Romare Bearden

As mentioned in my last post, Romare Bearden was a successful artist in displaying the image of Black America during the Black Arts Movement. His art was displayed in the MOMA in 1971 making him a well known abstract expressionist. Romare Bearden was the most successful post modern collage maker of that decade. As Early as 1790 realists proclaimed that an artist should only paint hat they observe in front of them. Romare Bearden painted as a response to the need to define his own experience. He was born in Charlotte NC, moved to Pittsburgh and then to Harlem. He earned a degree in mathematics at NYU in the early 30's, He started to paint seriously around 1935. It is important to point out that it was the "Harlem Renaissance" that helped Bearden view himself as a professional painter. He would never want to be called an African American (even though he was), he just wanted to display Afro Americanism in his work. In his piece "The Dove" it shows harlem in 1964. Crowded into this small pictoral space are images of everyday life, there is a fist showing black power, a man pulling a hat over his eyes, and an oversized hand with a cigarette; this was his view of the street. Bearden mentioned that the neighborhood he was constructing was overpopulated to the bursting point. The dove centered in the top of the composition is symbolic of the presence of christian faith. This collage creates patterns and forms and the contrasts of this pattern, color, and subject matter created harmony for his definition of life. This is a picture of "The Dove" by Romare Bearden. 

http://www.moma.org/modernteachers/files/25628489a0e301d9c8.jpg

All of my information came from a book called "Art Since 1940 Strategies of Being" Second edition by Jonathan Fineberg