Sculptor Brings African American History to Life on Grand Scale

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Ed Dwight’s ‘monumental’ works fill critical gap

Even as a child, Ed Dwight had a gift for art. But he set that talent aside to focus on careers that included engineer, test pilot, astronaut trainee (the first African American in the program) and entrepreneur.

It was as the owner of a large construction company, Dwight says, that his childhood love for creating art reawakened. “What I was doing with the construction company was just taking scrap material that was left over and I was bringing it home to my garage,” he recalls. “I just taught myself to weld to make some art for my house.”

A life-changing commission

The amateur artist turned professional 25 years ago, when Colorado’s first African American lieutenant governor picked Ed Dwight to sculpt a major public statue.

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Sotheby’s moves to 4Q profit on reduced expenses

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Sotheby’s said that fourth-quarter net income was the second highest in its history due to an increase in the commission that it charges on auction sales and a cost-cutting drive.
The auction house said that income over the three months to December 31 was $73.6m (£49m), compared to a loss of $9.3m last time.

Bill Ruprecht, president and chief executive of Sotheby’s, said that the good fourth quarter was a “remarkable achievement”. Over the period, Sotheby’s increased commission from 16pc to 20.4pc compared to the previous year.

Mr Ruprecht said: “We are well poised to capitalise on an economic upturn and art market rebound as it occurs.”
The good run has continued. Sotheby’s recently sold L’Homme qui Marche 1 by Alberto Giacometti for $104.3m and Gustav Klimt’s Kirche in Cassone (pictured), for $43.2m.

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‘American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life, 1765-1915’ @ LACMA

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What is an American? Today, as the 20th century — the so-called “American Century” — recedes in memory, the question can seem immodest or even grandiose. If we don’t know now, after decades wielding almost unimaginable superpower status around the globe, will we ever?

Still, there’s another way to look at it. The question arises anew because of the conflicted place in which the United States finds itself today.

With the national nervous breakdown unleashed by the 9/11 terrorist attacks — trauma Americans have collectively been unable to resolve — our identity remains a shambles. The uncertainty had been building for at least 30 years. In the aftermath of Abu Ghraib and AIG, once-settled matters of morality now appear unrecognizable.

5,200 Australians strip for art’s sake

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There were all shapes and sizes – the large and the small, the young and the old, and even a heavily pregnant woman who had re-scheduled the birth of her twins so she could take part.

But the one thing the 5,200-odd people who posed for the American artist Spencer Tunick at the Sydney Opera House earlier today had in common was that they were all totally naked.

Thousands had gathered just before dawn on Monday, a mild and overcast first day of autumn, to take part in the shoot by the renowned (and controversial) photographer at one of Australia’s most iconic landmarks. Titled Mardi Gras: The Base, the shoot was commissioned by Sydney’s Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras festival.

As the sun rose, Tunick instructed participants – many of who were clapping and cheering to support each other – to do a number of poses on the steps of the famous Sydney landmark, from standing up, lying down, and even embracing cheek to cheek, for over an hour.

Modern art collector Ernst Beyeler dies

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By Eliane Engeler
Associated Press
Sunday, February 28, 2010

Ernst Beyeler, 88, whose early eye for undervalued Picassos and Impressionists helped him assemble one of Europe’s most famous art collections, died Feb. 25 at his home near Basel, Switzerland. No cause of death was reported.

Mr. Beyeler became a widely respected art patron after World War II by acquiring hundreds of works by Pablo Picasso, Paul Cezanne, Claude Monet, Henri Matisse and others. He presented them to the public in his Basel gallery and later in the foundation he founded near the German border.

His art collection grew to be worth at least $1.85 billion, thanks to his taste for quality and his personal connections with artists such as Georges Braque, Marc Chagall and Alberto Giacometti. He also was a friend of Picasso’s.
“Art must touch you and leave a strong visual and mental impression upon you,” Mr. Beyeler once told the Swiss weekly magazine NZZ Folio.

New attention for Harlem Renaissance artist with Greensboro roots

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No grand monument marks the spot in Maplewood Cemetery where Malvin Gray Johnson’s family laid him to rest 75 years ago.
There’s no marker at all.

Yet somewhere beneath this grassy spot lies the grave of the man whom one researcher calls “the most significant artist to come out of Greensboro.”

After he left his native Greensboro for New York in 1912 at age 16, Johnson became a rising star in the 1920s and 1930s during the explosion of black culture known as the Harlem Renaissance.
Most of his works eventually made their way to historically black universities, some into private collections and a self-portrait into the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

But because he died so young — at 38 — and so long ago, the artist fell into obscurity in Greensboro and in art history.

“I didn’t know that he grew up in Greensboro,” says state Rep. Alma Adams, who shows images of Johnson’s work in her African American art class at Bennett College.

