Meet Patricia Andrews-Keenan, founder of Pigment International, leading a movement to elevate Black artists, build a sustainable art ecosystem, and make Chicago the North Star of Black fine art (Photo Provided).
Her mentees call her “Auntie.”
But it’s safe to say that Patricia Andrews-Keenan has helped mother a movement in Chicago—centering Black artists and building sustainable communities for them to thrive.
As the founder of Pigment International, a Chicago-based platform uplifting Black contemporary art and culture, Andrews-Keenan has spent the last seven years using her corporate, media and storytelling background to connect artists, collectors, and communities across the globe. What started as a passion project in 2018 has since grown into a multilayered organization that publishes a print magazine, produces events and cultivates a digital network of Black creatives.
Andrews-Keenan said she was well past retirement age when she launched Pigment. But her journey—part collector, part communicator and now mentor—has made her a force within the art world and beyond.
“I started when I was in my 20s… anything with Black images on it,” she said, referring to how she got her love of art. “The big change came for me around the 2000s when I started meeting artists and getting to know them and realizing that they had great stories to tell that need to be concretized.”
From Cable to Culture
A Grambling State University journalism graduate, Andrews-Keenan spent years in corporate affairs and cable television before focusing on the arts. She credits her time marketing for networks like BET as key training.
“We understood building platforms,” she said. “I just took the skill set I learned in the corporate community, along with my love for Black art and a passion for telling that story.”
Pigment International now operates on multiple levels: a digital newsletter, a quarterly thematic publication, and an annual glossy magazine that has earned accolades. But at its core, the mission is simple—connection.
“We’re not above you, not below you. We just want to be in the network and share what you have to say and show what you have to show.”
Art of Mothering
With a son and grandson, Andrews-Keenan draws parallels between nurturing family and nurturing artistic talent. Both involve this one virtue: legacy.
“When we started in 2018, there were 15 artists we took to Miami,” she said. “We did a show in Miami, and today, I can still call any of those 15 artists, and they will come and work with us. They’ve developed amazing careers, and they’re doing things all over the world.”
The relationship-building doesn’t stop there. In 2022, she brought a Chicago-based artist to the prestigious Venice Biennale. That same artist was invited back in 2024.
“It’s about creating opportunities… If you want to call it nurturing, it is—but I think it’s nurturing plus the business. You can build something if you’re so determined to build it.”
Making Chicago the North Star
Photo Provided
Andrews-Keenan doesn’t look to New York or Los Angeles as the model for a thriving Black art ecosystem. She believes Chicago can and should lead.
“I want Chicago to be its own North Star,” she said. “We’re not followers in this. We’re leaders.”
Pigment International is anchoring that effort through its Pigment International Art Fair and the designation of Black Fine Art Month in October—an initiative formally recognized in the Congressional Record in 2019 by Rep. Robin Kelly.
“Just like Negro History Week got a foothold in Chicago and moved out, we want Black Fine Art Month to get a foothold here and move out,” Andrews-Keenan said.
Cities like Houston and Aurora have already issued proclamations. The hope is to continue scaling it nationally.
Investing in Our Own
Black art is a necessity, a medium with incalculable value as it empowers and heals. For Andrews-Keenan, it’s timeless.
“Black art is trending, but never trendy,” she said. “Black people created art that fed their soul, that told their story… and that’s as important today as it was back then.”
She stresses the importance of supporting Black artists while their work is still accessible.
Supporting Black artists, she argues, is both a cultural responsibility and an economic opportunity.
“We miss an opportunity when we aren’t investing in our own folks.”
Self-Reliance in a Shifting Political Climate
In today’s political and cultural moment, Andrews-Keenan says Pigment’s mission is more critical than ever.
“We have to take care of ourselves. One of our tenets is self-reliance,” she said. “We gotta make it through this… and the only way we’re going to do it is if we pool together.”
That means sustaining their platform with or without institutional funding and staying committed to telling Black stories regardless of who’s listening.
“Even if they send stuff back from the African-American Museum, back to the donators, somebody’s going to get that stuff, and we’re going to keep telling the stories of those things too.”
Looking Ahead
So, what’s next for Andrews-Keenan and the movement she’s building through Pigment?
Five or 10 years from now, she envisions her organization thriving under a new generation of leadership.
“Our goal is to work with some of these young people coming up to perpetuate the platform.”
She would like to see Black Fine Art Month gain widespread recognition like Black History Month and have her organization partner with HBCUs like her alma mater, Grambling State, and Chicago State University to integrate arts journalism into the curriculum.
“If I had known I could’ve written about art—I would’ve done that 20 years sooner,” she did.
A Legacy Rooted in Giving
With Mother’s Day upon us, it’s hard not to see the maternal thread running through everything Andrews-Keenan does.
And through Pigment International, she’s helping a movement grow—one story, one show, one artist at a time.
“Once you have that instinct… you’re a nurturer,” she said. “We want to give because if you give, you’re going to get what you need.”
And while young artists in the city do call her “Auntie,” the care, cultivation and community Andrews-Keenan has provided to so many proclaims “Mother.”
The Chicago Defender celebrates Black mothers who nurture, build and Inspire.
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