Smoke – 2013 – by Artist Kwesi Abbensetts

Abbensetts creates “works exploring his own identity and blackness, through an approach he dubs “revisionary self-appropriation.”

Kwesi states that this is an extension of his work in photography and experimentation. “Like hallucinations splashed onto paper, the pictures of Guyanese born artist Kwesi Abbensetts seem to abide by no photographic convention, utilizing layered exposures, desaturated hues, and cubist fragmentations to create portraits that seem more like paintings, at times.

Abbensetts approach is something of an antithesis to academia and formalized art conventions. The self-taught artist aims to be intuitive rather than overly calculated in his approach. “My work is not based on any particular conceptual notion or any sort of research or historical sorts of representations,” he tells. “It’s just based on the idea that I intuitively work with whatever information I have.”

Lot #58544