Portraits of Serena and Venus Williams, Ava DuVernay Coming to the Smithsonian

“What I am interested in as an artist is what is often overlooked, what people might not notice about a subject,” said Toyin Ojih Odutola, the Nigerian-born, New York-based artist known for her life-size figurative drawings exploring identity and rendered in charcoal, pastel, ballpoint pen and pencil. With Serena Williams, among the most photographed people in the world and often framed as fierce or glamorous, what was missing in representations was her sense of joy, Odutola felt.

“I thought about her being a mother, a sister, a daughter, and how funny she is,” Odutola said. In a first exploratory Zoom conversation, the artist asked about depicting her laughing, Odutola said. “Serena loved that.”

Odutola traveled to Williams’s home in Florida to take reference photos, from which she would construct a composite. “Serena looked at them on the day and liked it, but kind of left it to me,” Odutola said.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/01/arts/design/portrait-gallery-serena-venus-williams-ava-duvernay.html