The Artsy Vanguard 2019: Tschabalala Self
Tschabalala Self in her studio in New Haven, Connecticut. Photo by Julie Bidwell. Courtesy of Pilar Corrias.
Tschabalala Self, Loosie in the Park , 2019. Courtesy of Pilar Corrias Gallery.
What makes Tschabalala Self such a rising star is her visionary approach to textile-based canvases, where the fabrics act as backgrounds to the painted figures. “Tschabalala brings the cutting edge of visual culture today into dialogue with a Western art-historical canon that has held as a tradition the exclusion and marginalization of the black figure,” said Legacy Russell, associate curator at the Studio Museum in Harlem, where Self has been an artist-in-residence from 2018–19.
Just four years ago, Self graduated from Yale University with an MFA; instead of moving to New York, she remained in New Haven. Despite staying in Connecticut, Self’s work quickly became known internationally. After a solo show at Thierry Goldberg Gallery in New York in 2015, she was picked to be in Larry Gagosian and Jeffrey Deitch’s “Desire” show in Miami in December 2016, and scored a solo show at Pilar Corrias Gallery in 2017.
Installation view of “Hammer Projects: Tschabalala Self,” at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, 2019. Photo by Joshua White. Courtesy of the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles.
In June 2019, after Self’s solo show at the Hammer Museum closed, one of her works was consigned for auction at Christie’s in London. Out of Body (2015) saw 19 bidders push the price to 5 times the high estimate, to a total of £371,250 ($471,322) with fees. The buyer was Jose Mugrabi, the patriarch of a family with more Warhols than any collector on the planet. Self has an upcoming show with Pilar Corrias in October, and in 2020, the artist will have solo exhibitions at the Baltimore Museum of Art and the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston. This month, Self also joined the roster of Galerie Eva Presenhuber, where she will have a solo show in New York in May 2020.
