OF RUBELL MUSEUM AND THE ARTISTS
Contemporary art is defined as the art of today, so it is apropos for a contemporary art museum to invite artists to create artwork in real-time. The Rubell Museum Artist-in-Residence program began in 2011 with American multimedia artist Sterling Ruby and continued in the new 100,000-square-foot Allapattah museum space in 2019 with painter Amoako Boafo. Boafo is a Ghana-born, Austria-based artist whose work explores Black identity through figuration.
Yanko at the Rubell Museum. PHOTO COURTESY OF RUBELL MUSEUM AND THE ARTISTS
This was followed in 2020 by Genesis Tramaine, an American painter encapsulating expressions of Black identity through accumulated portraits. Expanding on this interest in portrait painting, the 2021 invited residents included Ghanaian artist Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe, as well as sculptor Kennedy Yanko—whose site-responsive metal interventions recall John Chamberlain’s contorted car forms, but with dexterity and themes that are uniquely hers. On view at the Rubell Museum through October 2022, Quaicoe’s and Yanko’s artworks reveal a shared interest in quiet monumentality, as well as a recontextualizing essential form and color—and are worth a visit.
Kennedy Yanko, “I am water” (2021) PHOTO COURTESY OF RUBELL MUSEUM AND THE ARTISTS
A portrait triptych by Quaicoe is on view alongside iconic artworks such as Glenn Ligon’s “AMERICA” neon, Kehinde Wiley’s “Sleep” canvas and Vaughn Spann’s “Big Black Rainbow (Smoky Eyes)” painting. Equally mammoth in scale and contrast, Quaicoe’s textural surfaces recall white stucco walls and backdrop the figures to purposefully pronounce their Blackness. Wearing cowboy regalia, the characters disrupt conventional race and gender narratives seen in cowboy culture and Western movies, appearing unapologetic in their larger-than-life postures that recall studio photography—an active portrait tradition in Accra where Quaicoe was raised. A second, smaller exhibition room shows intimate diptych portraits of Black male figures who are twins. Considered a special birth in Ga culture, the paintings read as celebratory sibling portraits illustrating a bond that the artist, himself a twin, appreciates.
Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe, “Moses Adoma” (2021) PHOTO COURTESY OF RUBELL MUSEUM AND THE ARTISTS
Yanko’s three hanging sculptures are ambitious in weight and scale yet appear velvety soft. Manipulating junkyard material found around Miami and applying layers of bright primary yellow, red and blue, these once brutal discards transform into flowing, sensual forms. A loose nod to Marcel Duchamp’s practice of elevating found materials, these abstract ready-mades are titled “I am flower,” “I am water” and “I am that,” creating a space for Yanko’s individual narrative as history in the making. Further expanding this viewpoint, Yanko titled this series for the Rubell Museum White, Passing to reference her own identity and embody tensions inherent to her work, namely symbiosis and dynamism, peace and disruption.
Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe, “Rainyanni (Cowgirl)” (2021) PHOTO COURTESY OF RUBELL MUSEUM AND THE ARTISTS
Quaicoe at the Rubell Museum in front of “David Theodore” (2021) PHOTO COURTESY OF RUBELL MUSEUM AND THE ARTISTS
The Rubell Museum Artist-in- Residence program is undoubtedly a catalyst for artists’ careers, and collectors Mera and Don Rubell, with longtime Executive Director Juan Roselione-Valadez, invest in artists’ work to bring museum visitors fresh perspectives, acquire unique artwork for the collection and do what they do best—bank on artists’ success. It is not surprising that Otis Kwame Kye Quaicoe and Kennedy Yanko hold their own among the museum’s greats, a wonderful reminder that art is living. 1100 NW 23rd St., Miami, rubellmuseum.org
Photography by: Photo Courtesy: Rubell Museum and the artists
