On a sun-drenched summer evening, some of New York’s finest artists gathered at the Whitney Museum for a private tour of Amy Sherald ’s first major solo show, “American Sublime.” They’d been assembled by Broadway superproducer Jeffrey Seller and director Thomas Kail, who invited friends from New York’s bustling performing-arts community to take in and, hopefully, be inspired by the work of a truly great visual artist.

Amy Sherald: American Sublime at the Whitney Museum. Matthew Carasella.

Forty-two of Sherald’s portraits, often depicting quotidian Black American life, have lined the walls of The Whitney since April 9. Among the collection are Sherald’s most heralded works: Miss Everything (Unsuppressed Deliverance), which won Sherald the National Portrait Gallery’s Outwin Boo

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