By Chianti Marks
AFRO Intern
The Baltimore Museum Of Art (BMA) recently opened the “Amy Sherald: American Sublime” exhibition and honored the artist with the 2025 Artist Who Inspires award. The exhibit, which will be on display until April 5, 2026, highlights the evolution of Sherald, an artist who has made a name for herself as she moves forward in revolutionizing the world of portraiture.
The exhibition features about 40 paintings, illuminating her artistic development from 2007 to 2024 in a stunning mid-career survey. Many works feature Baltimore-based models and were painted in the city, reflecting her deep ties to the community as a graduate of the Maryland Institute College of Art’s Hoffberger School of Painting.
For more than a decade, Sherald has used a grayscale palette to depict skin tones as a radical tool for redirection—one that draws attention to her subjects’ interior lives and the narratives within each portrait.
“American Sublime is a salve. It’s a call to remember our shared humanity and an insistence on being seen,” said Sherald, in the BMA exhibit overview.
Sherald made history in 2016 as the first African American to win the grand prize in the National Portrait Gallery’s Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition for her painting, “Miss Everything (Unsuppressed Deliverance).” She was commissioned to paint the official portrait of former First Lady Michelle Obama for the National Portrait Gallery as a result of that recognition.
The BMA obtained her painting, “Planes, Rockets, and the Spaces in Between” in 2018 and has maintained a close relationship with the artist. Now, Sherald’s offerings are available in the city that shaped her as an artist.
“Baltimore has always been part of my DNA as an artist. Every brushstroke carries a little of its history, its energy, its people and my time there. To bring this exhibition here is to return that love,” said Sherald, in materials sent to members of the media.
In addition to the exhibit, visitors can also view the Art21 “Everyday Icons” episode which focuses on Sherald and her work.
“I really have this deep belief that images can change the world,” says Sherald, in the video. “It’s not that I started making work with that belief, but it’s what I’ve come to know. It’s a beautiful way to tell a story.”
In the video, Sherald discusses the concept behind her official portrait of former first lady Michelle Obama.
“I wanted to paint a quiet and powerful portrait of her that offered the viewer a different kind of moment and make it genuinely about her rather than the title of ‘First Lady,’” Sherald explains.
She also talks about her choice to depict skin tones in grayscale, a method she adopted in order to shift the focus of the discussion from race to humanity.
“I was always drawn to the photograph of my grandmother, Jewel. I just think photographs from this time, that eyes really tell a story, like you can really feel who they were in that moment, and I think that’s what really draws me to black and white photography is because it’s so special and saturated with so much emotional energy,” said Sherald. “Looking at her picture, I saw a woman who was dignified, who represented herself in a way that influenced how I wanted to be represented in the world as well.”
Sherald’s portrait of Breonna Taylor, also featured in the exhibition, is described in the episode as an act of remembrance and reclamation. Sherald explained the purpose of each detail—from the colors chosen to the inclusion of her engagement ring.
“I think that we deserved a whole picture of her life,” she said.
Visitors to the BMA also get a behind-the-scenes look of the making of “For Love, and for Country.” The painting, featured in the exhibition, is a reimagining of the V-J Day Kiss photograph captured by Alfred Eisenstadt in 1945. The photograph, of a sailor kissing a woman in Times Square, was captured as Americans celebrated Victory over Japan Day, which signaled the end of World War II.
“I have been looking at a lot of photographs of iconic American moments and reconsidering them and reimagining them,’” she said in the film.
As visitors move through the exhibition—from its layout to the descriptions of her different styles and processes—Sherald’s art, concepts and techniques reveal stories layered deep within each painting. The exhibition offers a rich and immersive experience for the public.
Sherald’s work proudly, quietly and yet powerfully celebrates Black leaders, every day people living every day lives and even the Black martyrs who have reshaping the world. Through her artistry, she invites viewers to see more than what meets the eye—to find humanity, stillness, and meaning in each gaze.
Admission to “Amy Sherald: American Sublime” is free on Thursday evenings and all day Thursday, Jan. 15, and Thursday, Feb. 19. Tickets are required at other times: $18 for adults, $16 for active-duty U.S. military members and their families with valid ID, $16 for seniors 65 and older, $10 for students with valid ID, and free for children and teens 17 and under.