Henry Taylor’s B Side and The Beauty of Imperfection
I love art, I always have. When I was a kid, I would draw the most horrendous, mal-formed, amateur comics you could imagine, but my lack of skill didn’t matter to me, I just loved the process of making things. In fact, I adored it so much I went on to dedicate my entire undergrad to Fine Arts: Painting and Drawing, spending 4 years of my life focused on honing the craft.
During that time, I learned the ins and outs of composition, how juxtaposition of color could create the illusion of motion where there was none, how to tell the medium used on a painting from the surface’s texture and the layering techniques used to create it, and how to iterate on ideas endlessly until I had a final product capable of surviving the onslaught of critiques my professors would present to me during any review of my work.
It was an arduous process, but it was satisfying, there was pride in the struggle to prove myself worthy to both my mentors and peers with each subsequent piece.
However, slowly but surely, that satisfying struggle transformed into a crippling perfectionism. It was easy to miss at first, being in school meant — regardless of my own preferences — I had to produce a certain amount of work by a given deadline. It was like a toxic equilibrium, school kept me producing at a high level of output, and my own perfectionism meant maintaining a certain level of quality for each individual piece — even if that meant sacrificing my sleep, social life, and sanity. It wasn’t until after I finally graduated that the change in my relationship to art became truly clear to me.
No longer could I just doodle for fun, creating without a thought of what the “quality” of the work I was producing would be. Now I had standards, and anything I made needed to meet those standards or it might as well have been a waste of time. The joy of the craft was gone, all that was left was the crushing sense of obligation any time I tried to create. So, I sat in stagnation, every once in a while making something, but never quite capturing that same feeling of exuberant glee I once had such a clear grasp of as a child. It wasn’t until looking at Henry Taylor’s show that I was reminded how much beauty there was in the creation of work free of the self-imposed restrictions regarding what it means to have created a “finished” and “rendered” piece I had left myself imprisoned within.
When I first entered Henry Taylor’s exhibit at the Whitney, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. I was unfamiliar with the artist, and beyond that it had been several months since I had walked through an exhibition with a critical eye for the works on display. I worried — just for a moment — that it was even possible the magic of looking at new artwork had run its course in my life, and that for me the experience might be somewhat underwhelming. The moment my eyes drifted across one of his paintings, all those fears washed away like delicate footprints in the shifting tide, I was enamored.
Every piece had such character, each one brimming with mysterious narratives and intriguing approaches to mark making. They broke all rules of what it was to have a finished piece. Layers of underpainting showed through to the surface, depth was often non-existent outside of crude size relationships between figures, there was great contrast in the detail of rendering between different portions of the same composition, and for some pieces it seemed as though the surface had barely received any gesso at all — with the paint being absorbed directly into the canvas leaving the fidelity of the color far more diffuse.
Far from being flaws, all of these features were what made these pieces what they were, pure expressions of raw artistic intent. You could tell the deeply personal connection Taylor had with each canvas, as if he was inviting you into the inner sanctum of his creative process. The implication of the exhibitions title “B Side” — in reference to the side of records that typically receive less attention and contain more of the artist’s experimental songs — were on full display here, challenging preconceived notions of what portraits are and inviting viewers into vibrant, personal, sometimes harrowing worlds.
This approach complimented the rawness of the scenes on display, capturing moments of violence, tenderness, and all that lies in between. One piece presented Philando Castile’s death, the outside obscured by a thick yellow ochre tone, with the only figure beyond the interior of the car clear to see being the torso of the officer holding their gun pointed to Castile’s lifeless corpse — eyes still open. Another displays the portrait of a young black boy, each mark making up his visage clear to see in an unblended state, leaving a potent sense of texture present. Taylor’s ability to capture political context and lived experience is displayed not merely via the content of his pieces, but in the very manner in which he constructs them.
This didn’t stop with one medium of expression either, the exhibition was rich with different 3d installations alongside their 2d counterparts. One I found especially compelling was the large collection of mannequins — all fitted in leather jackets with photos of different black figures — paying homage to the Black Panthers. These pieces oozed with a sense of care and focus in their construction, as though each minute detail was placed in the manner it was for an important reason. Still, it was in his 2d work that Taylor’s artistic character truly shone through for me.
Taylor’s approach to handling the paint, with its startling toughness and directness, served as a wake-up call for me. It was a revelation, a stark departure from the meticulous perfectionism that had stifled my own creative spirit. I found myself immersed in Taylor’s unapologetic exploration of the human experience, unbound by common standards. His paintings were not constrained by a pursuit of flawless rendering but rather embraced the imperfect, the incomplete, and the unconventional.
Leaving the Whitney Museum, I felt rejuvenated, as if a weight had been lifted from my creative soul. Inspiration to create, unburdened by self-imposed restrictions, began to resurface. I found myself picking up my personal sketch book — which had remained untouched for months at that point — with newfound enthusiasm, embracing the freedom to create without the constant pressure of meeting rigid standards. Henry Taylor’s artwork reminded me that the beauty of art lies not in its adherence to perfection but in its ability to capture the raw essence of human experience. That true fulfillment comes from embracing the authenticity and freedom inherent in the act of creation itself.