Fruitful hands Designs by Carole Carson

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I first laid eyes on this pensive gentleman in a civil rights newspaper from the sixties called The Southern Courier. http://www.southerncourier.org/ I was captured by his eyes because I felt like they held the story of his life. I took a picture of the newspaper itself so that I could paint him. He was a sharecropper in Alabama, if my memory of the article serves me correctly. I could imagine how difficult his life must have been during that time of our history. Working hard for little pay. Taking care of a family. Fighting racism and inequality. He appears to have lived a long life…the suffering had to be long as well.

Nigel Freeman on Auctioning African-American Art

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Nigel Freeman’s African-American Fine Art department at Swann Galleries surprised many market observers when it began holding sales devoted to African-American art. Leading up to his seventh semiannual auction of African-American art, which was held on Tuesday, February 23, and earned $1.24 million, Freeman took time to speak about how the idea came about, how his specialists select art for the sale, and what he sees as the future of African American art at auction.

Oprah Helps Chef Fulfill Michelle Obama Wish

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When Oprah Winfrey recently asked her former personal chef what he wanted for his 50th birthday, Art Smith’s first thought was a new treadmill.
Aim higher, she told him.
How about a check to help fund the sort of healthy eating programs for children called for by another of his high profile clients, first lady Michelle Obama, recently called for?
Done.
On Monday, during a party hosted by celebrity chef Nigella Lawson, Smith says he’ll formally announce the $250,000 donation from Winfrey to his Common Threads nonprofit.
“We’re going to educate a lot of children about taking care of themselves,” Smith said during an interview late Friday at the South Beach Wine and Food Festival.
“I’d like to take this money to create healthy programs for children that mirror the first lady’s program,” said Smith, who recently lost 90 pounds thanks to his own healthy eating reforms.

Prince George’s County celebrates Black History Month

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Speaking at Prince George’s County’s annual Black History Month celebration last week, former Negro Baseball League player and Temple Hills resident Jimmy Bland fondly recalled the black families in segregated southern communities that housed and fed ballplayers like himself.

“There were a lot of places we couldn’t go and a lot of places [where] we couldn’t eat, but we had a real good time,” he said.

Bland, 70, and two other county residents who played for Negro League teams were among those honored at the sixth annual Black History Month celebration Feb. 17 at the County Administration Building in Upper Marlboro.

Beverly A. Collins Visual Artist

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Born and raised in Cincinnati, OH, I studied art at Wayne State University and the University of Cincinnati prior to moving to Los Angeles in 1978. Not having worked in the arts during the majority of my adulthood, opting instead to be a wife, mother and subsequently a single-parent, I devoted my life to the rearing of my daughter. It wasn’t until I experienced the “empty nest” syndrome and the mass lay-off from a job I thought would carry me into retirement that I revisited the art within me with the passion that drives me today.

Upon receipt of the lay-off notice in 1997 and the accompanying severance check, I almost immediately went to the art supply store, purchased an easel, enough canvases to last for a while, pints of paint, and painted for seven days straight — 10-12 hours a day. Upon completion of this cathartic experience, I emerged from the paint and the canvas, not quite realizing what had just transpired, to witness a rebirth – the beginning of a new phase in my life. For the first time in my life, I felt as though I had identified my purpose — to glorify God in me by capturing the miracle of color on canvas and sharing it with all who will see.

Color, line, texture and form embrace the very essence of our existence. One needs only to see a rainbow . . . enjoy a flower . . . squeeze a big red ripe tomato . . . become dazzled by the beauty of a tropical fish . . . catch a glimpse of an exquisitely colored bird . . . watch a beautiful butterfly . . . or pet a lady bug to experience the miracle of color in our lives.

Through the use of color, line, texture and form I hope to capture in some small way the essence of our existence and thereby give homage to the universal power of God that makes it possible for the very same colors we see in a rainbow to again reveal themselves in our environment and all the things therein. Once this is done, it is my desire to put art into the hands of those who understand and appreciate the overwhelming power of color in their daily lives by capturing the beauty of color, line and form to be displayed in places where we can experience the power of its radiance, energy, and interaction.

Beverly A. Collins
(213) 925-5797

www.beverlycollins.com

Peter Oluwadare Adeniyi – Brazilian Artist

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The Artist “Laid back Art ………… Laid back Life.”

Called Darton X, Peter Oluwadare Adeniyi is internationally well known , not only in África but also in Europe.

Born in June, 3rd 1968 in Ikere-ekiti, a small city in Ondo (State of Nigéria), Darton X has started painting since he was six, creating self-portraits from the mirrow of his own bedroom.

Taking part of a local School of Art, in 1978, Darton X twelve years old was 3th price at the conference of art show of west Africa in Nigéria. Darton X has emigrated to Italy in the 80’s, where he studied electronics and arts.

