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| Beauford Delaney (American, 1901-1979), Marian Anderson, 1965, oil on canvas, 63 x 51½ in., J. Harwood and Louise B. Cochrane Fund for American Art. Image via VirginiaMuseum.blogspot.com. |
Modernist's portrait one of several works by black artists added to collection of Richmond, VA museum
On December 16, 2012, The Board of Trustees of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts met to approve the acquisition of a focused group of 12th to 20th-century objects by African and African American artists, among other works. The acquisitions underscore VMFA’s ongoing commitment to building, interpreting, and programming a diverse, global permanent collection. Each quarter, after VMFA’s trustees approve proposed acquisitions, the art becomes the property of the Commonwealth of Virginia, exemplifying the museum’s “It’s Your Art” motto.
Important paintings by two leading 20th-century American modernists—Beauford Delaney’s Marian Anderson (1965) and Aaron Douglas’s The Prodigal Son (ca. 1927)—were purchased with the J. Harwood and Louise B. Cochrane Fund for American Art. In addition, Elizabeth Catlett’s bronze Standing Mother and Child (1978) was donated by the Richmond chapter of The Links, Inc.
Two photographs by Gordon Parks are the first by this major 20th-century photographer to enter VMFA’s collection. Both of these images enable the museum to tell a more expansive story of photography at mid-century, while emphasizing Parks’ commitment to documenting the Civil Rights movement over more than a decade.
Beauford Delaney is critically acclaimed for his modern portraits, of which Marian Anderson is his most ambitious and accomplished. Characterized by a chromatic brilliance and technical complexity, the painting of the iconic contralto and cultural figure epitomizes the artist’s exploration of abstractions that featured the color yellow as a symbol of perfection and transcendence. The second work by Delaney to enter VMFA’s collection (the 1946 New York cityscape, Greene Street, was acquired in 2010), Marian Anderson becomes the museum’s first painted portrait of a celebrated historical black figure.
Called the Dean of African American art, Aaron Douglas is regarded as the leading visual artist of the Harlem Renaissance as well as the first black artist to create a distinctive modernist style that connected contemporary African Americans with their African heritage. The Prodigal Son has all the hallmarks of Douglas’s signature approach, while evoking one of his most important collaborations – eight gouache accompaniments to James Weldon Johnson’s God’s Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse, a collection of free-verse poems inspired by folk sermons of Southern black preachers. The Prodigal Son oil acquired by VMFA directly relates to this award-winning 1927 publication for which Douglas produced various drawings and paintings, including versions of the same subject in different media.
Standing Mother and Child is among the best-known later sculptures by the seminal African American artist and social activist Elizabeth Catlett. The iconic theme of mother and child, so expressively rendered in this 1978 bronze, is one most associated with the artist (who had three sons with her second husband, Francisco Mora). Characterized by Catlett’s distinctive figural realism with abstract elements drawn from African and Pre-Columbian art, Standing Mother and Child emphasizes the loving intimacy between the all-but fused figures.
Gordon Parks’ position as the first African American photographer on the staff of Life magazine put him at the center of the period’s complex racial struggles—from segregation in the South to the rise of the Black Power movement. Stokely Carmichael, Watts, Los Angeles was the lead image in the May 17, 1967 Life article on this important, if controversial, African American leader who coined the term “Black Power.” Gordon Parks wrote the essay in the feature, offering an important opportunity to pair his written voice with his photographic vision.
Untitled, Mobile, Alabama comes from a series of 70 original transparencies taken for a September, 1956 Life photo-essay on segregation entitled “The Restraints: Open and Hidden.” The “colored entrance” neon sign reveals the degree to which segregation was indelibly designed and integrated into 1950s American culture. Yet the dignity and repose of the woman and small child stand in contrast to the more violent Civil Rights images of protests usually associated with the genre.
In addition to this resonant array of African and African American objects, additional works of art were acquired by purchase and gift at the December meeting.
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