AMY SHERALD
‘As soft as she is…’
2023
70-color screen print on Lana Aquarelle HP 600gsm
114.9 x 93.9 cm

American portrait painter Amy Sherald (born in 1973) is celebrated for her striking, psychologically charged depictions of Black subjects. Born in Columbus, Georgia, she studied at Clark Atlanta University before earning her MFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art. Sherald’s work is known for its distinctive use of grayscale skin tones set against vibrant, often simplified backgrounds, a stylistic choice that removes the visual cues of race while emphasizing individuality, dignity, and presence. Her portraits explore identity, representation, and the narratives of everyday and historical Black experience, bringing a contemporary and deeply human perspective to the tradition of portraiture.

The original painting ‘As soft as she is…’ dates to 2022. The direct address of the figure combined with the pose makes her a commanding presence. As with many of Sherald’s portraits, the skin is painted in shades of grey, while the contemporary clothing is painted in bright colours. Sherald’s use of grey paint for the skin of her subjects – a historical technique known as ‘grisaille’ – is connected to her exploration of Black identity, how it relates to questions of colour in painting and to her interest in early photography. By choosing to render the body in shades of grey, Sherald suggests a timelessness that stops the predominantly brightly coloured paintings being viewed as straightforward depictions of an individual. This is further created through the removal of any context for the figure.

The work was painted from a photograph taken by Sherald. While Sherald’s earlier works were sometimes based on photos she had taken of friends or people she met in the street, for more recent works she has hired models or been commissioned, as with her official portrait of former First Lady Michelle Obama, painted in 2018. This has enabled her to control more aspects of the composition, most notably the clothing, which is often a dominant feature of her work.

Sherald’s work has been seen to provide a fresh take on the genre of portraiture, offering a soothing, hopeful and positive message about the African American experience. The artist herself has explained that her portraits “reflect a desire to record life as I see it and as I feel it. My eyes search for people who are and who have the kind of light that provides the present and the future with hope.”