From Gauguin to Calan, P.3 at the NOMA

The visit for Prospect.3 should start at the New Orleans Museum of Art, on the second floor, where the visitor can find the nexus of the biennial, Paul Gauguin's painting Under the Pandanus, 1891. The title of Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?, 1897, another work from Gauguin, would better summarize "the search" which is going to propel the visitors around New Orleans in the next few months. Gauguin is found next to Degas in the gallery. The two artists mingled while in Paris and, upon his return from New Orleans, Degas encouraged the restless artist to move to the Crescent City. Gauguin ended up in Tahiti and even further, the Marquesas Islands, in his search for exoticism and himself. Degas reported to the dealer Ambroise Vollard: "I advised him to go to New Orleans, but he decided it was too civilized. He had to have people around him with flowers on their heads and rings in their noses before he could feel at home."
The next P.3 artist, Tarsila do Amaral is represented with a painting and three drawings. Upon her return from Europe, the artist traveled in Brazil with the poet Oswald de Andrade, looking for the primitive and indigenous in her country. Os Anjos, 1924, is a naive but provocative painting representing mestizos as angels. One can find the influence of Fernand Léger in the tubular bodies and of her childhood in the colors baby blue, pink, she "adored as a child". The Brazilian artist was a member of the Anthropophagic Movement, and the sketches are related to one of her most famous work, Anthropofagia, 1929.
Jeffrey Gibson's search translates into a dichotomy in his works. From Choctaw and Cherokee descent, he "modernizes" traditional material like raw hide, beads, mixing them with fluorescent light or metal, and in the process westernizes the American Indian culture. He is represented by half a dozen iconic works appropriately displayed next to the golden cabin from Will Ryman, titled  America, 2013, part of the permanent collection.
Two abstract expressionist landscapes from Ed Clark and one of his oval paintings are next to a work from Joan Mitchell belonging to the permanent collection. The american artists became friends in Paris. Mitchell, who lived in France most her adult life, meets the criteria for P.3. In one of his essays, John Ashbery states: "she voluntarily became an apatride, not an expatriate". Alma W. Thomas did not choose to leave her birthplace. She was uprooted during her childhood from her native Georgia to Washington, D.C. with her family, to flee the racial violence. In the three paintings selected for P.3, she depicts nature with her characteristic brushstrokes and vivid colors. She was a member of the Washington Color School.  
Huguette Calan, another female artist, was born in Lebanon, taught in France and is currently living in California. Her body-landscapes are filled with sensuality and poetry.
The paintings from Frederick Brown are first and last, decking the Great Hall. Musicians have been selected among his portraits which include folk heroes, religious figures and more. Music is a dear theme in New Orleans, however, I could not find the link with P.3.

At first, the Prospect.3 exhibition at the New Orleans Museum of Art seems spotty, but after some consideration, the works embedded in the permanent collection offer a platform to look at the landscape from Asher Durand or the boxes from Joseph Cornell with new eyes. This is what the biennial is also about.






photographs by the author:

"Os Anjos", 1924, Tarsila do Amaral
"Quiver", 2012, Jeffrey Gibson
"Sunrise", 1973, Huguette Calan

Ed Clark at Prospect.3

Edward Clark was born in 1926 in the Storyville section of New Orleans. After living a few years in Baton Rouge, he moved with his family to Chicago.

In 1943, at the age of 17, he left high school and enlisted in the Air Force during the height of WWII. Upon his return, he studied at the Art Institute of Chicago from 1947 till 1951 and the following year at L' Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Paris. While abroad, he was profoundly influenced by the tachist Nicolas de Staël. His early works are characterized by his unique push-broom technique and the monumental scale of his paintings.
After spending five years in Paris, he came back to the United States and lived in New York City where in 1957 he exposed a shaped canvas at the Brata Gallery, an innovation at the time. The first known of the sort was made in 1968 during his sojourn in France. He experimented with different techniques during his career like working on paper with dry pigments, inspired by the "pouring sand" technique of the Pueblo tribe of the American Southwest.

Now 88 years old, he was recently featured in a New York Times articles and states: "No matter what  I do, there's not a day that I am not an artist."
During Prospect.3, his work can be seen at the NOMA.

                                      

"Louisiana Red", 2004, Ed Clark

(photograph by the author)

Abstract art in Baton Rouge, LA

Baton Rouge this week-end?

