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Joseph Awuah-Darko Accuses Kehinde Wiley of Sexual Assault

Joseph Awuah-Darko, a prominent figure on the Ghanaian art scene, has accused world-renowned artist Kehinde Wiley of sexual assault.

Awuah-Darko said that Wiley assaulted him twice at a June 9, 2021 dinner held in the artist’s honor at the Creative Art Council at the Noldor Artist Residency, which Awuah-Darko founded in 2020. Wiley has denied the allegations.

Awuah-Darko’s May 19 post said that the first assault consisted of Wiley groping his buttocks while he was escorting Wiley and another guest up a flight of stairs to the bathroom.

This contact was, he said, “categorically unwelcome and unprovoked.”

He said it was witnessed by another dinner guest, who is not named; Awuah-Darko did not immediately respond to an emailed inquiry about the identity of this person.

“The second assault,” Awuah-Darko said, “was much more severe and violent.”

He did not go into specifics.

Wiley responded in an Instagram post, saying: “Someone I had a brief, consensual relationship with almost three years ago is now making a false accusation about our time together. These claims are not true and are an affront to all victims of sexual abuse. I have no idea why he has decided to target me in this way—particularly when there is a litany of evidence showing his claims are false—but I hope he gets the help he needs for whatever he is going through. I kindly ask for privacy as I work to clear my name.”

In a longer statement supplied to Artnet News via his press representative, Marathon Strategies, Wiley added that Awuah-Darko “has been trying to be part of my life ever since we met, flying to Nigeria to attend my birthday party, attempting to visit my home in upstate in New York, sending me warm and cordial text messages, and almost a year ago to the day attending my exhibition at the de Young Museum in San Francisco and posting to Instagram that the show by his ‘dear friend’ was ‘breathtaking.’”

The PR firm provided screenshots of several text messages between Awuah-Darko and Wiley dating from between the time of the alleged assault and Awuah-Darko’s Instagram posts, including the since-deleted May 27, 2023 post in which Awuah-Darko refers to Wiley as “my dear friend.”

Awuah-Darko, who is a collector, artist, musician, writer, curator and entrepreneur, was born in London to a family of Ghanaian financiers and lives in Accra.

He appeared on Forbes Africa’s “30 Under 30” list in 2019, where he was celebrated both as an artist and the managing director of the African Modern Art Fund.

The Noldor Residency supports African and diaspora artists.

He collects Ghanaian art stars such as Serge Attukwei Clottey and Gideon Appah.

On March 23, Awuah-Darko posted an Instagram video in which he said he had been assaulted but did not name Wiley.

In his post from Sunday, he said that it took him several months to “reconcile” with what had happened and said that given Wiley’s stature as a gay man, “formally reporting this assault in a West African country like Ghana (where anti-LGBTQIA+ sentiments are prevalent) would have been problematic at best—dangerous at worst.”

He also said that there are other victims of abuse at Wiley’s hands in New York (where the artist is based), Beijing (where he has a studio), Nigeria, and elsewhere; he added that other art world professionals “have quietly expressed witnessing this pattern of predatory behaviour [and] that this behaviour by Kehinde has been treated as an open secret within the art world for quite some time.”

Awuah-Darko did not immediately respond to an emailed request to expand on any of these claims.

No criminal charges have been filed against Wiley, according to a report in the New York Times, which also noted that Wiley’s lawyers sent Awuah-Darko a cease and desist letter demanding that the Ghanaian artist delete his Instagram posts and refrain from making what it said were false statements against Wiley. Awuah-Darko told the Times that he had not seen the letter.

“I thoroughly invite you to leverage your supposed credibility, your influence, your loyalists, and everything you have to gag those of us who come forward,” Awuah-Darko concluded in his Instagram post. “Because I assure you, you will need it.”

Since his first show with Sean Kelly in 2012, Wiley has rocketed to international stardom.

He received a U.S. State Department Medal of Honor in 2015 and ascended to even higher rungs of fame when he was commissioned to paint a portrait of President Barack Obama, which was unveiled in 2018.

In 2019, he made another splash when he founded Black Rock Senegal, a residency program in that country’s capital city, Dakar.

