“Odyssey: Jack Whitten Sculpture, 1963–2017”

For much of his career the veteran African-American artist Jack Whitten (1939–2018) was somewhat under appreciated by the art world, even though he had major shows at the Whitney (1974), the Studio Museum in Harlem (1983) and the New Museum (1993). A moment of “re-discovery” about a dozen years finally put him on the map as an artist to contend with, as appreciation grew for his over-all abstracted paintings that touched on themes from race to cosmology. This show introduces viewers to his sculptures, a heretofore, little-known aspect of his practice notable for its frequent references to African art.