Jennifer Packer

(b. 1984)

Known for her virtuosic paintings of Black subjects, interiors, and still lifes, Jennifer Packer describes her practice as “completely political.” Packer’s portraits are intimate works that radically revise past modes of representation of Black subjects. Through a broad range of painterly techniques, Packer’s portraits deliver complex views that evoke psychological depth and encourage slow looking rather than surface glances.  Packer is also known for her floral still lifes, a series she began painting in the wake of Trayvon Martin’s murder in 2012. Intended to evoke funerary floral arrangements, Packer subsequently painted further works in tribute to other victims of anti-Black state violence, including Sandra Bland, Laquan McDonald, and Breonna Taylor. Many of these paintings were shown in her first solo show at the Renaissance Society in 2017.