In 2021, two men connected at the intersection of fine art, snowboarding, culture and outdoor adventurism: action sports icon Selema Masekela and artist Chase Hall. They met at Hall’s exhibition in Brooklyn, NY. Chase, a lifelong snowboarder, grew up watching Selema commentate the X Games, absorbing the example Selema set as one of the few Black faces in action sports at the time. Selema left the gallery with his mind set on doing a project with Chase in the future.

He wrote about his experience of Chase’s artwork, saying, “The depth of power and the regal storytelling of Black existence in the world, hit me at a DNA level.”

Chase’s artwork spans mediums, from painting to printmaking, sculpture, photography, video and beyond. He engages through his work with both his personal history and American history, exploring race, class, nuance and mixedness. His recent work includes a solo exhibition at the SCAD Museum of Art in Savannah, GA, and a large-scale commission for the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City (not to mention various solo and group exhibitions, commissions, residencies, and inclusions in permanent collections at numerous world-renowned museums of fine art).

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