Derrick Adams

Even the best museums, galleries, critics, and auction houses cannot talk about art without their names. Derek Adams, Refik Anadol, and Nicolas Party visited Korea. The artists I met in person were as considerate and gentle as their works, full of respect for their roots, nature, and things that will disappear.

The protagonist of Gagosian Gallery’s first pop-up exhibition in Korea is artist Derek Adams, who has been visually exploring black identity for a long time. His new work, filled with colorful mannequins, contains stories of all people beyond nationality and skin color.

Derrick Adams is interested in the political power that functions even in the most ordinary moments. People build their own identities in the world around them, such as the music they listen to every day, conversations with others, the appearance of buildings in the city, and giant billboards. They judge and desire what they see and hear. And they constantly talk to each other, solidifying their values ​​and worldviews. In this way, people who occupy the same space enjoy similar cultures and continue to connect from the past to the present, and from the present to the future. For over 20 years, Adams has been working with this interest and perspective to visually edit ordinary moments of African Americans, working across various media such as Cubist paintings, installations, sculptures, and video art.

As you can see from the 'Floaters' series, which depicts people wearing colorful swimsuits and leaning on colorful tubes (he also launched a swimsuit collection with Bilboqua based on this work), there is no violence or sadness in his work. It is just filled with leisurely flowing peace and optimistic happiness. He, who enjoys talking about the aesthetics and identity of black people, including himself, has finally come to Korea through the first pop-up exhibition in Korea, Derrick Adams: The Strip, at Gagosian Gallery, the world's largest gallery (the exhibition runs until October 12). The new work, which stands out with its window filled with various mannequin heads wearing colorful wigs and the brick-shaped relief that acts as a frame in the work, is a series themed on black women who are both consumers and muses in modern society. However, in the end, the work is a work that goes beyond the identity of black women and contains a deep contemporary reflection on beauty. The APMA cabinet on the first floor of Amore Pacific headquarters, where Adams’ first solo exhibition in Korea was held, was an exhibition space surrounded by large windows. Many city people passed by, glancing at Adams’s work as if they were looking into a department store window. They had no idea that they were being exposed to the political power of Adams’ paintings.

There was a lot of curiosity about the first exhibition held by the Gagosian Gallery in Korea. How did you feel about coming to Korea for your solo exhibition?

I was very happy to be selected as the first artist to be introduced in Korea by Gagosian Gallery. It is also great to be able to hold a solo exhibition in such a charming city as Seoul. I also think that Amorepacific’s APMA cabinet is a great space to showcase my work that captures beauty and commerciality. I hope that non-art people, such as passersby, children, and office workers hurriedly walking, will be able to come across my work by chance or naturally, thanks to the structure surrounded by large windows.

Ahead of the interview, I looked through articles about his various activities. His diverse career as a writer, curator, and professor, as well as his activities for his hometown of Baltimore, stood out.

Cities and cultures have a huge impact on people who grow up there. This applies to everyone, not just artists. Baltimore, where I grew up, is one of the oldest cities in the United States, and is a land with a deep history and cultural resources in various fields including music, visual arts, and business. If you ask me what specifically influenced me in such a city, I would say (life)style. It goes beyond just fashion, but also what I eat, what music I listen to, how I decorate my home, and what kind of community I live in. It has influenced me in every aspect. It would be quite useful to delve into the various elements of the city I have lived in to find out who I am.

Is there a memory from your childhood that still stands out?

There was an art teacher I particularly admired when I was in elementary school. He discovered my artistic talent early on and supported it. He submitted my drawings to various local contests, so I often received awards. Whenever I won a contest, I received a lot of support from the local community. Even though I was young, I remember thinking that I would definitely repay that love if I became an artist in the future, and that I had a strong ambition as an artist. (Laughs)

Even though you've been living in Brooklyn for almost 20 years, is that why you still participate in programs big and small for Baltimore's creators and citizens?

I moved here in 1993, so it’s been over 20 years since I settled in Brooklyn. I’ve been in constant contact with Baltimore artists. Baltimore has a long history, but it’s not a major city in the United States, so artists working in the area are often excluded from the art market, which I find regrettable. I’m trying to use the art infrastructure I’ve built up to invite Baltimore artists to Brooklyn to hold exhibitions or to create spaces for gallerists and collectors. I hope that young Baltimore artists will continue to work with the belief that they are receiving constant support and encouragement from a strong community. However, I don’t want all young artists to move to big cities. When I was young, I had to move to New York or Brooklyn to succeed as an artist, but that’s no longer the case. More important than a wider stage is your own color.

Recently, many writers have been dealing with diasporic messages in search of their roots. What prompted you to delve into autobiographical memories and trivial emotions?

