The global recognition of the American artist’s politicised figurative painting continues with a suite of solo shows. On the occasion of this year’s Royal Academy show, The Guardian reckoned Marshall to be ‘America’s greatest living painter’, and there are many who would agree that his evocation of classical composition to paint scenes of Black history and ordinary life, from the beauty parlour and barbershops, school trips and picnics, to rebels against slavery and African collaborators in the trade, marks him out. ‘Staggering, triumphant’, thought The Times of the London exhibition, which travels to Kunsthaus Zürich and Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris over the next year. ‘Prepare to be bewitched’, agreed The Daily Telegraph. The exhibition is only the latest chance for critics and artists to revel in the art-historical references and complexity of Marshall’s politics. Indeed, the walls of the RA weren’t expansive enough for the British capital’s acclaim for KJM: the artist took over the Tabernacle, a former church in Notting Hill, to show a selection from Rythm Mastr, the graphic novel series the artist has worked on for over 25 years.