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Zusatztext "Leslie Umberger’s monumental catalogue, Between Worlds: The Art of Bill Traylor, which accompanied her 2018 exhibition at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, is a stunning, intensely researched, and moving tribute to a unique figure in the history of American art . . . . The catalogue, which includes more than two hundred gorgeous illustrations of artworks from public and private collections, along with ample reproductions of archival material and historical photographs, make it not only the most comprehensive resource for Traylor’s work, but also an excellent one for those interested in the history of the American South. A bold and brilliant text, contained inside a beautifully produced object, Between Worlds sets the standard for the type of critical scholarship that can be done on an artist once discounted as marginal or an outsider." ---Aleesa Pitchamarn Alexander, Panorama: Journal of the Association of Historians of American Art Informationen zum Autor Leslie Umberger is curator of folk and self-taught art at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Stephanie Stebich is the Margaret and Terry Stent Director of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Kerry James Marshall is an internationally renowned artist and 1997 MacArthur Fellow. Klappentext "Bill Traylor (ca. 1853-1949) is regarded today as one of the most important American artists of the twentieth century. A black man born into slavery in Alabama, he was an eyewitness to history--the Civil War, Emancipation, Reconstruction, Jim Crow segregation, the Great Migration, and the steady rise of African American urban culture in the South. Traylor would not live to see the civil rights movement, but he was among those who laid its foundation. Starting around 1939, Traylor--by then in his late eighties and living on the streets of Montgomery--took up pencil and paintbrush to attest to his existence and point of view. In keeping with this radical step, the paintings and drawings he made are visually striking and politically assertive; they include simple yet powerful distillations of tales and memories as well as spare, vibrantly colored abstractions. When Traylor died, he left behind more than one thousand works of art. In Between Worlds: The Art of Bill Traylor, Leslie Umberger considers more than two hundred artworks to provide the most comprehensive and in-depth study of the artist to date; she examines his life, art, and powerful drive to bear witness through the only means he had, pictures. The author draws on a wealth of historical documents--including federal and state census records, birth and death certificates, slave schedules, and interviews with family members-- to clarify the record of Traylor's personal history and family life. The story of his art opens in the late 1930s, when Traylor first received attention for his pencil drawings on found board, and concludes with the posthumous success of his oeuvre"-- Zusammenfassung A major new look at the work of one of America’s foremost self-taught artists Bill Traylor (ca. 1853–1949) came to art-making on his own and found his creative voice without guidance; today he is remembered as a renowned American artist. Traylor was born into slavery on an Alabama plantation, and his experiences spanned multiple worlds—black and white, rural and urban, old and new—as well as the crucibles that indelibly shaped America—the Civil War, Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and the Great Migration. Between Worlds presents an unparalleled look at the work of this enigmatic and dazzling artist, who blended common imagery with arcane symbolism, narration with abstraction, and personal vision with the beliefs and folkways of his time. Traylor was about twelve when the Civil War ended. After six more decades of farm labor, he moved, aging and alone, into segregated Montgomery. In the last years of his life, he drew and p...
