![]() He expands the universal language of art so that it includes aspects of the lived Black experience but does so without relying upon color cues.”įor that, and other reasons, Thompson’s work was ahead of its time. His exuberant use of color challenges the very systems in which colors are used as markers for racial otherness. Instead, she says, “he presents us with something inherently unstable. “People try to map race and gender on the figures he represents,” says Tuite. Filled with dramatic crescendos and suggestive movement, his paintings even occasionally took actual musicians like Nina Simone as their subjects.īut the most immediately striking dimension of his art may be those blazing canary yellows and Yves Klein blues, his fire hydrant reds and sugary lilacs, and how profoundly they scramble our expectations of color as an indicator of race. In fact, Thompson’s paintings, with their sensuous silhouettes and a Matisse-evocative litany of bold primary colors, have often been likened to the music and musicians Thompson loved. ![]() "Garden of Music" (1960) by Bob Thompson.Ĭourtesy of High Museum of Art / Allen Phillips /Wadsworth Atheneum While Thompson could go against the grain in his artistic approach, he was very much an insider in the vibrant bohemia of New York in the early ‘60s, a subterranea of jazz, “Happenings” and Beat literature where his peers were artists Red Grooms and Allan Kaprow, musicians Ornette Coleman and Charlie Haden, writers LeRoi Jones and Allen Ginsberg and the creatives who made the West Village Cedar Bar their clubhouse. It is her attempt to answer the question she posits: “How can his work help us to reveal the structures that continue to shape inclusion and exclusion within the art world?” But it also builds upon the Whitney exhibition by reflecting our changing times and a need to rectify larger problems of representation in the art world.įor Diana Tuite, who organized the show as curator of modern and contemporary art at the Colby College Museum of Art in Waterville, Maine, “This House Is Mine” tackles a quandary that art institutions around the Western world, which have historically favored artists of European descent, are wrestling with: how to recognize the unacknowledged talent of both present and past artists of color. “This House Is Mine” celebrates a sometimes-unsung figure in art history who has proven deeply influential for contemporary Black artists like Rashid Johnson and Henry Taylor, who contribute essays extolling Thompson’s virtues in the show’s accompanying catalogue. That was the first time Michael Rooks, curator of modern and contemporary art for the High, had seen Thompson’s work, which he described as avant-garde “in that particular moment in time when painting was struggling to assert itself without apology.” ![]() Kid’s got good taste.Ĭhildren 12 and under ride free to New York with Seastreak through Memorial Day, so save a little extra and put it towards your one of a kind masterpiece at Color Me Mine in Tribeca."Bob Thompson: This House Is Mine" at the High Museum of Art focuses on the colorful artwork of this artist heavily influenced by Old Master painters, who died prematurely, in 1966 at the age of 28. With an outpost in Tribeca and a super-friendly staff, it’s no wonder Suri Cruise has been spotted here on a regular basis. You paint it, they fire it and you take it home – it’s really that easy.Īdults can get in on the fun too, with walk-ins, parties or ladies night! Color Me Mine has ongoing specials like 50% off for students on some Friday nights, and an upcoming event for Valentine’s Day. Paint a mug, a plate, a cupcake, or any of their other 400 pieces. Pottery is their canvas, and there’s no limit to the amount of paint they can summon. Arguably the most popular spot to take budding visionaries is Color Me Mine.Ī national chain of good times, Color Me Mine pottery studio caters to kids and grownups itching to paint a work of art on something they can take home (and actually use!). So it’s only natural that the city is teeming with classes geared towards developing creativity in your little ones. New York is nothing if not cultural, and the kids that grow up there are surrounded by artistic outlets.
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