A plot in paradise - art Across the Curriculum

Imagine this sequel to a story written long ago. Eve has returned to Paradise, and she has landed in the tropics. Of course some things have changed. For one thing, she has to wear a dress. But that's all right, she's home again.

Or is she?

Look closer at In the Garden (left) by Romare Howard Bearden (1911-88). The color and heat now contain and compress her figure into flat geometric forms and patterns. She looks pasted to the wall, as in a 15th-century fresco, or perhaps she's part of a contemporary billboard, fading and peeling in the sun. Eve may be back in Paradise, but her private purgatory crowds her. She is no longer full nor free. Still, her containment gives her purpose as she steps onto the porch of her island home.

What has she gained?

Instead of being at the beginning, she is now in the middle, with the passage of time looking backward and forward simultaneously. She's a mother, sister grandmother, great grandchild--all at once. She is a new Eve for the 20th century.

The artist uses a palette for celebrities; layers of greens, yellows and reds contrast with the black skin and hair of his Caribbean character. For an artist to be able to inspire poetry of the eye while employing a multilayered technical process as complicated as lithography, that's sheer genius.

True, Bearden had help from master printmakers, with whom he worked (from mid- to late-career) on a number of print editions of his work, but his creative hand was never far from the printing plate. He received instruction, but he also influenced and supervised. Bearden was inspired and energized by the printmaking process, and even combined print, paint and collage techniques in some pieces.

This work is one in a portfolio of six different prints with biblical references entitled The Prevalence of Ritual. The other titles are Baptism; Delilah; Noah, The Third Day; Salome (John the Baptist); and Prologue to Troy. In the Garden, a lithograph, is either based on an actual collage or printed in a collage-like manner. The colors and the ink density have the feel of a stamping process. Bearden must have liked the textured areas of this print; had he wanted the shapes to be solid, he would have chosen silkscreen or straightforward collage.

Bearden's facility and versatility in draftsmanship and composition, along with his mastery of numerous painting and collage media make him one of the most accomplished artists of the 20th century. Preferring the title of "artist" rather than "African-American artist," Bearden was not only a spokesperson for fellow African Americans, but also for humanity as a whole. His themes reflect his world, and Bearden's was a world shared by others, known to all who he relished in portraying.

Bearden's world was that of North Carolina, New York and beyond. While young Romare was growing up in Harlem, his father entertained numerous artists and musicians in their home, a practice that Bearden himself emulated as he grew into adulthood. His love of jazz and blues carried into his art, much in the same way (although with different results) his friend and colleague Stuart Davis used music to inform his visual imagery.

A folk artist he was not; Bearden was in no way isolated from the mainstream. He might qualify under the definition of having had little formal art training, but he did receive a bachelor of science degree from New York University in 1935, and he studied at the Art Students League beginning in 1932. George Grosz, Bearden's mentor from 1936-37, was most influential by exposing Bearden to satirical illustrators such as Daumier. Grosz encouraged Bearden to address more and more sensitive issues in his political cartooning for the Baltimore Afro-American newspaper.

In the late 1930s, Bearden earned his living in New York as a social worker, a profession which, no doubt, also influenced his choice to interject domestic and social issues into his imagery.

But Bearden is clearly not a folk artist, because he came from a privileged, well-exposed and erudite background. His mother, who was very socially conscious, served on the neighborhood school board, and as treasurer for the Council of Negro Women. Bearden went to Paris in 1950 under the G.I. Bill (after serving in World War II), where he studied philosophy and art history for six months at the Sorbonne.

It seems odd that such an inspired artist should have also studied mathematics (which he did at NYU) but one can be sure that Bearden recognized the connections between the lyrical balance in mathematical equations and meaningful composition in visual expression.

Bearden could be claimed as a Southern artist, too, since he was born in Charlotte, S.C. Although his family moved to Harlem when he was 3, Bearden returned to the South for visits, and he also lived with his maternal grandmother outside of Pittsburgh, Pa., during his last two years of high school.

From the beginning, Bearden's approach to art-making was nontraditional. He liked to work from black-and-white images of Old Master works, which he over-painted or copied and reinterpreted with bright colors. He worked in sections, applying an African-cubist aesthetic of his own invention to contemporary images. His inspiration was brought forth by not only social ideas, but by observation.