2 portraits of young men face off — and show a story about race in the history of art
There's a face-off at the Huntington Museum of Art near Los Angeles. The contenders are Thomas Gainsborough's 18th-century painting Blue Boy and Kehinde Wiley's very 21st-century Portrait of a Young Gentleman. The two young men are sportily dressed and look directly at visitors; they even stand the same way. But there is one major difference. They remind me of trading
