Bio
Elijah Trice is a contemporary artist and architectural designer, born and raised in Baltimore, MD. Trice was born into a family of skillful artists, photographers, and musicians. At a young age, he developed figurative and technical drawing skills and started to experiment with graphite and charcoal. He went on to receive his Bachelor of Sciences in Architecture at Morgan State University. After a year of working in an architecture firm, he decided to continue his studies at Rhode Island School of Design. During his second year of graduate school, he decided to pursue oil painting full-time, creating a bridge between his architectural and art education background.
Inspired mostly by everyday conversations with friends, family, even strangers, he captures personalities and expressions that tell stories about his subjects, allowing subjects to control and tell their own narrative in an authentic manner. Trice's work celebrates the cultural impact of blackness in America while critiquing sociopolitical narratives geared toward people of color.
Trice graduated in 2023 with a Master of Architecture degree from Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, RI. He has exhibited work in Baltimore, MD and Providence, RI.
Statement
In the studio, I paint portraits of people with phenomenal stories to tell without a platform to share. I decide to document subjects that are a part of the minority experience heavily based in Baltimore City. My curiosity about how people view and navigate the world stems from my architectural and community design background. This expertise is why I allow subjects to express themselves freely, giving them control over their narrative and documentation process. As a native of Baltimore, authentic storytelling and representation of the black and brown experience is crucial in my practice.
The creative process starts by photographing and recording interviews of each subject. The composition, color selection, and scale of each painting are directly inspired by audio recordings from the conversations. I use warm, saturated colors for skin tones to represent the spirit and energy of each subject. Techniques such as scraping, pushing, and removal of oil paint are used sparingly in the background to accentuate hierarchy, creating an emphasis on the subject's life experiences as the focal point. My goal is to produce work that reflects the black and brown experience from the lens of Baltimore residents, highlighting themes such as sexuality, gender, race, and immigration.