Philadelphia Weekly

Photo by Barkley Hendricks’

Bashir, Jules, Tuff Tony and Angie wouldn’t stand out in a crowd. But in Barkley Hendricks’ “Birth of the Cool” at Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, these seemingly ordinary people, depicted in nearly life-size paintings, become new icons for a secular age. The works have such a sense of stillness that they feel almost like religious images.

Which is not to say these people are saints. While the Philadelphia-born Hendricks—trained at the Academy (certificate, 1967) and at Yale (MFA, 1972)—uses the conventions of religious painting (gold leaf in several works and a halo above Fela Kuti in another), these figures have attitude. Their body language is confrontational. They smoke. They blow bubblegum in your face. Kuti grabs his crotch; Tuff Tony scowls; hardly anybody smiles in these portraits. Hendricks serves up a new paradigm for the high art portrait: Instead of wealthy folks, he depicts ordinary people who lead complicated lives, have struggles and are worthy of contemplation.

It’s highly political move and while Kehinde Wiley and Jeff Sonhouse are following in Hendricks’ footsteps it is Hendricks’ works that blaze the trail with empowered images of African-Americans and a celebration of the black fashion sensibility.

PW talked with Hendricks last month when the show opened. It should be no surprise that the artist loves his camera as well as his paints, brushes and canvas. Hendricks has been photographing people since his days as a student at PAFA. Check out a selection of his photos at the African American Museum (701 Arch St. 215.574.0380. aampmuseum.org) through Jan. 3.

A strong photography portfolio got him into Walker Evans’ advanced photography class at Yale. “It’s dealing with how to see,” he said. “Think before you click the shutter. At Yale, I hung out more with the photographers than with the painters.”

The artist and self-taught musician loves jazz and has photographed many jazz greats—Miles Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, Sonny Rollins, Dexter Gordon, Charles Mingus, Modern Jazz Quartet, Oscar Brown Junior, Carmen McRea, Diane Reeves, Herbie Hancock.
Hendricks taught himself to play trumpet and drums and has taken some lessons. But he was no child prodigy. He didn’t even start playing instruments until he was in his mid-forties. He took some lessons from a master trumpeter in upstate NY who also makes trumpet mouthpieces for him … from wood. “Wood feels great on the lips in the winter,” Hendricks explains.

Speaking of wood, the artist is accomplished with carpentry tools and makes his own frames for his paintings. As a kid he worked with his father, a contractor, fixing up houses in Philadelphia. “We did everything imaginable to a house. I have a love/hate relationship to tools,” he recalls.

Unfortunately, while working in his home carpentry shop this summer one of his routers jumped up and cut his right arm deeply. “I was building a frame for one of my paintings and the router hopped up and hit my arm,” Hendricks explains. He was cut so deeply that the tendons in his arm were severed, causing him to lose feeling in his fingertips and rendering him unable to play the trumpet.

Fortunately, the accident hasn’t effected his painting since he’s an ambidextrous painter. n

For more on the Philadelphia art scene go to theartblog.org.