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Eye-opening African-American artwork
As usual, Bing Davis is on a mission.
“I felt a commitment to share and bring along as many African-American artists as I can,” he says, with the enthusiasm he brings to all of his many projects.
“I’ve got a list of 65 African-American artists all working right here in the area, and those are just the ones I know. Everybody thinks that it’s just me and Ronnie (Williams), but that’s really not true.”
He’s referring there to his own fame, both locally and nationally, as a skilled artist and teacher who works in a wide array of media, and who with his friend Williams, a long-time painter and educator, are well-known for work that reflects upon their experience as black Americans. His point is that he wants to spread the word that the Dayton area is brimming with talent. He takes great delight in showcasing it.
The latest showcase is the grand, open space of the Wintergarden at the Schuster Performing Arts Center downtown, where until Feb. 28 you can catch “Visual Voices 2010,” a collection of work from 21 African-American artists who live and work here.
Davis curated the February show, the fifth annual one in this space, and was pleased by what he came up with.
“We’re showing the rich diversity of styles and techniques that can be found in the visual arts in the African-American community,” he says, surveying the display. “The pieces here range from drawing to traditional oil painting to fabric dolls, photography, collage and ceramics.
“And people will see they deal with the same universal themes that all good art does — joy, sorrow, pain, love and agape.”
Indeed, at the center of the exhibition is a large pastel by Janice Hamilton, “I Am the First and the Last,” depicting God as a black man, albeit with the same flowing robes and familar symbols that would have been used by Renaissance painters who could only have imagined a white face on the Almighty.
Like Hamilton’s piece, most of the works examine or touch upon African-American experience or perspectives, though the range of those perspectives is vast.
For Dwayne Daniel, it means a beautiful modern woman, whose contemporary braids and hoop earring seem to lead her to contemplate the shadowy image of an African woman from days gone by.
For Frances M. Turner, it means a lively pair of African dolls in bright traditional garb, gleefully climbing a ladder.
For Curtis Barnes Sr., it means an oil called “Obama,” which piles the letters of the president’s name and the year of his election into giddy, jostling, multi-colored layers of a celebratory alphabet jumble.
For Lillian Herbert, it means using locks of hair from the customers who use her salon to create an unusual but transfixing African landscape of blacks, tans and browns, which the viewer has to struggle not to touch.
For Ronald W. Claxton, it means a stunning collage that reimagines the famously grainy photo of pioneering bluesman Robert Johnson into eye-popping colors, cigarette a-dangle, fingers a-fret.
Each of the 21 pieces brings something. William Pettiford III speaks a warning, with his digital photo superimposing the globe onto a tight line of cartridge shells. It’s chilling. Paula Ramey speaks of joy with a dancing origami construction. “She uses this Japanese art form with African-American approaches,” Davis says happily.
He’s the ringmaster, the teacher, the one who gathers and nudges and constantly pushes who always finds new ways to use art to remind us all, black or white or whatever, of the important things in our midst.
A lot of people will be strolling past these artworks over the next few days, as “Wicked” packs ‘em into the auditorium seats. But remember, if you are one of those lucky ticketholders, to take an appreciative look onto the walls outside the theater. The wicked witches will soon be gone, but these smart, engaged artists will still be here — living, working and creating, and only asking that you pay attention and open your eyes.
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