Otis Houston Jr.
(b. 1954)
BornGreenville, South Carolina, United States
ActiveNew York, New York, United States
BiographyCountless people have experienced Otis Houston Jr.’s art by driving past it under New York’s Triborough Bridge. Since 1997, he has posed in eclectic costumes and displayed poetic spray-painted banners alongside assemblages of found objects, such as fruit, plants, and exercise bikes, on the stretch of pavement on the FDR Drive that serves as his studio. Beyond this highly visible platform, he also creates paintings, mixed-media works, installations, and music, all blending the textual and visual, motivated by his engagement with social activism. Complex issues such as poverty, health, class, racial injustice, addiction, and inequality, as well as messages of love and hope, are addressed with an irreverent spirit, with pieces bearing declarations such as “Can’t GO Unless WE ALL GO” and “You Can Kill Me But You Can’t Kill My Spirit.”Born in 1954, Houston Jr., who also uses the moniker Black Cherokee, grew up in Greenville, South Carolina. His fervor for art arose after he took art classes while he was incarcerated in the late 1970s. Some of his earliest works were collages cut from newspapers and magazines. Following his release, he settled in the Harlem neighborhood of New York, where he was drawn to the possibilities of bringing art to a public place. His colorful performances—on one day he holds a paintbrush aloft and wears a watermelon as a hat; on another his head is in a birdcage while he has a steering wheel in one hand and a cigar case in the other and holds a pen in his mouth to evoke the hazards of smoking—led to a mention in The New Yorker in 2001. By 2009, he was included in a group show at Canada gallery in Tribeca.
His first institutional solo show was held in 2022 at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center and Art Preserve in Sheboygan, Wisconsin. In 2024, the American Folk Art Museum honored him with its Visionary Award. As he stated at the time, “My art is an outward expression of who I am. It fulfills me. I meet so many people, it relieves stress, helps me to have a purpose in life, and I enjoy every minute of it.”
Allison C. Meier, 2025
Text written as part of “Rethinking Biography,” an initiative supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).