Troy Lamarr Chew II - Painter

Welcome to Art is Awesome, the show where we talk with an artist or art worker with a connection to the San Francisco Bay Area. 

Today, Emily chats with Troy Lamarr Chew II, a talented painter with an ongoing exhibition at San Francisco's Altman Siegel gallery. Troy pursued his passion for art, eventually studying at the California College of the Arts and receiving a prestigious residency at the Headlands Center for the Arts. His recent work explores invisibility,  inspired by his time as an Uber driver. His work can be seen in notable museums and galleries. Troy  discusses his artistic journey, influences, and unique approach to language and representation in his art.

About Artist Troy Lamarr Chew II :

Troy Lamarr Chew II explores the legacy of the African Diaspora and its reverberations throughout American culture. His work looks methodically at systems of coded communication and how this is translated and mistranslated both within the Diaspora and the mainstream.

Chew’s rich artistic visual language draws inspiration largely from Black culture and its history. A highly skilled realist, inspired by European painting techniques, Chew uses these art historical traditions to reframe their exclusion of Blackness. In his Out the Mud series, hand dyed and sewn cloths from West Africa are replicated in a trompe l’oeil fashion, their patterns “torn” away to reveal portrayals of contemporary Black culture and resistance. In another series, Slanguage, the artist paints Flemish style vanitas picturing everyday objects, coded in hip-hop lexicon. His Three Crowns series explores the social history of cosmetic dentistry and the use of grills in hip-hop culture. The artist’s lush and luminous oil paintings embody the energy of this infinitely re-mixed yet deeply rooted genre.

In 2020, Chew was awarded the prestigious Tournesol Residency at Headlands Center for the Arts after becoming a Graduate Fellow from California College of the Arts, San Francisco in 2018. Solo exhibitions include The Roof is on Fire, Altman Siegel, San Francisco, CA (2022), Yadadamean, CULT Aimee Friberg Exhibitions, San Francisco, CA (2020); Fuck the King’s Horses and all the King’s Men, Parker Gallery, Los Angeles, CA (2020); WWJZD, Cushion Works, San Francisco, CA (2019) and Stunt 101, Guerrero Gallery, San Francisco, CA (2019). Recent group exhibitions include Walk Against the Wind, Micki Meng and Parker Gallery, New York, NY (2023); The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century, The Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD (2023); Imperfect Paradise, Barbati Gallery, Venice, Italy (2023); Continuum, presented by the Kinsey African American Art & History Collection and Residency Art Gallery at Sofi Stadium, Inglewood, CA (2022-2023); I Yield My Time. Fuck You!, Altman Siegel, San Francisco (2020); California Winter, organized in collaboration with Hannah Hoffman at Kristina Kite Gallery, Los Angeles, CA (2019), Vanguard Revisited, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, CA (2019), Graduation, Good Mother Gallery, Oakland, CA (2019) and Black Now(here), Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco, CA (2018). His work is included in the collections of the Kadist Foundation and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

See more of Troy's work at the Altman Siegel Gallery HERE.  

Follow Troy on Instagram:  @troylamarrchewthesecond

Troy at the Parker Gallery CLICK HERE. 

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About Podcast Host Emily Wilson:

Emily a writer in San Francisco, with work in outlets including Hyperallergic, Artforum, 48 Hills, the Daily Beast, California Magazine, Latino USA, and Women’s Media Center. She often writes about the arts. For years, she taught adults getting their high school diplomas at City College of San Francisco.

Follow Emily on Instagram: @PureEWil

Follow Art Is Awesome on Instagram: @ArtIsAwesome_Podcast

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CREDITS:

Art Is Awesome is Hosted, Created & Executive Produced by Emily Wilson. 

Theme Music "Loopster" Courtesy of Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

The Podcast is Co-Produced, Developed & Edited by Charlene Goto of @GoToProductions. 

For more info, visit Go-ToProductions.com