"I'm sort of fascinated by his use of the alphabet as a stand-in for certain political gestures and even figures in some cases. In this painting, you see the player at the bottom with the thought bubble that says, 'Black Cunt!' referring to the other player whose person is replaced by the letter 'C'. As it reoccurs throughout the body of work, it's interesting to see how he creates his own visual language coupled with actual text and language."

"In Black See from 2012, the use of the letter 'C' reoccurs and there are multiple figures at the bottom depicted as such. This letter 'C' becomes an identity and a target for this racist situation. There's an overt callousness in the way that players become targets of racism in international sports. In a number of sports, it's commonplace from country to country and it's not just isolated incidents. There's this Black-White racism that goes on, particularly with African players. As a huge fan of English football, you see it all over the place."

"I think that is one of the most difficult things for artists who use political gestures and markers as a source for their work. It tends to get locked inside a dogma from one political position, whichever one it is. He has a way of looking at an event and then translating it through his own visual lens. It's remarkable that a lot of the subject matter Hookey uses is from the early 2000s, yet it has such a strong resonance now. You're looking at a painting from 2003 or 2006, and the issues are as fresh today as are the brush strokes. At times with folks that paint like this, such as Leon Golub and Sue Coe, it can almost become a historicized bookmark for that period when it's so anchored to one particular political event. But in Hookey's case, the work transcends that and it is equally relevant in 2020, as it was in 2003.

He somehow managed to pull the rug out from anchoring it to a period and having it become frozen in time. The work has a life after the event."

"I have personally referenced Elvis a number of times. He's a very interesting figure from history and music who has taken his voice and moves straight out of Black Blues from the South. And, you know, he's treated as a God. But, Elvis in Hookey’s work is the Elvis from the latter part of his career. It's one of those images that people look at as the tragedy of Elvis, the man, when he was doing Las Vegas shows and completely under the influence of drugs. He's overweight and not the Elvis that you saw in early films that people were attracted to. 

He's this tragic figure at the end of his career. A lot of Elvis impersonators have this tendency to use that Elvis because it's the most extreme: the hair, the sideburns, and the big belly with the Evel Knievel outfit. So the actual flip of taking this iteration of Elvis, and making him Black Elvis is an interesting idea.

Elvis appears again as a stand-in for the helicopter, called the ‘Elvis’ helicopter and it's used in this horrible fire. One of the strengths of Hookey's work is also his sense of humor. The helicopter contraption that he has on the back of Elvis is hilarious. This charged figure is reduced to a comical spectacle flying over this fire and putting it out. He is taking a serious issue and softening it with a sense of humor. For me, that's a much more accessible and palatable set of images than the actual scene itself. It’s an interesting commentary that goes beyond the literal fire and starts to talk outside of itself and into places of American popular culture."