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Romare Bearden
357 Canal St
WA 55375

REVIEW:  THE OBSCURITY OF THE 19TH CENTURY NEGRO ARTISTS

In Washington recently, I called a friend from the Corcoran Gallery for the specific directions to Howard University’s Gallery of Art where, “Ten Afro-American Artists of the 19th Century” is the current exhibit. My friend kept repeating, “don’t expect anything at Howard like the Corcoran show”, and his admonition proved very accurate indeed.

The Corcoran Bi-Annual this year emphasized the contemporary color statement. Huge canvas [[strikethrough]] s [[/strikethrough]]es literally blazing with color were in contrast to the more muted, romantic canvasses at Howard; as is a scorching July afternoon to an October twilight. I make this analogy since several of the painters shown at Howard are actually concerned with the mood of twilight and evening. Henry O. Tanner’s Christ speaks to Nicodemus amid long shadows on the terrace where the two sit. The pervasive blue-green tonality of his, “Gate of Tangiers” again sets the peaceful mood of evening. Golden sunsets gild the romantic landscapes that the Cincinnati artist, Robert Duncanson, loved to paint. The Neo-Classic figures of Edmonia Lewis’ “Old Indian Arrow Maker and His Daughter”, seem arrested in a placid hour that ones nostalgia is likely to associate with the evening. 

Other artists shown in the Howard exhibit include: Joshua Johnston, who may or may not have been at one time a slave; Patrick Reason, a New York City school teacher in the 1830’s, who did engravings mostly for anti-slavery periodicals; Julian Hudson and William Simpson, two mid-19th century portrait painters, of whom very little