CHARLES WHITE (1918 - 1979) Lo, I am Black . Charcoal and crayon drawing on cream illustration board, 1978. 1255x1050 mm; 49 1/2x41 3/8 inches. With the estate ink stamp signature, lower right. Provenance: the estate of the artist; the collection of Evelyn N. Boulware, New York. Exhibited: Heritage Gallery, Los Angeles, and ACA Gallery, New York, with the labels on the frame back. Illustrated: Barnwell, Andrea D. Charles White The David C. Driskell Series of African American Art: Volume I. Ronhert Park, CA: Pomegranate Communications, 2002, plate 50, p. 103. Lo, I am Black is one of the works the artist made in preparation for his last commissioned mural, Mary McLeod Bethune , for the Los Angeles Public Library in Exposition Park. In the 1970s, Charles White was received international recognition and had work in numerous museum exhibitions, including a solo exhibition at the High Museum of Atlanta. The year before White was appointed full professor and chair of the Drawing Department at Otis Art Institute, Los Angeles. Charles White's works have long celebrated African-American women: beginning with his first gallery exhibition of paintings in 1950, Black Women , exhibited at ACA gallery in New York. Some of his most famous commissions like Five Great American Negroes , 1939-40, for Howard University and The General (Harriet Tubman) , 1965, for the Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Company, also depicted heroic African-American women on a grand scale. In 1974 for his induction to the National Academy of Design, Charles White created another large maternal figure with the oil painting, Mother Courage II , which is very similar in drapery and composition to this drawing. Lo, I am Black shows the artist's continued consummate skill in figurative drawing late in his career. The seated, draped pose has the solidity and impressive nature of a Renaissance Pièta or a Mandarin Chinese figure. White had frequently given form to figures with drapery throughout his career. The face is as a consummate Charles White portrait: proud, transparent and without artifice. These elements come together in a universal work that crosses many boundaries. As the art historian and artist James A. Porter wrote: "his one-man exhibitions have always been for me unforgettable events, providing the highest opportunity for enlightenment through the revelation of powerful truths couched in beautifully nuanced graphic poetry that unfailingly hits the mark. Indeed, his art belongs not to one people, but to all the world." Gedeon D133, p. 199 and 343; Horowitz pp 3-4; Barnwell pp. 105-106.
CHARLES WHITE (1918 - 1979) Lo, I am Black . Charcoal and crayon drawing on cream illustration board, 1978. 1255x1050 mm; 49 1/2x41 3/8 inches. With the estate ink stamp signature, lower right. Provenance: the estate of the artist; the collection of Evelyn N. Boulware, New York. Exhibited: Heritage Gallery, Los Angeles, and ACA Gallery, New York, with the labels on the frame back. Illustrated: Barnwell, Andrea D. Charles White The David C. Driskell Series of African American Art: Volume I. Ronhert Park, CA: Pomegranate Communications, 2002, plate 50, p. 103. Lo, I am Black is one of the works the artist made in preparation for his last commissioned mural, Mary McLeod Bethune , for the Los Angeles Public Library in Exposition Park. In the 1970s, Charles White was received international recognition and had work in numerous museum exhibitions, including a solo exhibition at the High Museum of Atlanta. The year before White was appointed full professor and chair of the Drawing Department at Otis Art Institute, Los Angeles. Charles White's works have long celebrated African-American women: beginning with his first gallery exhibition of paintings in 1950, Black Women , exhibited at ACA gallery in New York. Some of his most famous commissions like Five Great American Negroes , 1939-40, for Howard University and The General (Harriet Tubman) , 1965, for the Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Company, also depicted heroic African-American women on a grand scale. In 1974 for his induction to the National Academy of Design, Charles White created another large maternal figure with the oil painting, Mother Courage II , which is very similar in drapery and composition to this drawing. Lo, I am Black shows the artist's continued consummate skill in figurative drawing late in his career. The seated, draped pose has the solidity and impressive nature of a Renaissance Pièta or a Mandarin Chinese figure. White had frequently given form to figures with drapery throughout his career. The face is as a consummate Charles White portrait: proud, transparent and without artifice. These elements come together in a universal work that crosses many boundaries. As the art historian and artist James A. Porter wrote: "his one-man exhibitions have always been for me unforgettable events, providing the highest opportunity for enlightenment through the revelation of powerful truths couched in beautifully nuanced graphic poetry that unfailingly hits the mark. Indeed, his art belongs not to one people, but to all the world." Gedeon D133, p. 199 and 343; Horowitz pp 3-4; Barnwell pp. 105-106.
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.jpg "Source: Christie's")
.jpg "Source: Christie's")
