When I launched the campaign to raise funds for Beauford's tombstone, I contacted the U.S. Embassy to inquire whether they could help me research information about the French government's acquisition of Beauford Delaney works. They told me that France owns two of Beauford's paintings and sent me an image of Jazz, a painting that they told me was allocated to the French Embassy in Taipei, Taiwan. They obtained the image from France's Fonds national d'art contemporain (National Contemporary Art Fund).
I published this information in an article dated April 6, 2010.
The Centre national des arts plastique (CNAP; English translation: National Center of Plastic Arts) manages the works amassed by the Fonds national d'art contemporain on behalf of France since 1791. I was privileged to be invited by Jean-Baptiste Delorme, Conservateur du patrimoine - Responsable de la collection arts plastiques (1945-1989) to visit one of their archive facilities earlier this week to see Beauford's works in person!
Frequently, photographs of a particular work neither resemble each other nor do justice to the original, and this was definitely the case for Jazz.
© Estate of Beauford Delaney,
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
Photo courtesy of France's Fonds national d'art contemporain
Published on the Les Amis blog in 2010
Collage and individual images © Les Amis de Beauford Delaney
Jazz, 1966
FNAC 29060
Centre national des arts plastiques
© droits réservés / Cnap /
Crédit photo : Yves Chenot
© Estate of Beauford Delaney,
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
Delorme and I discussed this work at length, including the fact that it was shown at the Musée Galliera in 1967, was purchased directly from Beauford in 1968, and bears the name of a second, earlier Beauford Delaney work - Portrait of Marian Anderson (1965). A letter that Beauford wrote in French to the French government and dated March 16, 1958 (the year is evidently written in error, given the previously mentioned facts) states that the government has informed him that they have purchased Portrait of Marian Anderson. He expresses his joy about the fact that this work is "appreciated by the government of a country that I love and where I chose to live" (my translation).
The second abstract, which is untitled (sans titre), is much larger (130 x 96 cm / 51.2 x 37.8 in) than Jazz (60 x 49 cm / 23.6 x 19.3 in). It was shown at the Salon des Réalités nouvelles exhibition in Paris in 1972. CNAP loaned this work to the United States of Abstraction: American Artists in France exhibition that was shown at the Musée d'art de Nantes in Nantes, France (May 19 to July 18, 2021) and the Musée Fabre in Montpellier, France (August 6 to October 21, 2021).
© Les Amis de Beauford Delaney
FNAC 31447
Centre national des arts plastiques
© droits réservés / Cnap /
Crédit photo : Yves Chenot
© Estate of Beauford Delaney,
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
Both museums are part of the FRAME (FRench American Museum Exchange) network, a group of 32 major U.S. and French museums whose mission is to promote cultural exchange through the development of innovative exhibitions, educational and public programs.
The coloring and the size of Sans titre, 1963 remind me of another untitled painting that hung in the Resonance of Form and Vibration of Color exhibition in Paris in 2016. It now belongs to the Mint Museum in North Carolina.
(1959) Oil on canvas
144.5 x 95.5 cm / 56.9 x 37.6 in
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
About CNAP (excerpted from the CNAP Website):
The Centre national des arts plastiques (CNAP) is a public institution under the French Ministry of Culture. It fosters and supports artistic creation in France in all areas of the visual arts: painting, performance art, sculpture, photography, installation art, video, multimedia, graphic arts, design and graphic design. It follows young artists closely, provides expertise and support to the emergence of new forms, and assists artists and contemporary art professionals.
On behalf of the French State, CNAP expands and manages France’s national contemporary art collection, the Fonds national d’art contemporain, of over 105,000 works. Each year, it lends some 2,500 works from its collection.
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