by Matt Randal
Awol Erizku is a twenty six years old, Ethiopia born, multi-media artist from the Bronx, New York, whose art has a profound mission with just cause. Photographs, sculptures and video installations of this remarkable artist represent a critical discourse of art history and try to rectify centuries long lack of people of color on the walls of museums and galleries. This artistic elevation of blackness is most directly seen in his critically acclaimed series of photographic portraits, in which Awol Erizku reworked some of the most famous and iconic classic portraits of artists such as Caravaggio and Vermeer, in which Erizku replaced their subjects of white color with modern black faces.