Charles White (artist)

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Charles Wilbert White (born April 2, 1918 in Chicago , † October 3, 1979 in Los Angeles ) was an American artist who thematized in his pictures African American life in the United States. He is one of the most important black artists in his country.

Life

White was born in Chicago in 1918, where his African American mother, Ethelene Gary, moved from Mississippi in 1914 . The mother raised the boy alone. The Native American father Charles White, who worked as a waiter in train restaurants, paid little attention to his son. The parents had met in 1917 and never married. His mother often left White alone in the public library because of the domestic help required by his mother. Here he rummaged through illustrated books and began to draw. White became interested in the artists of the Harlem Renaissance early on .

White lived in the black slums of the Southside and experienced violence and racial discrimination there on a daily basis. After her father's death, White's mother married Clifton Marsh, a ironworker in 1926. He soon became an alcoholic and abused mother and son frequently. The family's financial situation barely improved.

While attending high school, his talent for painting was recognized and he was allowed to attend the Saturday classes at the Art Institute of Chicago on a scholarship . After two art schools rejected him because of his skin color, White began studying at the Art Institute of Chicago in 1937 and received support from the Works Progress Administration .

Visits to his mother's relatives in the south had a lasting influence on him and he also began to be interested in politics. As a teenager he became a painter for the National Negro Congress and later became involved in the civil rights movement of Martin Luther King . During this time he painted mainly in the style of American and social realism and influenced by the frescoes of the muralists around Diego Rivera .

In 1941 White went to New Orleans to teach at Dillard University . Here he also married the artist Elizabeth Catlett , whom he had met shortly before. White served in the US Army during World War II, but had to retire due to health problems. White and Catlett moved to New York City and lived in Mexico for some time. Here White worked mainly as part of the artist collective Taller de Grafica Popular and improved his skills as a graphic artist, which he had acquired with Harry Sternberg at the Art Students League of New York . In Mexico, White also met the muralists David Alfaro Siqueiros , Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco personally. White and Catlettt divorced shortly after returning to the United States.

From 1943 to 1945 White taught at the George Washington Carver School in New York City. After the divorce, White married social worker Frances Barrett in 1956. In New York he exhibited mainly in the ACA Galleries.

From the mid-1950s, White had increasing health problems. He fell ill with tuberculosis and lost a lung. On the recommendation of his doctor, he decided to move to Southern California. From the early 1960s he exhibited intensively at the Heritage Gallery in Los Angeles, which had specialized in African American art.

White taught at the Otis Art Institute from 1965 until his death in 1979. For many African American artists, his lessons were style and identity-forming. Many enrolled just because of White, including David Hammons and Kerry James Marshall .

plant

White's style was shaped by the New Objectivity and strongly influenced by the muralism movement. For White, his art was part of his political commitment and the artist, who died in 1979, is known to this day for his “Images of Dignity”. What is meant are detailed, respectful depictions of Afro-Americans, who show the Afro-Americans not as victims, but as heroes. White painted and drew black workers, children and card players and protesters and celebrities like Harry Belafonte, with whom he was friends. In later years White's work took on more and more allegorical traits .

Exhibitions (selection)

literature

  • Sidney Finkelstein: Charles White: An Artist of America . VEB Verlag der Kunst, Dresden 1955
  • Andrea D. Barnwell: Charles White . Pomegranate, San Francisco 2002
  • Harry Belafonte, James A. Porter, Benjamin Horowitz: Images of Dignity: The Drawings of Charles White . Exhibition catalog, Ward Ritchie Press, Los Angeles 1967

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e M. H. Miller: The Man Who Taught a Generation of Black Artists Gets His Own Retrospective , New York Times Magazine, September 28, 2018
  2. ^ A b c Holland Cotter: Charles White Was a Giant, Even Among the Heroes He Painted , New York Times, October 11, 2018
  3. ↑ Andrea D. Barnwell: Charles White . Pomegranate, San Francisco 2002, p. 13
  4. ↑ Charles White , CEJJES Institute, accessed on February 14, 2019
  5. ↑ a b c Charles White: A Retrospective , Arts Institute of Chicago, accessed February 14, 2019
  6. ^ A b c Charles White , Hammer Museum, accessed February 14, 2019
  7. ↑ a b Sacha Verna: Afro-Americans as Heroes , Deutschlandfunk, October 8, 2018
  8. ↑ a b c d e Charles White , Smithsonian American Art Museum, accessed February 14, 2019
  9. ^ Charles White: A Retrospective , Museum of Modern Art, New York City, accessed February 14, 2019
  10. ^ Charles White , Los Angeles County Museum of Art, accessed February 14, 2019
personal data
SURNAME White, Charles
ALTERNATIVE NAMES White, Charles Wilbert (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American artist
DATE OF BIRTH April 2, 1918
PLACE OF BIRTH Chicago
DATE OF DEATH 3rd October 1979
Place of death los Angeles