Getting to Know Forrest Kirk (video 6:57)

Forrest Kirk
American, 1975-

Farewell to the Flesh, 2020
mixed media on canvas
6 x 9 ft.

SBMA, Museum purchase with funds provided by the Luria Foundation
2020.25



Forrest Kirk - undated photo

“My work is about current social narratives, but it’s also about creating beautiful work. My work has to be visually appealing, before I drop the narrative into the work. It’s the whole ‘attract more with honey than vinegar’ approach.” – Forrest Kirk

COMMENTS

Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?

Since as early as I can remember, I’ve always drawn, colored, and painted. As a kid growing up in the inner city, I would draw and paint imaginary worlds and lose myself in my imagination. As a teen, I attended a graphic art high school and used my creativity in graffiti and silk screen printing. Then as a young adult, I moved to Paris, France and attend an atelier and painted on the streets of the Montmartre arts district.

After moving back to the states, I wanted some stability so I finished college and started working as a software engineer. After working for over 10 years in engineering, I had a near death experience on a drive home from work. At that point, I decided that life was too short, and I decided to pursue my artwork full time, instead of the weekend hobby it had become.

Please tell us about your art.

My art is my lexicon. It’s the world as I see it using paint or other mediums to articulate it. I create paintings and sculptures that get beyond the distractions to capture a subject’s essence. Some of my subjects are quite beautiful, others less so. My goal is to inspire those who see my work to look more carefully at the world around them.

I paint figurative and abstract together in a seamless way. My art is often described as moving or emotional, deep and thoughtful, inspirational and even important.

I work very quickly and intuitively reacting to each stroke as if the canvas is speaking to me directly. I paint layer after layer sometimes exposing what is underneath in order to create portals of light and mystery. I paint mostly with my brushes although I have an arsenal of tools at my disposal. As a black male, there has always been this stigma of us being primal or gorillas so, in each of my paintings, I use some amount of gorilla glue. It’s my way of taking the negative gorilla connotation and making something beautiful out of it in each work.

What do you think is the biggest challenge facing artists today?

The biggest challenge for an artist today is being true to yourself while surviving in a commercial market. Finding financial security in your career without sacrificing your true voice.

http://voyagela.com/interview/meet-forrest-kirk/

SBMA CURATORIAL LABELS

In the painting Farewell to the Flesh, two semi-abstract figures confront one another, as if an agitated situation is about to explode. One is female with a headdress or coiffure, and the other, which grows plantlike from the right margin, feels male. We, the viewers, are left to iron out who these figures are. This pregnant ambiguity is typical of Forrest Kirk’s recent work for which he has received glowing press attention.

The artist offers some clues about the painting’s mysterious content. The woman’s headdress looks African or Egyptian. This allusion to Africa fits with the artist’s commitment to exploring the African American experience through various subjects and iconography, including Harriet Tubman, police violence, James Baldwin, and the Black Power fist. The bracing colors and purposefully jarring contrasts in combination with the scraped areas create an atmosphere of tension and aggression. The artist, however, withholds enough that the story remains open-ended and intriguing.

The Museum has no comparable artwork, but many will provide a rich context, including the mid-century, boldly colored, large abstract pieces by Helen Frankenthaler, Pierre Soulages, and Hans Hofmann. While these artists were primarily concerned with aesthetic issues, Kirk uses semi-abstract language to tackle contemporary social issues around racial inequality and the Black experience in America.

- Park Projects, 2022