Noah Davis
Growth#1
Egon Investment Scores
Liquidity
6/10
How easily works can be bought and sold at auction
Institutional
10/10
Museum collections, biennials, and institutional recognition
Momentum
9/10
Recent price trends, gallery moves, and market buzz
Discovery
3/10
Undervaluation opportunity relative to peer artists
Risk
1/10
Investment risk factors — higher means more volatile
Market Position
- Pricing
- Price Ranges by Period
- 2019 2023
- $80,000-$1,500,000 at auction
- 2024 2025
- $1,100,000-$2,002,000 (significant price acceleration)
- Early Career 2007 2015
- Primary market through Roberts & Tilton
- Liquidity
- Moderate to high liquidity. 15+ auction results documented. Strong institutional demand. Gallery representation through David Zwirner ensures market stability.
- Collector Base
- Institutional collectors (MoMA, LACMA, Hammer, Whitney, Rubell); major private collectors including Mera and Donald Rubell, Dean Valentine, Michael Sherman, Mellon Foundation, Marie-Josée and Henry R. Kravis, Aileen Getty, Glenstone Museum
- Auction History
- Market Trajectory
- Dramatic upward trajectory posthumously. Market accelerating significantly 2024-2025 with multiple million-dollar+ sales and new records. Positioned as rising star in contemporary figurative painting market.
- Current Auction Record
- Date
- November 18, 2025
- Work
- The Casting Call (2008)
- Venue
- Sotheby's New York
- Amount
- $2,002,000 (with fees)
- Increase From Previous
- 33% increase ($502,000 above previous record)
- Recent Sales 2024 2025
Work Date Price Venue Estimate Status The Casting Call (2008) November 18, 2025 $2,002,000 (with fees) Sotheby's New York $1,000,000-$1,500,000 — Snail Pace (2010) November 19, 2025 $1,400,000 (with fees, $1.1m hammer) Christie's New York $1,000,000 high estimate — Untitled (2014) October 11, 2024 Christie's Auction Closed Untitled (Boy with Glasses) (2010) May 14, 2024 Christie's Auction Closed - Earlier Auction History
Work Date Venue Congo #7 (2014) November 17, 2022 Christie's Untitled (Blue Figure) (2010) November 10, 2023 Christie's Untitled (2010) May 17, 2023 Phillips Judge Judy June 30, 2020 Sotheby's - Previous Auction Record
- Date
- November 17, 2022
- Work
- Congo #7 (2014)
- Venue
- Christie's
- Amount
- $1,500,000
- Market Position
- Exceptionally strong. Two auction records set in November 2025. Major international touring retrospective (2024-2026) driving significant market attention and institutional validation. Estate now represented by David Zwirner (major blue-chip gallery). Strong secondary market activity at Christie's, Sotheby's, Phillips. Featured in marquee evening sales alongside established contemporary masters.
Institutional Presence
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York
The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York
Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)
Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), Los Angeles
Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA)
Nasher Museum of Art, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina
Rubell Museum, Miami
Santa Barbara Museum of Art
Glenstone Museum, Potomac, Maryland
Mellon Foundation Art Collection
Smithsonian Institution (4 works documented)
- Exhibitions
- Exhibition History Lifetime
Title Year Venue Type Noah Davis: Nobody 2008 Roberts & Tilton, Los Angeles Solo Noah Davis: The Forgotten Works 2010 Roberts & Tilton, Los Angeles Solo — — Tilton Gallery, New York Solo Savage Wilds 2012 James Harris Gallery, Seattle Solo The Missing Link 2013 Roberts & Tilton, Los Angeles Solo Garden City 2014 PAPILLION, Los Angeles Solo Imitation of Wealth 2015 The Underground Museum, Los Angeles Solo 30 Americans — — Touring group exhibition - Posthumous Major Exhibitions
Title Year Venue Type Young Blood: Noah Davis, Kahlil Joseph, The Underground Museum 2016 Frye Art Museum, Seattle Two-person with brother Kahlil Joseph Noah Davis 2020 David Zwirner, New York Career retrospective Noah Davis 2021 David Zwirner, London First UK presentation The Milk of Dreams 2022 59th Venice Biennale Group Noah Davis: Ancient Reign — David Zwirner, New York (69th Street) — Noah Davis (Major International Retrospective) — — —
- Museum Collections
- Institutional Validation Notes
- Exceptional institutional presence for posthumous artist. Collections include MoMA, Whitney, LACMA, SFMOMA. Major international touring retrospective 2024-2026. Inclusion in Venice Biennale. Represented by blue-chip David Zwirner gallery.
- Awards and Recognition
- Year
- 2013
- Award
- Art Here and Now (AHAN): Studio Forum Award
- Institution
- Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)
Career & Biography
- Career
- Identity
- Birth Death
- June 3, 1983 (Seattle, Washington) – August 29, 2015 (Ojai, California)
- Age at Death
- 32
- Cause of Death
- Rare form of soft tissue cancer
- Family Background
- Son of Keven Davis (entertainment and sports lawyer representing Serena Williams, Venus Williams) and Faith Childs-Davis (artist, writer, and non-profit leader). Brother: Kahlil Joseph (filmmaker and video artist). Married to Karon Davis (sculptor and artist).
- Total Works Created
- Approximately 400 paintings, collages, and sculptures
- Artistic Context
- "If I'm making any statement, it's to just show black people in normal scenarios, where drugs and guns are nothing to do with it" - described work as "instances where black aesthetics and modernist aesthetics collide."
