The origins of Black abstract painting can be traced back to Norman ... pools of water slicked with rainbows of oil, the merging of surfaces and depths and distorted reflections.

As the Financial Times notes, Yiadom-Boakye creates her subjects, rendered in often-abstract ... paints black people, and in the most hallowed of traditional European art forms: oil painting ...

(MoMA also has a gorgeous abstract ... presence of an oil painting — portrays Mary, the mother of Jesus, and her cousin Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, as black women of undeniable ...