The hidden meanings in a US masterpiece

Marshall also scatters mirrors and nods to the school of beauty, culture Jan van Eck’s portrait of Arnorfini(1434) and Diego Velázquez’s Las Meninas (1656), the two works are famous for playing with reflection. In Van Eyck’s domestic scene, the curved mirror provides viewers with an expanded view of the room. Meanwhile, the arrangement of the mirrors behind Bellazuquez’s paintings reveals a reflection of Philip IV and Queen Mariana. In Marshall’s work, the mirror behind reveals the flash of the photographer’s camera, just as the woman at the center posses for the viewer. “These are all very intentional and direct references,” says Marshall. “But in general, to the average person, this place looks familiar without those references.”

Nods to modern black culture are just as common in painting. The signed poster by Lauryn Hill and another for the 2010 Tate Britain Show by British-born artist Chris ofili, is painted on the salon walls. At the time of the Tate exhibition, Ofili was widely considered to be the most famous black artist in British history, but Marshall first saw Ofili’s work in New York before seeing it in London. “They were rich, complicated and stacked, so they were the best paintings I’ve ever seen,” he says, and he believes that he “works at the highest level that allows you to make paintings.”

For Godfrey, Marshall’s diverse mix of references, from art history to black culture, is part of his genius. “He refers to Raphael and Holbein, as he is a scholar of painting and its history.

Courtesy of Kelly James Marshall/Jack Shaynman Gallery, New York

However, the most striking feature of the cultural school, a beauty school that closely resembles most of Marshall’s works in retrospect, is the figures themselves. Everyone in the salon is painted in deep shades of black. Godfrey tells viewers he’s portraying more about “the presence of black people in large-scale paintings.” In the 60s and 70s, especially in America, people were beginning to use the word black in capital B to refer to themselves and their identity. “At that point, Marshall decided to literally make numbers for black people.”