Four Brown Chairs 2020

Jammie Holmes's painting of four brown chairs has the look of oil paint, thick and deliberate, laid down with real intention. I can imagine him thinking about his heroes like Alice Neel as he makes this. Like Neel, Holmes isn't afraid of bluntness. He paints bodies without idealizing them. He is interested in their weight, their form, their occupation of space. It seems like he wants to make his figures seem real, like the feeling of hanging out with your friends. I love the confidence of the color palette. The walls feel like a party; a yellow and brown explosion contrasting with the monochrome checkerboard floor. A particularly poignant gesture can be seen in the slight impasto and the shadows they create as the artist carves out the subjects' faces. It reminds me that painting is a conversation across generations, as artists borrow, steal, and riff off each other's ideas. In this way, Holmes is asking us to consider what it means to represent the everyday realities of Black life. He's not offering answers, just a space for contemplation.