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Faith Ringgold: A View
From the Studio
March 6 - August 14, 2005
This spring, the Allentown
Art Museum will feature the latest work by leading contemporary African
American artist Faith Ringgold (b. 
1930),
as well as work from her distinguished thirty-five-year career. On view
in the Museum's Rodale Gallery March 6 - August 14, 2005, "Faith Ringgold:
A View from the Studio" will feature painted story quilts and
prints from Ringgold's latest Jazz Series, as well as paintings, soft sculpture,
drawings, and prints dating from 1960s-1990s. The exhibition is unique
in that it carefully studies the artist's creative process. Guest
curator Curlee Raven Holton, director of the Experimental Printmaking Institute
(EPI) at Lafayette College, is Ringgold's long-time collaborator and principal
printmaker. He brings to this showing an intimate knowledge of the
artist's creative methods, studio work, and inspirations. (right:
Faith Ringgold in her studio. Photo: Hub Willson)
"This exhibition is a first," says Holton.
"The majority of the works that will be on display were drawn from
Faith's studio and EPI's archives. This exhibition offers us the unique
opportunity to step inside the mind of the artist. It helps us to
better understand the creative and intellectual process of one of America's
most prominent contemporary artists."
Ringgold is an acclaimed painter, printmaker, and sculptor
best known for her signature "story quilts" that combine narrative
paintings with quilted borders and text. She has exhibited in major
museums in the United States, Europe, South America, Asia, Africa, and the
Middle East. Her work is owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art,
the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Museum
of Modern Art, and now, the Allentown Art Museum.
"The Museum is excited to exhibit the work of an artist
of Faith Ringgold's distinction," states Museum Executive Director
David Brigham, who coordinated the presentation. "She is a leading
American painter, sculptor, and printmaker, as well as an award-winning
children's book author. She has made a valuable and unique contribution
to the history of art, by combining fine art traditions with needlework
and storytelling traditions that build on her heritage as a woman artist
of color."
Ringgold's Jazz Series, on view directly following a showing
at ACA Galleries in New York, is a fabulous exploration of the Jazz Age
musicians and singers of the 1920s and 30s. Through Ringgold's rich
palette of blues, greens, oranges, and reds, her expressionistic brushstrokes
and exaggerated drawing style, she captures not only the faces and settings
but also the moods of jazz. These range from joyous, even ecstatic,
to melancholic. Some of the works are adorned with handwritten original
songs by Ringgold, with titles such as "You put the devil in me,"
"Mama can sing," and "Papa can blow."
The exhibition will be complemented by several related
programs and events including a preview party, an all-ages Winter Festival,
and a major lecture by the artist.
"Faith Ringgold: A View from the Studio" is the
title of a full-color, hardbound book by Curlee Raven Holton with Faith
Ringgold, published by the Museum and Bunker Hill Publishing in conjunction
with the exhibition.
Label text from the exhibition
- Jazz Stories: Mama Can Sing and Papa Can Blow #1 "Somebody
Stole My Broken Heart," 2004
- Acrylic on canvas with pieced border
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
- Ringgold's newest body of work, the Jazz Stories, captures
the movement and music associated with America's original art form. An
African-American woman is portrayed in the foreground as both the singer
and conductor sway with the movement of her body. The contours of her body
and the swerving blue lines throughout the red background give us a sense
of the pulsating beat and temperature. Ringgold's palette is complemented
by her border, which is made up of quilted fabric patches, combining painting
and fiber art in her signature style.
-
-
- Harlem '76 Portrait Masks Series,
1975
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
- Mixed media soft sculpture mask
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
- In 1975, Ringgold created the Portrait Mask Series, which
included such great African-Americans like Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. and
Martin Luther King, Jr. Ringgold also created masks as part of The Harlem
Series included Moma, Joanna, and Leroy. These masks were the first life-like
faces in Ringgold's soft sculpture. She created them using foam rubber,
which she cut to create a realistic resemblance of the human face.
-
-
- Mama Can Sing You Put The Devil in Me, 2004
- Serigraph
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Allentown Art Museum, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Arnold Kaplan,
2004. (2004.25)
-
- This print is part of Ringgold's new Jazz Stories, originally
created as an acrylic painting on paper. It was painted in bold colors,
which reflect Ringgold's desire to capture the drama and vitality of jazz
music. Marisha Simons at the Experimental Printmaking Institute at Lafayette
College translated it into a twelve-screen serigraph. In this process,
each sheet in the edition is imprinted twelve times, once for each color
in the work. Among many challenges, the master printer must align each
screen to ensure that the total image registers as a whole. As such, no
two prints in the edition are exactly alike, making each one a unique work
of art. (right: Faith Ringgold, American b. 1930. You Put the
Devil in Me, ed., 2004, screenprint, 20 x 30 inches, Allentown Art
Museum. Faith Ringgold © 2004)
-
-
- Mama Can Sing and Papa Can Blow,
2003
- Etching
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Experimental Printmaking Institute (EPI), Lafayette College,
Easton, Pennsylvania
-
- Mama Can Sing and Papa Can Blow was a multi-plate etching,
printed at EPI by master printer Curlee Raven Holton. This print is unusual
in that it combines two individual works from Ringgold's Jazz Stories as
a single print. It portrays a close up of a full-bodied singer painted
in bright blue, red, and gold along with the saxophone player executed
in the same palette.
