In collaboration with Nicholas Roman Fine Art and on display October 12- November 9, 2019.
CREATE Council for Resources to Enrich the Arts, Technology & Education in collaboration with Nicholas Roman Fine Art presents, New Perspective: Selected Works of Artists from the African Diaspora, October 12- November 9, 2019, Opening Reception, Saturday, October 12, 4-7pm, at CREATE’s Catskill Gallery, 398 Main Street in Catskill, NY.
The value of art by black artists has risen astoundingly over the past several years. This ascent to the grand stairway of international auction houses is a potent symbol of newly changed attitudes toward the work of black artists in the contemporary art scene. Will it last? Or is it another trend to get it while it’s hot? However, the rise of art and artists from the African American Diaspora is an essential shift to acknowledge the voices less heard and to open the eyes of those who were not looking. This collaborative exhibition embraces the current change as well as widens the perspective lens with a focus on the interests and knowledge of African, African American and Caribbean artists in the global arts scene.
Featured artists in the show span from Ghana to the United States with Caribbean heritage and include Franck Albert Hodelin, a New York City based artist known for his oil paintings on canvas; Ghanaian artist Isshaq Ismail, who harmonizes a variety of media and techniques in what he calls his “abstract grotesque figure” paintings; self-taught Ghanaian artist Hilton Korley whose impressionist painting evoke traditional scenes of African pastoral life; African American Artist Claude Lawrence, a Chicago-based jazz musician and borderline recluse who had managed to fly under the art world’s radar for over three decades; emerging artist Nicholas Roman Lewis whose work stems from his meditative process and primarily focuses on graphic and video representations of stillness; and Joseph Pannie “Nana,” Ghanaian artist whose work focuses on “figurative abstraction.
“New Perspective is our first exhibition under our new name, CREATE, and I wanted to do an exhibition with a new topic in the Council’s exhibition narrative and to somewhat challenge the public’s perception,” stated co-curator and CREATE’s executive director, Marline A. Martin. “This exhibition is at least an artistic exercise that I hope will become a symbol of cultural and artistic expression as CREATE garners movement around its name.”
Image: Franck Hodelin, Oil on Canvas, courtesy Nicholas Roman Fine Art.