Black everyday life enters the grand narratives of painting.

Kerry James Marshall belongs to two worlds. And within him, Black cultures, exiled on the spine of an America forged by violence, invincibly grow. Born in Birmingham in 1955, raised in Watts, the artist witnessed the 1965 riots. “You shouldn’t mess with that boy because he’s Black,” wrote James Baldwin. Kerry James Marshall understood everything, and from genre scenes, he extracted history painting. Marshall’s other world is his immense knowledge of European painting. Manet, Caillebotte, and Seurat surface in his compositions, but the bourgeois give way to Black hairdressers in Chicago in School of Beauty, School of Culture. The Atlantic Slave Trade, Civil Rights, and Black Power are part of an artistic language now recognized worldwide. The Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris is dedicating its first French retrospective to him, bringing together seventy works, including eight new pieces created specifically for Paris. Kerry James Marshall’s signature style also lies in his subversive spirit, taking racial labeling literally by using a very deep black. The question of the Other is ultimately resolved in monumental formats.

MUSÉE D’ART MODERNE DE PARIS
From September 18, 2026 to January 24, 2027
11 av. President Wilson, 75116
Metro: Alma-Marceau (Line 9) / Iéna (Line 9)
Tue-Sun 10am-6pm, Thu until 9:30pm
Price: €17 – Reduced rate: €15 – Free for under 18s