Artistic Profile
- Influences
- Mark Rothko (color field abstraction)Marlene Dumas (figuration, psychology)Luc Tuymans (muted palette, history painting)Kerry James Marshall (Black representation)Fairfield Porter (American scenes)Peter Doig (dreamlike quality)Francis Bacon (psychological intensity)Caspar David Friedrich (Romantic atmosphere)Romare Bearden (African American subjects)Piet Mondrian (geometric abstraction)Max Ernst (Surrealism)Leipziger Schule and Magischer Realismus
- Themes and Subjects
- Key Themes Subjects
- Everyday Black life depicted with dignity and normalcySwimming pools and leisure scenesArchitectural spaces (Paul Williams housing projects, modernist buildings)Family photographs and personal archivesEgyptian mythology and African civilizationPop culture references (television, music)Surreal and dreamlike scenariosPortraiture (wife Karon, son Moses, family, community)
- Movements and Periods
- Signature Works
- Mary Jane (2008) - Girl in school clothes against botanical background
- American Sterile (2008) - Breakthrough work
- The Casting Call (2008) - Auction record holder, depicting women in casting call scenario
- Isis (2009) - Portrait of wife Karon as Egyptian goddess
- 1975 series (2013) - Based on mother's 1970s Chicago photographs
- Pueblo del Rio series (2014) - Reimagining LA public housing
- 40 Acres and a Unicorn (2007) - Fantasy and history blend
- Painting for My Dad (2011) - Father as hermit under starry sky
- Snail Pace (2010) - Man riding snail with gold leaf
- Influenced Artists
- Significant influence on younger generation of figurative painters; referenced as key figure in 21st-century figurative painting revival
- Stylistic Innovations
- Created unique synthesis of figurative and abstract painting; pioneered flat figurative style that influenced 2010s-2020s contemporary painting; developed distinctive approach to representing Black subjects that avoided cliché while engaging art history
- Art Historical Positioning
- Positioned as crucial figure in rise of figurative and representational painting in first two decades of 21st century. Seen as bridge between European painterly tradition (Dumas, Tuymans) and American abstraction (Rothko) while foregrounding Black experience. Compared to Kerry James Marshall for depicting Black life with complexity and dignity.
- Techniques and Mediums
Critical Reception
- Critical Reception
- Critical Consensus
- Unanimously acclaimed as crucial figure in 21st-century figurative painting. Praised for technical mastery, emotional depth, complex engagement with representation of Black life, art historical literacy. Described as 'once-in-a-generation colorist' and visionary community builder. Legacy continues to grow posthumously.
- Key Critical Themes
- Balance between abstraction and figurationRepresentation of Black life beyond traumaArt historical engagement (Rothko, Dumas, Tuymans, Marshall)Dreamlike, timeless qualityCommunity building through The Underground MuseumCollapsing of inherited images and imagined futures
- Monographs Catalogues
Title Year Contents Publisher Noah Davis 2020 Essays by Helen Molesworth, roundtable with Thomas Lax, Glenn Ligon, Julie Mehretu, Fred Moten; chronology by Lindsay Charlwood David Zwirner Books Noah Davis: In Detail 2021 Essay by Franklin Sirmans, roundtable discussion, extensive chronology David Zwirner Books Noah Davis (Retrospective Catalogue) 2024/2025 Essays by Tina M. Campt, Wells Fray-Smith, Paola Malavassi, Eleanor Nairne, Claudia Rankine; contributions by Dawoud Bey, T.J. Clark, Francesco Clemente, Karon Davis, Marlene Dumas, Helen Molesworth, Jason Moran Prestel (co-published)
- Publications and Media
- Documentary Coverage
- Note
- Two-channel video installation often shown with Davis's work
- Work
- BLKNWS
- Years
- 2018-2019
- Creator
- Kahlil Joseph (brother)
- Major Publications Reviews
Date Author Publication Quote October 2015 Helen Molesworth Artforum — — — Artforum — February 2010 — Dazed "Painting does something to your soul that nothing else can. It's visceral and immediate." February 2020 — The Brooklyn Rail — — Sebastian Smee The Washington Post "The show [at David Zwirner New York] is so good—yet so poignantly final—that it leaves you feeling both euphoric and wretched" — Jerry Saltz New York Magazine "What's remarkable about Davis' work is that he's very ahead of the curve on a sort of flat figurative painting that's absolutely dominated the 21st century." — Andrew Russeth Surface "establishes him as one of the signal figurative painters of the era, and a once-in-a-generation colorist." — Novuyo Moyo e-flux Criticism — September 2024 — Wallpaper* —
Gallery & Representation
- Fair Presence
- Represented at major art fairs through David Zwirner (Art Basel, Frieze, etc.)
- Representation
- Since
- 2020 (posthumous)
- Significance
- Top-tier blue-chip gallery representing estate
- Estate Gallery
- David Zwirner (New York, London, Los Angeles, Paris, Hong Kong)
- Exhibition Activity
- Highly active posthumously with David Zwirner. Multiple solo shows 2020-2024 in New York and London. Major international museum tour 2024-2026.
- Secondary Market Galleries
- Roberts Projects, Los Angeles (formerly Roberts & Tilton)Christie's, Sotheby's, Phillips (auction houses)
- Lifetime Gallery Representation
- Note
- Gallery became Roberts Projects after Jack Tilton's death
- Years
- 2007-2012/13 (approximately 5 years)
- Dealer
- Bennett Roberts
- Primary Gallery
- Roberts & Tilton, Culver City, California
- Geographic Reach
- Estate managed through David Zwirner. Works available through gallery and secondary market. High demand, limited supply given artist's death at age 32.
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