Amy Sherald cancels Smithsonian show, citing removal of transgender painting
'American Sublime' debuted at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in November 2024. The exhibition was curated by former SFMOMA staff member Sarah Roberts, and is now on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Slated to open at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., in September, the show would have been the first by a Black contemporary artist at the museum.
'Trans Forming Liberty' which depicts a Black, transgender woman in the pose of the Statue of Liberty was among the final pieces Sherald finished for the exhibition before it debuted in San Francisco last year. The painting is over 10 feet tall and shows the model wearing a pink wig and blue gown, holding a bouquet in the style of the monument's torch.
'A painting of a transgender woman is a political painting,' Sherald told the Chronicle in November. 'Being Black is political because I think queerness and blackness can be the same where if a whole bunch of Black people start showing up to a space or queer people,' it becomes a Black or queer space, Sherald finished.
The New York Times reported that the artist sent a letter to to Lonnie G. Bunch III, the secretary of the Smithsonian, which runs the Portrait Gallery, in part saying:
'I entered into this collaboration in good faith, believing that the institution shared a commitment to presenting work that reflects the full, complex truth of American life. Unfortunately, it has become clear that the conditions no longer support the integrity of the work as conceived.''
Sherald, 51, is best known for her 2018 official portrait of first lady Michelle Obama 'Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama' and the 2020 painting 'Breonna Taylor,' a painting of the 26-year-old emergency medical technician who was fatally shot by police in Louisville after officers forced their way into her home that was commissioned as a cover for Vanity Fair magazine.
Born in Columbus, Ga., Sherald lived and worked in Baltimore for much of her career, winning the National Portrait Gallery's Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition in 2016 for her 2014 painting 'Miss Everything (Unsuppressed Deliverance).' 'American Sublime' features nearly 50 paintings and works on paper by Sherald from 2007 to the present.
The artist said in a statement reported by the Times that she had been 'informed that internal concerns had been raised' over the painting.
'These concerns led to discussions about removing the work from the exhibition,' her statement said. 'It's clear that institutional fear shaped by a broader climate of political hostility toward trans lives played a role.'
In its own statement, SFMOMA backed Sherald. "Amy Sherald is one of the most important portraitists today, and her work celebrates and illuminates our shared humanity. SFMOMA stands by Amy's artistic vision and respects her decision regarding the presentation of her mid-career survey, American Sublime.'
In the days after the 2024 election of President Donald Trump, Sherald called it 'a moment where I'm deeply worried about the lives of Black people and queer people.'
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