The LSU Museum of Art presents three abstract artists, from African-American descent, John T. Scott, Eugene Martin and Edward Clark. It is a great occasion to visit the Shaw Center for the Arts, a sober six-storied building located along the Mississippi river, downtown Baton Rouge. It is a quiet day in an otherwise busy venue, home to the Baton-Rouge Symphony, the LSU School of Art Gallery, the LSU Museum of Art, the Manship Theater (325 seats), classrooms and amenities such as a sushi restaurant on the rooftop.

The place is eerie (early Saturday) but I feel privileged to be here, alone among all these works. After a short introduction with enlightening comments about the artists and abstract art in the African-American community, the exhibition progresses with paintings and sculptures.

The giant canvasses from Edward Clark occupy most of the first and second room, bringing colors and movement to a point of romanticism, rendering abstract landscapes impressionistic, like "Louisiana Red" 2004, red sky, dark swamps, and infinite pale waters reflecting a peaceful , ethereal glow with the four elements air-fire, water and earth interdependent in the painting.

This is followed by "Luminous Turbulence", 2002, pinks and greys, "The Wave" 2006, blues and browns with the brush leaving deep crevasses on the canvas like the lines used to date trees, telling the history of the landscape.

Ed Clark is known for his "push broom" technique, applying the color on the canvass with a broom, bringing spontaneity and a physical dimension to his paintings. He can be qualified as a member of the American action painting movement.

Occasionally, he gives some relief to the canvass by using dry pigments, clay or soil from the countryside he is depicting, like in "The Crescent", 2006.

Smaller paintings, from the 60's and 70's, have a characteristic oval shape. Mainly related to voyages made by the artist, they evoke places with colours, and also bring memories of smells and sounds. The painter travelled extensively and produced the "Bahia Series", 1988, pink, violet , blue, the "Yucatan Series", 1976, turquoise, violet and pale blue, or the "Southern Light", 1978, green, black, blue. I found these paintings less spontaneous. The oval shape freezes the dynamic of the works.

The artist is well represented with 8 giant canvasses, 5 paintings in the oval series, and smaller works. For me, the "Wasted Landscape", 1961, seen above, is the most powerful of the large canvasses with its violent colors and message.

John T. Scott, a son from New Orleans, well known for his kinetic sculptures, is painting and sculpting music with his "Jazz thinking."

The works on display are mainly sculptures, like "Diddle Bow #1", 1983. The "Diddle Bow Series" was inspired by the African warriors who were using the hunting bows to make music after the fight. " Ritual Cutter 1&2", 1978, features two instruments of torture, in bright orange colour and "Dancing at the Crossroads", 1996 occupies a whole wall. The colours are a mixture of Mardi Gras and African exuberance. One can read a story, but the work does not use the space well, hybrid, between a wall decoration and a sculpture.

My preferred works are half a dozen sculptures from the "Circle Dance Series", light, gracious, of small sizes, made in patinated bronze which gives them an eternal look. They are creating rhythm in space with their circles of dance, strings and thin hammers. Like strange instruments, they could be played. "Boarded Back Window", 2001, "Kloee's Dream", "Zydeco Two Steps" with the lines of a dancer enhanced by the play with the shadows.

Three "Ethiopian Graffiti" complete the display.

The exhibition ignores his woodcut prints, but it is another story, and they would not fit in this colored display.

The third artist, Eugene Martin, was born in Washington, DC and later in life, moved to Louisiana. His paintings are a mixture of abstract and figurative. The painter never sided for a style and cubism, surrealism, color field techniques can be found in the same work. In a way, this makes him unique.

The colours are bold, sometimes just gaudy. His satirical abstract pieces send a cartoonish message, but in a sophisticated way, confusing the viewer.

The artist wrote: " They are opposing forces in all living things. My work reflect this and stirs up a contrast of emotions."

This exhibition is very rich and helps me understand these three artists, inspired by their roots, including colors and themes.

They were pioneers using the new abstract language, building their own voice. They will keep being heard.

The gallery's space is well used, and the abundance of works does not translate into overload. They are carefully displayed, each in its best light, without infringing on the next.

My eyes filled with colours, my next visit is the roof of the Shaw Center to enjoy the timid Spring sun and look at the lazy Mississippi.

1. "Wasted Landscape" 1961, Edward Clark

2. "Ethiopian Graffiti #3", John T. Scott

3. " Untitled" 2000, Eugene Martin

4. View from the top floor of the Shaw Center for the Arts

photographs 1, 2, 3, courtesy of the LSU Museum of Art

photograph 4 by the author