After finishing my studies, I began to think about the cultural context, theme, and art historical position that I wanted to incorporate into my work. In the process, I began to look at my surroundings from a critical and aesthetic perspective, and I was particularly drawn to African-American history. However, I did not want to include grand historical events in my work. Instead, I wanted to capture everyday moments that anyone would nod their head to and express in my paintings how they dynamically affect me in the present. This is why I became interested in the unique appearance, style, and nuance of black people.

There are also many writers who address the topics of political inequality and external pressures on black people.

Most artists who do such work do so because they want to remind people of the history of oppression that black people have experienced, which many people have forgotten. As a result, they are sometimes evaluated as doing “very political work.” However, can my work really be said to be non-political? The subjects of my work are the impressive moments that I see while walking or realize while talking with my black friends. Not only that. I also constantly reflect on the women who had a great influence on me as a child and the time I spent in Baltimore. When I visit my hometown, I carefully observe the paint colors or bedspreads in the houses of my friends or family. It is a time to recall the cultural and political influences on my unconsciously developed perspectives and views. Aren’t these elements much more blatantly political than the works of the artists I mentioned above? They are elements that exert influence on someone throughout their lives through familiar and repeated exposure. Because these thoughts form the basis of my art, people often evaluate me as a conceptual artist.

But people passing by your work through a window might not easily realize that meaning. On the surface, what they see are simple moments of happiness, like a leisurely time at the pool, a walk, or a hug.

The reason I don’t draw explicit pictures of violence or oppression is simple. The ordinary happiness and peaceful emotions I experience in my daily life leave me with much stronger afterimages. Furthermore, we live in a world where we can access scenes of violence in real time through SNS. As an artist, I don’t feel the need to reproduce such scenes that are already overflowing in the world. I just want to freely draw the scenes I want and dream of. One more thing I hope for is that through my pictures, many black viewers will look back on their surroundings and communities and recall the small happiness they have forgotten.

What is the ultimate message and worldview that you pursue?

I want to break the public's prejudice against African Americans and provide an opportunity to expand their perspective on them. I will continue to talk about the cultural influence of black people. As I said before, I do not want to talk about the macro story. I want to contribute to the public's sense of how black culture is transmitted to the world and how it affects their lives through the colors, styles, and textures that I often use in my work. I feel like I have already achieved a lot just by showing my work, a painting that contains the most ordinary moments of black people, in a prestigious world-class gallery.

Maybe it's because I've never lived in a world like this, but the more I hear about your story, the more curious I become about what it's like to live as a black person in America.

Thankfully, I was born into a middle-class family in Baltimore, and spent my childhood surrounded by love from my family and friends, and even grew up in a community that constantly gave and received artistic inspiration. Of course, there were moments of prejudice and hardship that I experienced because I was black. Nevertheless, the important fact is that black people overcame all of those realities and showed their unique spirit of resistance, and achieved remarkable progress in all fields. There are black people among the current U.S. presidential candidates and among the former presidents. Everyone experiences good and bad things in life. What is more important is 'how you look at it.'

Unlike in the past when it was difficult to escape the influence of one's birth environment, now one can be active anywhere in the world with the persona one pursues through SNS. Does this change also allow artistic freedom for you?

Anyone can make themselves known and become a celebrity through SNS, breaking away from the method of gaining recognition through a predetermined route. In addition, they can directly select and appeal to the target they want to make themselves known to. Just as artists can make themselves known by designating specific audiences and collectors. This direct method of communication is having a great influence on young creators. Crossover phenomena, where distant regions and countries share the same cultural context, also occur consistently. In such a world, it is possible for people who are fascinated by the visual structure, colors, and textures that I express to like black culture without any understanding or experience of the black community.

Like K-pop? Your solo exhibition, Derrick Adams: The Strip, is filled with new works inspired by the window displays of beauty stores around your Brooklyn studio and around the world. A well-edited scene, the window display may be the original SNS feed. Is there a message you want to convey to the Korean audience through this exhibition?

In fact, it is very different from previous works. If I had emphasized the physical beauty and individuality of black people up until now, this new work focused on the pure and essential beauty felt in the process of decorating oneself rather than the ultimate beauty that is often evaluated by others. In the case of black people, there is a tendency to regard the process of wearing wigs, wearing colorful dresses, and applying cosmetics as religious rituals or performances. The self-centered beauty discovered in the process of decorating oneself like this is the theme of this series. In a world where everyone is passionate about decorating themselves and struggling to cultivate and increase their value, I felt that I could move forward with a universal story through this theme.

What adds to your value?

People around me, including my family and friends. And the persistent effort to constantly adjust my focus on how I view life, art, and reality makes me a better person and artist. These days, I try to observe things in detail that I would have unconsciously overlooked in the past. Beyond paintings, I am also continuing to conceptually interpret objects used in real life, such as brutalist architecture, adding artistry to everyday things and thereby giving them new meaning. I am so absorbed in the joy of discovering newness in the familiar and creating with that inspiration that I really don’t have time to be bored in life!