-
-
- Mama Can Sing, 2004
- Acrylic on paper
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Papa Can Blow, 2004
- Acrylic on paper
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Illustrations for O Holy Night,
2004
- Gouache on paper
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
- Published in 2004, O Holy Night is Ringgold's most recent
illustrated children's book and is accompanied by a CD of Christmas carols
by the Boys Choir of Harlem. It debuted at The Metropolitan Museum of Art
at Christmas time, with a book signing by the artist and performance by
the Boys Choir. The book carries on a longstanding tradition in African-American
church murals and Sunday school books of representing the Holy Family as
black.
-
-
- Tar Beach #2, 1990
- Silkscreen, pieced fabric
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
- Tar Beach #2 followed a series of works from the late
1980s called The Woman on a Bridge, which incorporated elements of painting
and quilt making. Through this combination, Ringgold broke free from the
constraints of painting. Prior to Ringgold's work, the fine art of painting
was considered to be in a separate realm from the craft of quilt making.
Ringgold thus challenged the hierarchy between the male world of fine art
and the female domain of craft. By 1990, Ringgold's painted story quilts
were in considerable demand, and she experimented with a silk-screened
image to make them more widely available. (right: Faith Ringgold,
American b. 1930. Tar Beach 2, ed., 1990, silk screen on silk, 68
x 64 inches. Various collections. Faith Ringgold © 1990)
-
-
- Change 3: Faith Ringgold's Over 100 Pound Weight Loss
Performance Story Quilt, 1991
- Acrylic on canvas with pieced fabric border
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
- Ringgold experimented with various print mediums in making
her quilts. In this example, she created photo-etched plates that were
printed directly onto fabric panels. This quilt is part of the Change Series,
which celebrates the artist's successful weight loss.
-
-
- Under a Blood Red Sky, 2001
- Etching
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Experimental Printmaking Institute (EPI), Lafayette College,
Easton, Pennsylvania
-
- Under a Blood Red Sky is part of Ringgold's The Coming
to Jones Road series. The series is comprised of more than a half dozen
painted quilts depicting a beautiful, imagined landscape from two hundred
years ago. These quilts tell the tale of a successful but difficult journey
via the Underground Railroad to the North by runaway slaves. It is also
a visual account of the struggle and anger that has provided an inner force
for Faith, just as it did for the black ancestors who came before her.
Metaphorically, this series suggests that the journey is not yet over and
that the freedom won is a veiled and amorphous prize. The quilts and prints
in the series also have a dreamlike aura, which Ringgold achieves by using
a vibrant palette and by softening outlines.
-
-
- The Wake and Resurrection of the Bicentennial Negro, 1976
- Mixed media soft sculpture
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
- This work represents Ringgold's experimentation with
a range of genres, such as the mask, painting, figurative sculpture, and
installations and featured new media such as music, story, and live performance.
The Wake and Resurrection of the Bicentennial Negro is composed of multiple
figures that are masked with full costumes. When performed, the characters
take their place at a funeral table complete with flowers, a black pulpit,
lighted candles, and decorative thangkas (Ringgold's term for wall hangings
with fabric borders). Ringgold decorates the faces with feathers and sequins,
and their hair with raffia, yarn, and unraveled rope.
-
-
- Jazz Stories: Mama Can Sing and Papa Can Blow #2 "Come
on and Dance with Me," 2004
- Acrylic on canvas with pieced border
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Jazz Stories: Mama Can Sing and Papa Can Blow #8 "Don't
Wanna Love You," 2004
- Acrylic on canvas with pieced border
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- American People Series #1: The Wall Between Friends,
1963
- Oil on canvas
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- American People Series #11: Three Men on a Fence, 1964
- Oil on canvas
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- American People Series #5: Watching and Waiting, 1963
- Oil on canvas
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Soul Sister: Black Light Series #3, 1967
- Oil on canvas
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Mrs. Brown and Her Three Children: Catherine, Elsie
and Dolores, 1973
- Mixed media
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Women's Liberation Talking Mask, from the Witch Mask
Series, #1, 1973
- Mixed media with beads, raffia, cloth and gourds
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- The Window of the Wedding Series #2, Breakfast in
Bed, 1974
- Acrylic on canvas, thangka with printed and pieced fabric
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Dah #3, 1983
- Acrylic on canvas
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Wynton's Tune, 2004
- Serigraph
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Coming to Jones Road #6: Baby Freedom Came One Night, 2000
- Acrylic on canvas with canvas painted border
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Woman on a Pedestal Series, Evelyn, 1979
- Soft sculpture
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Woman on a Pedestal Series, Yvonne, 1978
- Soft sculpture
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-
-
- Bubba, 1989
- Mixed media with 18 karat gold KKK pin
-
- Faith Ringgold
- American, born 1930
-
- Collection of the Artist, Courtesy ACA Galleries, New
York
-