Armando Alleyne: A Few of My Favorites is the first book of collected works by New York artist Armando Alleyne. Other Means worked closely with the artist and publisher to help conceive, design, and co-edit this publication.
A Lifetime of Paintings
Armando Alleyne (b. 1959, New York) is an artist, born and raised in New York’s Lower East Side, whose painted and collaged renditions of jazz musicians, Afro-Latin singers, boxers, his family members, and acquaintances move with a rhythm all their own.
Parallel to his practice of painting portraits of Black icons, Alleyne allows elements of his lived experience to take form in his work. His portraiture animates his firsthand experience of homelessness, deploys a pantheon of religious symbolism to pay homage to a sister lost to AIDS, and explores his erotic fantasies through painting, poetry, and prose.
Never shying away from the seminal, the sensual, or the political, Alleyne’s paintings tell a story of how we are subject to our city and how in it we can search for the tools to heal.
Armando’s life and personal history are thoroughly archived through photographs, illustrations, and texts written by the artist. Artworks are presented alongside a series of snapshots and personal anecdotes that memorialize artworks sold and people who are no longer with us.
Armando Alleyne (b. 1959, New York) is an artist, born and raised in New York’s Lower East Side, whose painted and collaged renditions of jazz musicians, Afro-Latin singers, boxers, his family members, and acquaintances move with a rhythm all their own.
Parallel to his practice of painting portraits of Black icons, Alleyne allows elements of his lived experience to take form in his work. His portraiture animates his firsthand experience of homelessness, deploys a pantheon of religious symbolism to pay homage to a sister lost to AIDS, and explores his erotic fantasies through painting, poetry, and prose.
Never shying away from the seminal, the sensual, or the political, Alleyne’s paintings tell a story of how we are subject to our city and how in it we can search for the tools to heal.
Armando’s life and personal history are thoroughly archived through photographs, illustrations, and texts written by the artist. Artworks are presented alongside a series of snapshots and personal anecdotes that memorialize artworks sold and people who are no longer with us.
Armando Alleyne (b. 1959, New York) is an artist, born and raised in New York’s Lower East Side, whose painted and collaged renditions of jazz musicians, Afro-Latin singers, boxers, his family members, and acquaintances move with a rhythm all their own.
Parallel to his practice of painting portraits of Black icons, Alleyne allows elements of his lived experience to take form in his work. His portraiture animates his firsthand experience of homelessness, deploys a pantheon of religious symbolism to pay homage to a sister lost to AIDS, and explores his erotic fantasies through painting, poetry, and prose.
Never shying away from the seminal, the sensual, or the political, Alleyne’s paintings tell a story of how we are subject to our city and how in it we can search for the tools to heal.
Armando’s life and personal history are thoroughly archived through photographs, illustrations, and texts written by the artist. Artworks are presented alongside a series of snapshots and personal anecdotes that memorialize artworks sold and people who are no longer with us.
Armando Alleyne: A Few of My Favorites
Armando Alleyne: A Few of My Favorites was named one of the Most Beautiful Swiss Books in 2021.
Artworks fill the page with details reproduced at actual size.
The book design follows the format of a family photo album, with descriptions on the back of pictures and a sequence shaped by memory rather than chronology. This leads to a meandering experience for the reader, who has to flip back and forth many times to piece together the artist’s story.