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Negro Artists: An Illustrated Review of their Achievements Including Exhibition of Paintings by the late Malvin Gray Johnson and Sculptures by Richmond Barthé and Sargent Johnson Presented by the Harmon Foundation in Cooperation with the Delphic Studios April 22 - May 4, 1935, Inclusive.
New York: Harmon Foundation, 1935. 12mo (8” x 5”), illustrated wrappers. 60 pp., including wrappers, numerous illus. [with] An Exhibition of the Work of Three Negro Artists. New York: Harmon Foundation, 1935. 16mo (6.25” x 5.75”), self wrappers, illustration tipped onto front wrapper. 2 pp. The illustrated catalog for the Harmon Foundation’s 1935 exhibition of works by three contemporary black artists, held at the Delphic Studios, accompanied by an unrecorded invitation to the exhibition. In addition to featuring the works and biographies of artists Malvin Gray Johnson, Richmond Barthé, and Sargent Johnson, the catalog is both a retrospective of the Harmon Foundation’s efforts to showcase and foster African American artists and an appraisal of the current African American art scene. Included are sections entitled “A Decade of Progress” (the past ten years of the Harmon Foundation); “Art Study Through the Workshop”; “Schools and Universities Expand Art Courses”; and “New Notes on Negro Artists” as well as information on exhibition tours; art news from around the U.S. as it relates to contemporary African-American artists and their work; art work at a New York Y.M.C.A. and various other schools; photo illustrations of African American art classes; and a lengthy “Directory of Negro Artists” (several of whom were recently deceased). The invitation features an illustration on the front wrapper of a self-portrait by Malvin Gray Johnson, whose work was the main focus of the exhibition, evidently due to his recent death (fifty-three of the seventy-five works in the show were by him). Text on page one announces: “This selection of paintings by Malvin Gray Johnson of New York, done in the rural South prior to his death in the autumn of 1934, and the sculptures of Richmond barthé of New York and Sargent Johnson of Berkeley, California were chosen by the Harmon Foundation as representing distinctive wrk based largely on subject matter drawn from racial backgrounds. It is the seventh major exhibition of the work of Negro artists to be sponsored or conducted in New York by the Foundation as a part of its activity in this field, and is the beginning of what is hoped may be a regular series of more intimate showings of the work of a few individuals.” Established in 1922 by the white real-estate developer William E. Harmon, the Harmon Foundation was one of the first U.S. arts organizations to recognize African-American achievement in the fields of education, industry, art, literature, music, race relations and science. Many of these achievement emerged out of the Harlem Renaissance. Invitation not recorded in OCLC. CONDITION: Catalog good, light rubbing to front-cover; invitation with repairs to cuts in lower right quadrant, two light brown streaks on blank rear wrapper.
Item #6027
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