Charlie Parker Acquired by Rochester's Memorial Art Gallery

Beauford's painting of Charlie Parker was recently acquired by the Memorial Art Gallery in Rochester, NY. It hung in a show that celebrating the opening of the museum's new galleries in August 2015.

Untitled (aka Charlie "Bird" Parker), 1968
Oil on canvas
28 3/4" x 23 1/2", signed and dated
Photograph by Joshua Nefsky; Courtesy of
Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York , NY
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
The museum's information page about the painting lists its name simply as Charlie Parker.

Charlie Parker and several other paintings by Beauford were shown in the Whitney Museum of Art's show Blues for Smoke in 2013. Actor Billy Dee Williams purchased this portrait from Beauford during a visit that he and James Baldwin paid to Beauford's studio.

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Les Amis de Beauford Delaney and Reid Hall are partnering to bring an exhibition of original Beauford Delaney works to Reid Hall in Paris in February 2016! To sign-up to receive information about this show, click HERE.

To the Light - A Play about Beauford and James Baldwin

Playwright Bil Wright has written a new play about the intricate and sometimes volatile relationship between Beauford and James Baldwin.

James Baldwin and Beauford at the American Cultural Center
Photo: U.S. Information Service
To the Light (A Fantasy Inspired by Two American Geniuses: Baldwin and Delaney) explores the bond between Beauford and Jimmy, imagining their friendship from their first meeting through each of their deaths.

The play will be read at the Harlem Stage Gatehouse on October 7 and 8, 2015. Commissioned in part by the Harlem Stage Fund for New Work, it is being directed by Reginald L. Douglas.

Harlem Stage’s unique focus has been to identify visionary artists of color and support them by commissioning, presenting and producing their work - work that responds to the social and political conditions that shape lives. It has presented performances in traditional and non-traditional theater forms that speak to the Harlem community for years. The opening of The Gatehouse in 2006 enabled them to expand their capacity to present theater through extended play runs.

To the Light
Performance Length: 90 minutes
No Intermission
Age requirement: 18+

Harlem Stage Gatehouse
150 Convent Avenue (at West 135th Street)
New York, NY 10031
October 7 (Wednesday) at 7:30 pm and October 8 (Thursday) at 7:30 pm
Entry fee: FREE with RSVP - Click HERE to reserve!

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Les Amis de Beauford Delaney and Reid Hall are partnering to bring an exhibition of original Beauford Delaney works to Reid Hall in Paris in February 2016! To sign-up to receive information about this show, click HERE.

Where to Find Beauford's Art: Bonhams

It seems that Beauford is "on the radar" in Great Britain these days!

After last week's article on Beauford at the Tate Liverpool, I'm pleased to report that one of his abstract paintings is going up for auction at Bonhams in London, Knightsbridge.

Untitled
(1961) Watercolor and mixed media on paper
65 x 50 cm (25 9/16 x 19 11/16 in)
Signed and dated, lower right
Image courtesy of Bonhams
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
The auction (Sale 22806) will take place on September 22, 2015.

It is entitled:
British and European Art
Part I: Victorian & British Impressionist Art
Part II: 19th Century European, Impressionist & Modern Art

The estimated sale price for this work (Lot 207) is £1,000 - £1500 / 1400€ - 2100€.

Bonhams had the occasion to offer another Beauford Delaney painting for auction - this time, during a sale of American Art in New York in 2014:

Portrait of a Young Man
(1953) Oil on canvas
80.65 x 64.77 cm (31 3/4 x 25 1/2 in)
Signed and dated on verso
Image courtesy of Bonhams
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
This portrait was shown in the Beauford Delaney: From New York to Paris exhibition organized by the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. It hung there from November 21, 2004 – February 20, 2005 and was subsequently presented by the Knoxville Museum of Art (April 8 – June 25, 2005), the Greenville County Museum of Art (August 3 – October 2, 2005), and the Philadelphia Museum of Art (November 12, 2005 – January 28, 2006). A notation in the catalog for the show indicates that the subject of the portrait may be Beauford's dear friend, Larry Calcagno.

The estimated value of the painting for the auction was $12,000 - $18,000. It was "bought in" (it did not sell).

