Simmie Knox (b. 1935)

The Delaware Museum of Art recently acquired a very similar, large abstract work by Knox, titled Placees and painted in 1972.  Their work was exhibited at the Jacob’s Ladder Gallery in Washington, DC  (1973).  We were unable to find a catalog for that exhibition, but it is possible that this example presented in the auction, painted in 1973, was also included in that exhibition.

In a review which appeared in The Baltimore Sun , January 18, 1973, Lincoln F. Johnson wrote about Knox’s work:  

The forms suggest fictional submarine landscapes, views of the earth from outer space, and the shapes of astronomical configurations such as nebulae and galaxies.  

As transparent areas of light coalesce into solid forms and the spaces mysteriously invite but resist penetration, one seems witness to the separation of  light from darkness and the primordial churning of the elements in the first days of creation.  

What impresses me about Knox’s work is that not only technically competent, sophisticated in design and firmly anchored in the history of art but, more importantly, that it strikes so many reverberations, working between fiction and fact, between myths of creation and the common visual knowledge we have all derived from photographs of the stars, the earth and the world beneath the sea, images that at once diminish and exalt the importance of man.

Johnson, Lincoln F. “A Special Delight in Works by Two Artists.” The Baltimore Sun, 18 Jan. 1973, p. 1.

Knox’s work is included in the permanent collection of The Kreeger Museum in Washington, D.C. .  A Place: Suspended (1970) is also a large abstract composition similar in feel to the work in the auction.

A Place: Suspended represents ..an earlier moment in the artist's career before his focus on portraiture.  The large-scale work Is composed of two panels covered with surging waves of color, from rich, earthy reds and yellows to deep, vibrant blues and greens.  Knox said his change (from abstraction to portraiture) was driven by his penchant for capturing the human figure, and he attributes his time working in abstract painting as important to his understanding of space and color.

“Permanent Collection: The Kreeger Museum.” Permanent Collection | The Kreeger Museum, www.kreegermuseum.org/about-us/collection/painting/Simmie-Knox_A-Place-Suspended. Accessed 12 June 2025.

Although Simmie Knox (b. 1935) is best known as the first African American artist to receive a presidential portrait commission, an honor that placed his work in the White House with his depictions of President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton in 2000, his career began with bold explorations in abstraction. Born in Aliceville, Alabama, Knox was raised by his aunt and uncle on a sharecropper’s farm in nearby Leroy after his parents divorced. Art became a refuge early on and through formal study at Delaware State College (initially for Biology) and the Tyler School of Art at Temple University, where he received his MFA in 1972, he developed his innate talent into a vocation. Knox moved to the Washington, D.C. area after graduation, where he continued to develop his practice.

During the 1970s, Knox worked at the Museum of African Art in Washington and exhibited primarily as an abstract painter. In 1971, his abstract work was featured in the Thirty-Second Biennial of Contemporary American Painting at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, a notable moment that underscored his growing national presence. Knox’s work was also included in the important exhibtiton, Black Artists/South, held at the Huntsville Museum of Art, AL in 1979.

Eventually seeking a new challenge, Knox turned to portraiture, drawn to the discipline and depth it demanded. His ability to capture likeness and presence soon led to high-profile commissions, including portraits of Muhammad Ali, Thurgood Marshall, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Bill Cosby. His Clinton portraits elevated his national profile, but it is Knox’s steady dedication to portraying Black excellence and dignity that remains the throughline of his work.