Njideka Akunyili Crosby: “The Beautyful Ones” at the National Portrait Gallery

This display (17 November 2018–3 February 2019) brings together new and existing works from the ongoing series "The Beautyful Ones", some of which are being exhibited for the first time.

Akunyili Crosby was born in Nigeria in 1983 and moved to the United States at the age of sixteen, where she has lived and worked ever since. Drawing on artistic, historical, political and personal references, Akunyili Crosby creates densely layered figurative compositions that conjure the complexity of contemporary experience. Her cultural identity combines strong attachments to the country of her birth and to her adopted home, a hybrid identity that is reflected in her work. 

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Image: Njideka Akunyili Crosby, “The Beautyful Ones” Series #2, 2013

Acrylic, color pencils, pastel and transfers on paper

152.4 x 106.7 cm, 60 x 42 in

© Njideka Akunyili Crosby, courtesy the artist and Victoria Miro, London/Venice