According to Emma Gordon, the art specialist at Bonhams who shared the information about these paintings, Beauford's work has been offered for sale at other auction houses in the UK, such as Christie’s South Kensington and Sotheby’s London. She hopes that his UK profile is expanding.

To learn more about the works shown above and about the September 2015 auction, contact:
Emma Gordon
Specialist - 19th Century Paintings
London, United Kingdom
Tel: +44 20 7393 3960
Fax: +44 20 7393 3863


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Les Amis de Beauford Delaney and Reid Hall are partnering to bring an exhibition of original Beauford Delaney works to Reid Hall in Paris in February 2016! To sign-up to receive information about this show, click HERE.

Beauford at the Tate Liverpool

I first heard the names "Beauford Delaney" and "Glenn Ligon" coupled when Dr. Catherine St. John, former professor at Berkeley College in New Jersey, shared with me an article that she wrote in 2004 about these artists:

Born sixty years apart, artists Beauford Delaney and Glenn Ligon communicate narratives of belonging. The immutable link that connects them is James Baldwin, the writer, whose essay "Stranger in the Village" inspired Ligon to lift words off the page and onto canvas...

- from an abstract for "A Narrative of Belonging: The Art of Beauford Delaney and Glenn Ligon"

When I learned that Tate Liverpool and Nottingham Contemporary in the United Kingdom were presenting a major exhibition curated by Ligon that was to include works by artists who have influenced him or with whom he feels an affinity, I searched eagerly for a mention of Beauford. I found an online article about the exhibition, entitled Encounters and Collisions, which cited the names of a few of the artists who would be represented in the show. Beauford's name was among them.

Upon contacting Tate Liverpool for details, I learned that two of Beauford's paintings are part of the exhibition. One is a portrait of James Baldwin and the other is an untitled abstract:

James Baldwin, c. 1955
Oil on canvasboard
24" x 18"
Collection of halley k harrisburg and Michael Rosenfeld, New York, NY
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator

Untitled, c. 1958
Oil on canvas
30" x 25", signed and dated
Courtesy of Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York, NY
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
Beauford painted both of these works during his Paris years.

What was even more exciting for me was to read Ligon's "Letter to Beauford," one of several that he wrote to exhibition participants as part of his written contribution to the catalog. This personal missive explains in simple, personal terms why he selected these two paintings from the show - the critical influence that Baldwin had in both their lives and the inspiration that he, Beauford, and Baldwin drew from jazz and blues music. Ligon comments that "the line between figuration and abstraction is always porous" in Beauford's paintings and that this has inspired "a similar fluidity" in his work. He expresses his hope that his letter isn’t "too presumptuous" and how meaningful Beauford's work is to him personally.

Ligon has also selected literary and critical texts that punctuate the images in the catalog as part of his responsibilities as curator of the show. He includes Baldwin's essay "Stranger in the Village"; an excerpt from Amazing Grace: A Life of Beauford Delaney, where biographer David A. Leeming recounts the story of how he met Beauford; and a scholarly essay called Voices/Forces by Fred Moten, which explores the idea of a black avant-garde through a "trip to Paris" that focuses on the life and work of Beauford, jazz composer and musician Billy Strayhorn, and French dramatist and theater director, Antonin Artaud.

Beauford's portrait of James Baldwin hangs in Room 4 of the exhibition at Tate Liverpool; his abstract hangs in Room 3.

Glenn Ligon: Encounters and Collisions at Tate Liverpool
until 18 October 2015
© Tate Liverpool, Roger Sinek
Tickets for Glenn Ligon: Encounters and Collisions are priced at £10.00 (£7.50 concessions, £5 student ticket). Includes entrance into Jackson Pollock: Blind Spots (also open through October 18, 2015).

To book your tickets in advance, book online at www.tate.org.uk/tickets, call 0151 702 7400 (booking fee applies), or book in person at any Tate gallery.

Tate Liverpool
Albert Dock
Liverpool L3 4BB

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Les Amis de Beauford Delaney and Reid Hall are partnering to bring an exhibition of original Beauford Delaney works to Reid Hall in Paris in February 2016! To sign-up to receive information about this show, click HERE.