Untitled: Remembrance of Things Present
Enrico Riley, American, born 1973
2017
Oil on canvas
Overall: 61 × 74 × 1 9/16 in. (154.9 × 187.9 × 4 cm)
Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth: Purchased through the Winky Fund
© Enrico Riley
2019.3.1
Geography
Place Made: United States, North America
Period
21st century
Object Name
Painting
Research Area
Painting
Not on view
Inscriptions
Signed, in charcoal, on reverse, upper right: Enrico Riley 2017; inscribed, in charcoal, on reverse, top left edge: UNtitlED: REMEMbrANCE of THiNgS PrESENt", 2017
Label
In this image of a mother mourning the death of her son, Enrico Riley provides a contemporary Pietá that calls to mind Mary's grief after the death of Christ. The modern-day Christ figures lies supine on an examination table with only his feet exposed. This painting simultaneously engages the religious sentiment of sacrifice and the social cost of police brutality. Riley signals the latter through the motif of three clubs, which appears in some of his other works. Here is associates the murder and abuse of black bodies with the injustice of the crucifixion. Through his work, Riley portrays the black body as an infinite recepter of dehumanization and violence. Riley is an alumnus of Dartmouth College and a professor in Dartmouth's Studio Art Department.
From the 2019 exhibition A Space for Dialogue 97, Black Bodies on the Cross, curated by Victoria McCraven '19, Homma Family Intern
Course History
SART 15.01, Drawing I, Colleen Randall, Spring 2020
ANTH 50.17, Rites of Passage, Sienna Craig, Spring 2020
ANTH 50.17, Rites of Passage, Sienna Craig, Spring 2020
AAAS 88.19, Contemporary African-American Artists, Michael Chaney, Summer 2021
ANTH 73.01, Main Currents in Anthropology, Sienna Craig, Winter 2022
GEOG 72.01/AAAS 67.50/WGSS 66.09, Black Consciousness Black Feminism, Abby Neely, Spring 2022
Anthropology 73.01, Main Currents in Anthropology, Sienna Craig, Spring 2024
Exhibition History
A Space for Dialogue 97, Black Bodies on the Cross, Victoria McCraven, Class of 2019, Homma Family Intern, Alvin P. Gutman Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, November 9, 2019-January 4, 2020.
Publication History
Victoria McCraven, A Space for Dialogue 97, Black Bodies on the Cross, Hanover, New Hampshire: Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, 2020.
Provenance
Fred Giampietro Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut; sold to present collection, 2019.
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