Derrick Adams is one of today's most notable contemporary artists and, looking at his art, this comes as no surprise.
Scroll through to view all his available works and to read more about the artist.
Derrick Adams, Interior Life (Woman) and Interior Life (Man) on display, Hang-Up Gallery, London
Adams' multidisciplinary art practice spans painting, sculpture, collage, sound installations, video, performance with a particular focus on highlighting those aspects of black America which the artist feel are too often overlooked - "success and normalcy, the triumphant things that happen within the culture.”
“People couldn’t exist if they lived in constant grief. My work is focused on the idea of how crucial it is for Black people to think of leisure as a radical act.”
Derrick Adams
Exhibition view, Hang-Up Gallery
This perception has driven much of Adam’s work over the last few years, notably 2016’s seminal Floater series, which focused on black people enjoying leisure time in swimming pools. The series rightly placed black people in imagery from which they had often been excluded – but it also celebrated their relatively newly-found freedoms (black people were banned from America’s public pools as recently as the first half of the 20th century).
Man in Tidal Blue - HC
- 2017
- Pigment print on paper
- Hors de Commerce of 3
- Signed and numbered by the artist
- 46cm x 61cm
"Man in Tidal Blue" is part of a series titled Deconstruction Worker comprising a series of collage, painting and multimedia sculpture using pencil, ink, paint, fabric and printed shelf-liner. Inspired by the philosophies of Deconstructionism, the minimal geometric constructions of angular human figures that result are meant to appear to live both in a state of deconstruction and in the process of being built.
“He addresses important and tragic issues without preaching, but at the same time he serves guilt to the white viewer as an appetizer on a designer plate.”
Francesco Bonami
Style Variation 3 (High Top)
- 2020
- Screen print and archival inkjet on paper
- Edition of 30
- Signed and numbered by the artist
- 51cm x 69cm
- Sold framed
Adams set a new record high at Christie's auction in 2021 when "Figure in the Urban Landscape 31" sold for $250,000. The two-figure portrait of a father and daughter doubled the estimate of $100,000-$150,000. His previous high mark was set in 2018, when “Floater 48 (Unicorn)" sold for $81,250 at Sotheby’s auction.
Artists
Five Things You Should Know About | Derrick Adams
17 May 2021
One of America’s foremost contemporary artists, Adams is making waves in the UK too. Read on to find out more about him…