Museums Cancel or Delay Kehinde Wiley Shows in Wake of Allegations

The Joslyn Museum of Art in Omaha, Nebraska, the Minneapolis Institute of Art (Mia), and the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM) have shelved or postponed exhibitions by Kehinde Wiley.

These actions come in the wake of accusations of sexual assault against the artist.

The first was leveled by the artist-curator Joseph Awuah-Darko, on Instagram last month.

Since then, two others, activist Derrick Ingram and Nathaniel Lloyd Richards, have made claims of rape or groping, which Wiley has dismissed as “baseless.”

The Minneapolis show, an iteration of the survey “An Archaeology of Silence,” which debuted at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and later traveled to the Museum of Fine Art, Houston, has been canceled.

“Mia was considering taking the Kehinde Wiley exhibition, but as a result of these unfortunate allegations we will not be proceeding with this presentation,” the institution said in a statement to ARTnews today.

“An Archaeology of Silence” was scheduled to travel to the PAMM from July 2024 to January 2025, but a museum spokesperson said it has “suspended plans” to host the show.

The Flatwater Free Press, meanwhile, reported yesterday that the exhibition “Kehinde Wiley: Omaha” will not open on September 10 as scheduled, when the Joslyn Museum reopens after a more than two-year renovation.

“We are revisiting our exhibition schedule,” Amy Rummel, director of marketing and public relations, told the paper.

“The Joslyn will announce any updates at a later date.” The museum declined to answer questions about whether the delay was related to the assault allegations.

The exhibition was to focus on South Sudanese immigrants residing in Omaha.

While already widely known in the art world for portraits of young Black men in poses and settings that echoed those of the Old Masters, Wiley broke out onto a new level of global fame in 2018, when he was tapped by Democratic President Barack Obama to paint his portrait.

Wiley’s attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the museums’ actions or on the accusations themselves, but Jennifer J. Barrett, of New York firm Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, previously told ARTnews: “Posting something to Instagram doesn’t make it true. Yet, in today’s world, anyone can spread blatant lies with a single post, and the public accepts it at face value.”

Anti-Censorship Coalition Criticizes Cancellation of Kehinde Wiley Shows

The National Coalition Against Censorship, an alliance of nonprofit groups supporting free speech and civil liberties, has criticized the cancellation and postponement of Kehinde Wiley shows in the wake of sexual misconduct allegations.

Wiley, best known for his portrait of U.S. President Barack Obama, has denied allegations of sexual assault made last month by Ghanian art figure Joseph Awuah-Darko and two other men that later came forward.

Still, in the wake of the allegations, the Joslyn Museum of Art in Omaha, Nebraska, the Minneapolis Institute of Art, and the Pérez Art Museum Miami have shelved or postponed exhibitions of his work.

While the NCAC agreed that the allegations against Wiley are “serious and concerning,” the coalition argued that museums are not equipped to be moral arbiters.

“His stature as an artist would in no way excuse any such alleged behaviors or lessen their impacts,” NCAC said. “But the response of cultural institutions—to immediately rescind plans to exhibit the artist’s works—does a disservice to the audiences who wish to experience the work of one of the nation’s most well-recognized artists.”

The coalition said the response by the three museums implied a practice of scrutinizing the personal conduct of all artists they exhibit, saying that institutions are “not equipped or mandated to be enforcers of moral orthodoxy.”

Instead, the coalition suggested that museums should contextualize artworks that have artistic merit rather than canceling the artists.

Doing so, it said, would reduce the “complexity and quantity of art eligible for exhibition.”

As examples, it pointed to noted artists with “moral flaws,” such as Caravaggio, who was convicted for murder, and Picasso, who was known to be abusive to his lovers.

“Museums are, or at least should be, equipped to host exhibitions that probe the complexity of given artworks at the time in which they are presented, and host important discussions about ethical conflicts, should the need for them arise,” the coalition added.

The group called on the leadership behind the Joslyn, Pérez, and Minneapolis museums to go ahead with their respective Kehinde Wiley exhibitions, while acknowledging the allegations against the artist.

It further urged all museums to adopt “clear free speech guidelines” for future exhibitions.

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