You can see -- and buy -- works from Charlotte’s most famous artist this month
This is a story about the artist most closely identified with Charlotte and an exhibition of his limited-edition, signed and numbered works.
But it’s also a story about doing something constructive with grief.
Charlotte Fine Art Gallery chose Black History Month as the right time to showcase his work. Other places you could see Bearden’s work: The Library of Congress, MOMA and The Mint Museum.
This collection of 45-plus prints (on view through March 4) represents a selection of important lithographs, serigraphs and etchings, including “Mourning (Carolina Morning),” “Mecklenburg Autumn,” “Piano Lesson” and “The Lamp.”
The collector “is one of our clients,” said gallery owner/curator Joni Purk, explaining how her gallery came to host this exhibition.
If all you know about Bearden is that there’s an uptown park named for him, Purk suggests the book “The Art of Romare Bearden” is a great place to start learning.
An original Bearden is cost-prohibitive for most of us. Even these lithographs will set you back a bit. Prices start at $3,000.
Having watched a few too many crime dramas and documentaries about art forgeries, I had to ask a tacky question: How do you know these are real? Purk didn’t seem to mind it.
“The works all come with an appraisal done by Sharon Campbell, ASA, Campbell Fine Art Research and Appraisal out of South Carolina,” she said.
Bearden, mostly known for his collages, explored printmaking in the 1970s, which was pretty late in his career. There’s a lot of adaptation and improvisation found in his work — it’s sort of the visual equivalent of jazz. Frequent motifs include music, trains, domestic life and aspects of African-American history.
Love doesn’t die
This story is more than the story of a world-famous artist and his works. It’s also about grief being channeled into a project.
When Tom, the collector, died of brain cancer in 2014, he and his wife had been married 42 years. (Tom’s widow prefers we reference him only by first name.)
Tom’s career took the couple all over the world, but Charlotte was home. His widow was a longtime teacher in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. The couple then moved to a Chicago suburb for Tom’s work. It was there, in 2011, he was diagnosed with brain cancer. The couple decided to return here for Tom’s treatment.
And now, Tom’s widow hopes to honor the teams who helped treat him. She’s donating 25 percent of profits from the sale of the Bearden lithographs to the Levine Cancer Institute and the Preston Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Center at Duke University in Durham.
Thanks to Tom’s widow, this is a case where you can buy art … and benefit science.
The Bearden prints are on view from Feb. 1 – March 4, 2017 at Charlotte Fine Art Gallery in Carmel Village Shoppes (7510 Pineville-Matthews Road, Suite 9A.). The gallery is near the I-485 and I-77 corridors. Opening receptions are on Friday, Feb. 3 and Saturday, Feb. 4 from 5-8 p.m. RSVP: 704-541-0741. CharlotteFineArt.com.
Photos: Courtesy of Charlotte Fine Art Gallery
This story was originally published February 2, 2017 at 8:27 PM with the headline "You can see -- and buy -- works from Charlotte’s most famous artist this month."