Romare Bearden
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Romare Bearden (September 2, 1911–March 12, 1988) was an
African-American artist and writer. He worked in several media
including cartoons, oils, and collage.
Bearden was born in Charlotte, North Carolina. He attended De Witt
Clinton High School in the Bronx and completed his studies at New
York University (NYU), graduating with a degree in education. His
education was interrupted by stretches of time he spent as a
professional baseball player in the Negro Leagues. Bearden took
extensive courses in art and was a lead cartoonist and then art
editor for the Eucleian Society monthly journal The Medley. Bearden
had wide-ranging interests and abilities. He wrote and published
articles on numerous topics and created political cartoons. He
designed costumes and sets for prominent dance and theater
companies, illustrated books by influential authors, co-wrote books
about African American art and culture and composed songs. He was
also offered an opportunity to play professional baseball for the
Philadelphia Athletics, if he would agree to “pass as white”—an
offer he refused.
He studied under German artist George Grosz at the Art Students
League in 1936 and 1937. At this time his paintings were often of
scenes in the American South, and his style was strongly influenced
by the Mexican muralists, especially Diego Rivera and José Clemente
Orozco. Shortly thereafter he began the first of his stints as a
case worker for the New York Department of Social Services. During
World War II, Bearden joined the United States Army, serving from
1942 until 1945. He would return to Europe in 1950 to study
philosophy at the Sorbonne under the auspices of the GI Bill.
Between the war and
his stay in Paris, Bearden had some important artistic successes. He
developed a Cubist-inspired style of dark lines and thin color
washes with which he produced fairly abstract representations of
scenes from the Iliad and the Passion of Christ. He had several solo
exhibitions during this time, but in 1949 he was dropped from the
Samuel Kootz Gallery because his work was not abstract enough.
Bearden turned to
music, co-writing the hit song “Sea Breeze", which was recorded by
Billy Eckstine and Dizzy Gillespie; it is still considered a jazz
classic. In 1954, at age 42, he married Nanette (Rohan) Bearden, a
27 year old accomplished dancer and noted beauty who herself became
an artist and critic. The couple eventually created the Bearden
Foundation to assist young artists. Nanette Bearden was also
instrumental in convincing her husband to return to visual art.
In the late
1950s, Bearden's work became more abstract, using layers of oil
paint to produce muted, hidden effects. In 1956, Bearden began
studying with a Chinese calligrapher, whom he credits with
introducing him to new ideas about space and composition in
painting. He also spent a lot of time studying famous European
paintings he admired, particularly the work of the Dutch artists
Johannes Vermeer, Pieter de Hooch, and Rembrandt. He began
exhibiting again in 1960. About this time the couple established a
second home in the Caribbean island of St. Maarten.
During the
1960s civil rights movement, his focus shifted again, this time to
collage. After helping to found an artist's group in support of
civil rights, Bearden's work became more representational and more
overtly socially conscious. In 1964, he held an exhibition he called
Projections, where he introduced his new collage style. These works
were very well received, and were exhibited the following year at
the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. He would continue to
work with variations of his collage style until his death, and these
are generally considered to be his best work.
There have been
numerous museum shows of Bearden's work since then, including a 1971
show at the Museum of Modern Art entitled Prevalence of Ritual, an
exhibition of his highly prized prints entitled A Graphic Odyssey
showing the work of the last fifteen years of his life, and the 2005
National Gallery of Art retrospective entitled The Art of Romare
Bearden.
In "The Art of
Romare Bearden", Ruth Fine describes his themes as "universal". "A
well-read man whose friends were other artists, writers, poets and
jazz musicians, Bearden mined their worlds as well as his own for
topics to explore. He took his imagery from both the everyday
rituals of African American rural life in the south and urban life
in the north, melding those American experiences with his personal
experiences and with the themes of classical literature, religion,
myth, music and daily human ritual."
A mural by Romare
Bearden in the Gateway Center subway station in Pittsburgh is worth
$15 million, more than the cash-strapped transit agency expected,
raising questions about how it should be cared for once it is
removed before the station is demolished. "We did not expect it to
be that much," Port Authority of Allegheny County spokeswoman Judi
McNeil said Thursday. "We don't have the wherewithal to be a
caretaker of such a valuable piece."
It would cost the
agency more than $100,000 a year to insure the 60-foot-by-13-foot
tile mural by Romare Bearden, McNeil said. Bearden was paid $90,000
for the mural, titled "Pittsburgh Recollections." It was installed
in 1984.
