Joe Wesley Overstreet - American Contemporary Art

 

 Joe Wesley Overstreet (1933 – 2019) was an African-American painter from Mississippi who lived and worked in New York City for most of his career.In the 1950s and early 1960s he was associated with the Abstract Expressionist movement.
During the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, he became known for works such as Strange Fruit and The New Jemima, which reflected his interest in contemporary social issues and the Black Arts Movement. He also worked with Amiri Baraka as the Art Director for the Black Arts Repertory Theatre and School in Harlem, New York. In 1974 he co-founded Kenkeleba House, an East Village gallery and studio. In the 1980s he returned to figuration with his Storyville paintings, which recall the New Orleans jazz scene of the early 1900s. His work draws on a variety of influences, including his own African-American heritage, and has been exhibited in museums and galleries around the world. 

 

Charles Alston

Charles Henry Alston (November 28, 1907 – April 27, 1977) was an African-American painter, sculptor, illustrator, muralist and teacher who lived and worked in the New York City neighborhood of Harlem. Alston was active in the Harlem Renaissance; Alston was the first African-American supervisor for the Works Progress Administration's Federal Art Project. Alston designed and painted murals at the Harlem Hospital and the Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Building. In 1990 Alston's bust of Martin Luther King, Jr. became the first image of an African American displayed at the White House.Wikipedia

Alston's artistic style defies simple categorization and definition. His works range from detailed drawings concerned with realism, depth and modeling to extreme abstraction concerned with simplicity, flatness and pure expression. His art always remained to him an outlet for personal expression and growth, unbound by the restrictions of one particular genera. To Alston, "The whole creative thing is one of exploration of new or different areas," and in "developing or exploring an idea until you've gotten out of it everything you can, and beyond that, looking for unexplored areas." 

 The diversity of Alston's style reflects influences ranging from Egyptian and Oceanic art to more contemporary artistic styles like Cubism and Abstract Expressionism. However, his figures characteristically maintain a sculpture like quality derived from his earlier studies in African sculpture. His subjects, however, were derived mainly from the experiences of his life and time. As such they deal with the toils and triumphs of African Americans in the decades of the 50's, 60's and 70's. Alston states, "As an artist . . . I am intensely interested in probing, exploring the problems of color, space and form, which challenge all contemporary painters. However, as a black American . . . I cannot but be sensitive and responsive in my painting to the injustice, the indignity, and the hypocrisy suffered by black citizens." (.dropbears.com)

Norman W. Lewis

Norman W. Lewis (July 23, 1909 – August 27, 1979) was an African-American painter, scholar, and teacher. He is associated with Abstract Expressionism who also used representational strategies to focus on black urban life and his community's struggles. Lewis was African-American, of Bermudian descent.
Norman Wilfred Lewis was born in Harlem, New York to Bermudan parents. Always interested in art, he had amassed a large art history library by the time he was a young man. A lifelong resident of Harlem, he also traveled extensively during the two years that he worked on ocean freighters. An important early influence was the sculptor and teacher Augusta Savage, who provided him with open studio space at her Harlem Community Art Center. He also participated in WPA art projects, alongside Jackson Pollock, among others.Lewis began his career in 1933, with earlier mostly figurative work. He at first painted what he saw, which ranged from Meeting Place (1930), a swap meet scene, and The Yellow Hat (1936), a formal Cubist painting, to Dispossessed (1940), an eviction scene, and Jazz Musicians (1948), a visual depiction of the bebop that was being played in Harlem.Norman Lewis was the only African- American artist among the first generation of Abstract Expressionists.His work was overlooked many times because of his political involvement, and also because of the area where he lived. His skin colour at this time period had a major impact on his work life.

 In the late 1940s, his work became increasingly abstract. His total engagement with abstract expressionism was due partially to his disillusionment with America after his wartime experiences in World War II. It seemed extremely hypocritical that America was fighting "against an enemy whose master race ideology was echoed at home by the fact of a segregated armed forces."[4] Seeing that art does not have the power to change the political state that society was in, he decided that people should develop their aesthetic skills more, instead of focusing on political art. Tenement I (1952), Harlem Turns White (1955), and Night Walker No. 2 (1956) are all examples of his style. Twilight Sounds (1947) and Jazz Band (1948) are examples of his interest in conveying music.

 One of his best known paintings, Migrating Birds (1954), won the Popular Prize at the Carnegie Museum's 1955 Carnegie International Exhibition, the New York Herald-Tribune calling the painting "one of the most significant of all events of the 1955 art year." His signature style in those decades included repetitive ideographic or hieroglyphic elements that allowed Lewis to incorporate narrative sequences into his paintings.Wikipedia

Norman W. Lewis

Norman W. Lewis (July 23, 1909 – August 27, 1979) was an African-American painter, scholar, and teacher. He is associated with Abstract Expressionism. Lewis was African-American, of Bermudian descent.
In the late 1940s, his work became increasingly abstract.