Jack Whitten: The Messenger

Edited with text by Michelle Kuo. Text by Julie Mehretu, Glenn Ligon, Anna Deavere Smith, George Lewis, Sampada Aranke, Mark Godfrey, Richard Shiff, Annie Wilker, Michael Duffy, Dana Liljegren, David Sledge, Helena Klevorn, Kiko Aebi, Eana Kim, JaBrea Patterson-West. Jack Whitten offered the world a new way to see. Over nearly six decades, he dared to invent new forms of abstraction, constantly transforming both perception and our understanding of art in society. This gorgeously illustrated volume, with pathbreaking new perspectives and revelatory technical analyses of his innovative materials and processes, explores Whitten's wide-ranging and game-changing practice. Raised in the segregated Jim Crow South in the 1940s, Whitten undertook an extraordinary journey in becoming an artist, convinced that by changing form, he could help change the world. Jack Whitten (1939–2018) was born in Bessemer, Alabama, and began his studies in medicine at the Tuskegee Institute. After moving to New York in 1960 to attend the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, he became a leading artist in the wake of Abstract Expressionism, and of a generation of Black artists committed to abstraction. Hardcover / 9.5 x 12 in. / 304 pgs / 300 color