December 2020 | InspiredByPenta.com | 15
Opposite page:
Curator Destinee
Ross-Sutton.
Right: Portrait
of Ross-Sutton
by Kehinde Wiley.
Below: Portrait
of Ross-Sutton by
Amoako Boafo.
about how Black artists navigate the art
world. “People will try to pay low prices
for any artist,” she says. “But it is differ-
ent with Black artists because of this
history of exploitation of Black labor.”
In May 2018, Ross-Sutton co-curated
a pop-up show at Frieze New York,
exploring how women, especially
women of color, are portrayed in the
arts. She spent the next year traveling to
art fairs, which she chronicled on her
Instagram feed.
It was those posts that caught the eye
of Michael Elmenbeck, the creative
director and head of exhibitions at
CFHill in Stockholm. Elmenbeck had
been searching for the “perfect partner
and curator” to bring a show of Black
art to Scandinavia, when he began
noticing many artists he was drawn to
referenced Ross-Sutton.
“I realized this young person who is
a combination of curator, art lover,
muse, art advisor, seems to be a positive
source of energy for a lot of people,” he
says. So he messaged her via Instagram.
Ross-Sutton answered in two sec-
onds. “She lives with her telephone next
to her and she never seems to sleep,”
Elmenbeck says. Once Ross-Sutton
was assured that Elmenbeck was
serious—and sought to place works with
established collectors new to these
artists—she signed on.
When the show was being put
together early this year, few of the artists
were well known. “Half a year later, 50%
of these artists [are] super in demand,”
Elmenbeck says.
Less than a year later, Ross-Sutton
opened a virtual gallery on VorticXR, is
doing pop-up physical exhibitions in
different cities and countries, and
launched a U.S.-based exhibition titled
“Black Voices: Friend of Mind” with
works by 30 Black artists on the theme
of respite and self-indulgence.
That she is young and moving moun-
tains isn’t shocking to those who work
with her. As the Ghanaian artist
Oluwaseyi puts it: “Age does not limit
our greatness or our voices.”
requiring buyers not to auction their
purchased work for at least five years.
The sold-out show was a success,
although something of a “feeding
frenzy,” including “flippers looking for
their prey, not knowing that I handled
the sales and already know most of
them ;),” as Ross-Sutton said in an
email. In characteristic confidence she
added, “My sales agreements are
becoming quite the talk.”
That a 25-year-old could hold such
sway in the art world is testament to
demand for work by Black artists today,
and to Ross-Sutton’s fearless conviction
that she can protect the legacies of these
artists as she lifts many of them into
public consciousness.
Ross-Sutton, who grew up as one of
eight children, is driven by her love of
art—nurtured at the progressive schools
she attended as a child—and by a desire
“to do some good in the world.”
Although she studied journalism at
Kingsborough Community College in
Brooklyn, she began to focus on the arts
after a photography class showed her
the “power art can have.” As a volunteer
at the city’s Museum of Contemporary
African Diasporan Art, she found her-
self offering ideas for how to shape the
exhibitions. “I was lucky enough to be
heard,” she recalls.
That experience also taught her a lot
Opposite page: courtesy of Destinee Ross-Sutton; right: ‘Portrait of Destinee Ross’, 2019. By Kehinde Wiley. Oil on canvas, 181 x 143.2cm (71 1/4 x 56 3/8in). Copyright Kehinde Wiley; below: “Destinee Ross” by Amoako Boafo