The exhibition’s title is inspired by the seminal ethnographic study of Black life behind the veil of race by sociologist and Pan-Africanist W.E.B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk. Du Bois, who is buried near Osu—a neighborhood in Accra, Ghana near where Boafo grew up—conducted research that resulted in the coining of the phrase “double-consciousness,” which evokes the sense of Black people constantly having to look at themselves through the eyes of others. Du Bois’s text serves as an invitation to think deeply about Boafo’s artistic practice and how it challenges an “othered” gaze concerning the Black figure.

The works featured in Soul of Black Folks center the viewers’ gaze on the presence of Boafo’s subjects, who represent all walks of Black life. He vividly and attentively leverages his paintings as a forum to articulate the connectivity and cultural overlap of existence within the Black diaspora. Despite the physical and emotional friction of Boafo’s mark-making, his painted subjects appear confident and steadfast. Boafo’s paintings are deeply personal and intimately connected to his experience as a Ghanaian artist living and working between Vienna and Accra. His works serve as means of self-preservation—a celebration of his identity, Black people, and Blackness. More than mere portraits, they are images constructed to assert the dignity and importance of Black people.

Boafo was born in 1984 and raised in Osu, Accra in Ghana. He studied at the Ghanatta College of Art and Design in Accra in 2007, before attending the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna, Austria. Boafo was awarded the jury prize, Walter Koschatzky Art Prize in 2017 and the STRABAG Art award International in 2019 both in Vienna, Austria. In 2019, he participated in a residency with the new Rubell Museum in Miami, Florida and in 2020 collaborated with Dior for their Spring/Summer 2021 Men Collection. His work is widely collected by private and public collectors and institutions, most recently by Leopold Museum, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Rubell Museum, Marieluise Hessel Collection, the Aishti Foundation, Centre for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, Hessel Museum of Art, The Pizzuti Collection of Columbus Museum of Art, and the Albertina Museum in Vienna.

Boafo is represented by Roberts Projects, Los Angeles and Mariane Ibrahim Gallery, Chicago.

Major support for Amoako Boafo: Soul of Black Folks is provided by Daniel Xu and Flora Huang, with additional support from Louise Jamail, Glenn and Debbie August, Jeffrey Childers and Onay Gutierrez, Scott and Judy Nyquist, Anita and Gerald Smith, and Mariane Ibrahim Gallery, Chicago and Paris, and Daniel and Rosy Levy.

Contemporary Arts Museum of Houston is funded in part by the City of Houston through the Houston Arts Alliance.

Special thanks to Denby Auble and Kerry Inman; Marley Lott; Penelope and Lester Marks; Roberts Projects, Los Angeles; and all lenders to the exhibition.