It defrayed his studies with his paintings and in little time as an artist, transferring all its directions to a universe of subtle tones and colors Returning to Africa, Darton X continued to study and to paint with many African artists, mixing its educational influences with the strong and intense colors of his home.

Developing his skills, Darton X started to try new roads in the way of the modern cubism. His paintings had started to possess the almost phantasmagoric expressions of its predecessors and ancestral Africans. Showing his works around of the world, Darton X has a strong relation with Spain, Portugal and the Consulate of France in the Bahia.

As a satisfied painter, Darton X says: “In art the possibilities are infinite and the talent blossoms of the skin. To paint allows us to see in the future while the artist confirms the gift.”

http://www.dartonx.20m.com/

Blackstream – not mainstream art.

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The term “blackstream” was used by Black artists in the 1900s who were denied admission to the art mainstream. More recently, fine art appraiser Edward S. Spriggs of Atlanta, Georgia brought the term “blackstream” to our attention. Feeling there was a need to identify this important time of formative awareness of, belief in and commitment to African-American art, we coined the phrase BlackStream Renaissance.

We further define this growth period as being marked by a collective community conscientiousness that recognizes the creative, cultural and financial viability of African-American visual expression.

The interplay between artists, community members and available resources has created a fabric-like cohesion characterized by:
• Artists willing to create
• A community that can inspire its artists
• A community that accepts its own cultural
creations as having value
• Sufficient community resources to sustain the
exchange of value

The patrons and artists of the BlackStream Renaissance purchased and sold art, displayed it at home and at work and shared it with friends, family, co-workers and the general public. In short, they have made African-American art an indispensable part of their everyday lives. The African-American community is effectively supporting and building an art industry, perpetuated primarily by its own members.

Work by artist Andrew Turner

Collecting African American Art

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Collecting African American Art

Dr. Mary Schmidt Campbell, former Executive Director of the Studio Museum in Harlem, has stated “…to give an object a home.” (-) “At the most private and personal level, that is the goal of the serious collector. Exercising taste, judgement, an intense love of a culture and its traditions, motivated by a caring not only for the visual forms of an artifact… but also a caring for the – creative willfullness – of a culture or an individual, the real collector feels a deep and abiding kinship with the objects he collects.”

The life enhancement that a piece of art generates for a collector is the most valid reason for selecting any art work. Collector motivation should be not solely whether a work of art will appreciate financially, but should be based on a link, a kinship, a connection with the essence and life force of the work. ‘The thing about art is that you only hold it in trust. There’s a living spirit in a great work of art. If you see it only in terms of its monetary value, the circle of communication is incomplete,” states Corrine Jennings of the Kenkeleba-Gallery, New York. An astute art collector will see the value of an artist’s work long before the investment oriented art collector takes note. A connoisseur with a sensitive eye uses esthetics rather than economic considerations in acquiring art work. Only esthetics is intrinsic to the art work. Economic or investment appreciation may be considered for the long run after the collector has found some valid esthetic reason to purchase a piece of art.

African Americans are purchasing Black Art because some have available more disposable funds and now have the means to collect art and support Black artists. In addition, African Americans now desire to make a cultural statement concerning their identity that the silk dress, expensive vacation or BMW can’t make. Non-African Americans purchase Black art because it offers a means to diversify an already established collection, i.e. art from the perspective of the African American artists hanging next to art rendered from the perspective of an Oriental or European artist and so on. Moreover, African American art is a “bargain” in terms of prices paid for other art. These new patrons have also helped to make the market stronger for Black art and to make African American art more and more of an investment.

Nonetheless, the link, the kinship, the connection, the life enhancement, the circle of communication, the esthetic value should be a collector’s primary motivation for acquiring art work. Should a piece of art appreciate over time, then that’s a plus.

“The Builders” by Jacob Lawrence.

Florida Highwaymen African American Artists

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In the early 1950’s through the 1980’s a group of twenty-six African-American artists known as the “Florida Highwaymen” used vivid and bright colors to display the beautiful untouched Florida landscape. The Florida Highwaymen painted wind-bent palm trees, serene sunsets, churning oceans and bright red Poinciana trees. They painted from their garages and back yards on inexpensive Upson board and then on the weekends they would travel and sell their Highwaymen paintings to hotels, offices, businesses and individuals who appreciated the artwork for around $25 a piece.
Collecting Florida Highwaymen art has become an exciting, but often expensive, hobby. The market for an original work of art by a Florida Highwayman can easily bring $5,000 or more. Some of the Highwaymen who are still living have resumed painting to meet the continuing demand for their work. Please take your time to browse our site for more information, or search above to find exactly what you are looking for.