The definitive monograph of Sam Gilliam, one of the great innovators in post-war American painting

Phaidon is pleased to announce the release of Sam Gilliam. Developed in close collaboration with the Sam Gilliam Foundation, alongside Pace Gallery and David Kordansky Gallery, this is the only book to comprehensively survey the complete works of painting, sculpture, and public art by the groundbreaking artist across five decades. Spanning 200 images, never-before-seen archival material, and newly commissioned texts, this unprecedented monograph celebrates Gilliam’s life, work, and tremendous output, and is one of the final projects on which Gilliam personally signed off before he passed away in June 2022.

Born in 1933 in Tupelo, Mississippi, Gilliam is renowned as one of the greatest innovators in post-war American painting. Emerging from the Washington, D.C. art scene with a series of powerful abstractions that riffed on Color School painting, Gilliam was a radical experimenter and, as a Black artist in the nation’s capital at the height of the Civil Rights movement, blazed a new trail with his singular artistic vision. Gilliam’s works disrupted established artistic norms, styles, moods, and materials, with his lyrical abstractions inspired by the improvisatory ethos of jazz.

Gilliam’s work has been the subject of recent critical reappraisal. Sam Gilliam charts the artist’s innovative attitude toward painting and how he pushed the boundaries of the medium. With Gilliam’s Drapes, which are beautifully reproduced in this monograph, the removal of the stretcher meant that he could create structure out of color and space, and employ the human body and its relationship to architecture as the frames in which painting materializes. Showcasing the artist’s delicate watercolors, dramatic room-sized installations pulsing with color, and public artworks formed with spray-painted metal, this book highlights the unique path Gilliam forged throughout his practice.

Featuring more than 120 artworks alongside previously unseen archival materials such as experimental sketches, notes, and photographs, this book is a stunning celebration of an exceptional artist. Sam Gilliam includes exciting newly commissioned texts: a poem titled ‘Gilliam’s Rainbow’ by Ishmael Reed, one of America’s most significant literary figures; a long-form biographical essay by Mary Schmidt Campbell, President Emerita of Spelman College in Atlanta and a lifelong friend of the artist, that offers a unique view of Gilliam’s remarkable career; and an extensive illustrated chronology written by Andria Hickey with quotes from Melvin Edwards, Arne Glimcher, Rashid Johnson, David Kordansky, Thaddeus Mosley and William T. Williams. Additionally, the book features Gilliam’s own writing – including his commencement speech given at the Memphis School of Art in May 1986 – to ensure that the artist’s voice rings loudly beside the sumptuous illustrations of his artwork.

During the last five years of his life, Gilliam embarked on an incredibly prolific period, chiefly producing canvases bathed in luminous color. These works feature prominently in the book, along with exquisite details that highlight the artist’s mastery of materials such as sawdust, metal shards, scraps of fabric, wax, and mineral dust, offering a glimpse inside the brain of a true artistic maverick.

As one of the first Black artists to represent the United States at the Venice Biennale in 1972, Gilliam has served as an inspiration to a generation of younger artists such as Rashid Johnson, who stated that Gilliam “took a step that most people didn’t understand was possible.” This book is the definitive account of the artist’s work and life, and the first to comprehensively detail the breadth of his extraordinary career.

‘Throughout his life, Sam had a profound influence on his fellow artists and on the field of contemporary art, which he advanced in radical ways through his dynamic practice. His contributions to the canon continue to reverberate and inspire artists of all backgrounds to this day.’
– Annie Gawlak

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