One Fine Show: Art from the Dean Collection of Swizz Beatz and Alicia Keys at the VMFA

If you hang around the art world long enough, the odds are good that you’re going to encounter at least the aura of Kasseem Dean, a.k.a. Swizz Beatz, and his wife Alicia Keys. The two are often on the gala circuit, and at art fairs, it’s not uncommon to hear that they were just in the booth; in fact, you just missed them. I believe my closest encounter was the time I was enjoying Agnes Denes’s excellent retrospective at The Shed in 2020, when I heard someone in the nearby auditorium looping the piano opening to “Empire State of Mind” over and over again. When I inquired as to who was being tortured in the other room, a guard enlightened me that these noises were being made by Keys herself, rehearsing for a private party.

The couple’s most tangible impact on the art world has been through their collection, part of which is now on display at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts as “Giants: Art from the Dean Collection of Swizz Beatz and Alicia Keys.” The show (which was organized by the Brooklyn Museum and has zigzagged its way around the U.S., landing in La Jolla next) brings together around 130 objects by artists like Derrick Adams, Ernie Barnes, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Kwame Brathwaite, Barkley L. Hendricks, Gordon Parks, Ebony G. Patterson, Tschabalala Self, Amy Sherald, Vaughn Spann, Henry Taylor, Hank Willis Thomas, Mickalene Thomas, Kehinde Wiley, Kennedy Yanko and Lynette Yiadom-Boakye. The coordinating curator at VMFA is Valerie Cassel Oliver, the Sydney and Frances Lewis Family Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art.

Exhibitions of an art collection are not meant to be cohesive, and this one is a mixtape where each track is strong, if not necessarily flowing into the next song. That’s fine. There’s not much else that’s like Untitled, Miami, Florida (1970), Parks’ portrait of Muhammad Ali on the cusp of his comeback after his three-year exile for refusing the Vietnam War draft. Covered in sweat, Ali mugs in mock surprise, contradictory emotions that no doubt belie many hidden others. You could compare this to Untitled (Model who embraced natural hairstyles at AJASS photoshoot) (1970) by Brathwaite, the photographer who arguably started the “Black is beautiful” movement, but context in this case hinders the picture. There’s too much to notice by going deep inside it: the ripples within the tones of skin on the model’s arm and how they play with the color shifts in the background. The composition is crazy, with the afro most notable for both its colors and its texture. It’s a little idiotic to point out that, on top of everything else, the model is beautiful.

Pon de Rock (East View) (2007) is a curious one. Hendricks is best known for his portraits, so this late-career sea view shouldn’t be much to write home about. It is also, for some reason, framed in a protractor. But dig in, and you’ll find that the light on the teal ocean moves in a way I’m not sure I’ve seen before in a seascape. Combine this with vegetation that is charming despite being sparse and scraggly, and you have almost as much character here as a proper portrait. Clearly, this art world power couple is committed to building a collection that’s diverse in every way.

“Giants: Art from the Dean Collection of Swizz Beatz and Alicia Keys” is on view at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts through March 1, 2026.

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