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| ‘Alma Thomas,’ an Incandescent Pioneer | ‘Alma Thomas,’ an Incandescent Pioneer |
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| Alma Thomas, whose joyful abstract paintings are the subject of an undersized but important and inspiring exhibition at the Studio Museum in Harlem, had one of the great, late-blooming careers in American art during the post-World War II era. | Alma Thomas, whose joyful abstract paintings are the subject of an undersized but important and inspiring exhibition at the Studio Museum in Harlem, had one of the great, late-blooming careers in American art during the post-World War II era. |
| Born in Columbus, Ga., Ms. Thomas (1891-1978) attended Howard University and, in 1924, became its first student to earn a degree in fine art. After graduation she began teaching at Shaw Junior High School in Washington, continuing there until retiring in 1960. Only then, at 69, was she able to devote herself full time to painting. During the ensuing 18 years — despite acute arthritis — she produced the body of work for which she would be justly celebrated, a stream of vividly colorful paintings made of loosely applied patches configured in irregular grids and concentric circles. | Born in Columbus, Ga., Ms. Thomas (1891-1978) attended Howard University and, in 1924, became its first student to earn a degree in fine art. After graduation she began teaching at Shaw Junior High School in Washington, continuing there until retiring in 1960. Only then, at 69, was she able to devote herself full time to painting. During the ensuing 18 years — despite acute arthritis — she produced the body of work for which she would be justly celebrated, a stream of vividly colorful paintings made of loosely applied patches configured in irregular grids and concentric circles. |
| In 1972, at the age of 80, she became the first African-American woman to have a solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Today, one of her incandescent, concentric circle paintings, “Resurrection” (1966), hangs in the White House. | In 1972, at the age of 80, she became the first African-American woman to have a solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Today, one of her incandescent, concentric circle paintings, “Resurrection” (1966), hangs in the White House. |
| Asked once by an interviewer if she saw herself as a black artist, Ms. Thomas replied: “No, I do not. I am an American.” But the tradition she participated in overrode national borders. She was a euphoric Modernist, a believer in the infinite possibilities of human progress. | Asked once by an interviewer if she saw herself as a black artist, Ms. Thomas replied: “No, I do not. I am an American.” But the tradition she participated in overrode national borders. She was a euphoric Modernist, a believer in the infinite possibilities of human progress. |
| “I was born at the end of the 19th century, horse and buggy days, and experienced the phenomenal changes of the 20th-century machine and space age,” Ms. Thomas wrote about her work, which incorporated inspirations from Kandinsky to color television and from the flowers in her garden to the Apollo moon landings. | “I was born at the end of the 19th century, horse and buggy days, and experienced the phenomenal changes of the 20th-century machine and space age,” Ms. Thomas wrote about her work, which incorporated inspirations from Kandinsky to color television and from the flowers in her garden to the Apollo moon landings. |
| Organized by Lauren Haynes, associate curator of the Studio Museum’s permanent collection, and Ian Berry, director of the Tang Teaching Museum at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., where it first appeared in February, “Alma Thomas,” now at the Studio Museum, focuses mainly on Ms. Thomas’s post-retirement period. | Organized by Lauren Haynes, associate curator of the Studio Museum’s permanent collection, and Ian Berry, director of the Tang Teaching Museum at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., where it first appeared in February, “Alma Thomas,” now at the Studio Museum, focuses mainly on Ms. Thomas’s post-retirement period. |
| The earliest works, “Yellow and Blue” (1959) and “Untitled” (1960), reveal Ms. Thomas as an adept practitioner of Abstract Expressionism with a fine feel for color and atmosphere and a suave painterly touch. Around 1964, she briefly flirted with political subject matter through two semiabstract pictures of crowds of demonstrators holding up signs, both called “Sketch for March on Washington” (circa 1964). These early works give little indication of the optical punch and material immediacy that would mark her mature works. | The earliest works, “Yellow and Blue” (1959) and “Untitled” (1960), reveal Ms. Thomas as an adept practitioner of Abstract Expressionism with a fine feel for color and atmosphere and a suave painterly touch. Around 1964, she briefly flirted with political subject matter through two semiabstract pictures of crowds of demonstrators holding up signs, both called “Sketch for March on Washington” (circa 1964). These early works give little indication of the optical punch and material immediacy that would mark her mature works. |
| Ms. Thomas made her late works by brushing on one small block of color at a time until she had filled the canvas or most of it with her irregular patterns, as in “Iris, Tulips, Jonquils, and Crocuses” (1969), in which vertical sequences of patches in deep blue, yellow, red and orange create a syncopating rhythm. It’s a kind of grainy pointillism, and as the artist Jennie C. Jones notes in a brief catalog essay, a sort of visual music comparable to the minimalist jazz piano of Ahmad Jamal. | |
| The exhibition’s 16 canvases from Ms. Thomas’s mature period give a general sense of how much she could do with her basic color-block method. “Cherry Blossom Symphony” (1973), pearlescent pink, wide-brush strokes covering a dark blue-green underlayer, is like a Monet landscape translated into a grid by Mondrian, and it’s gorgeous. In “Stars and Their Display” (1972), one of the exhibition’s most beautiful pieces, blocky strokes of dark blue layered over lighter areas of red, blue and yellow produce a beguiling nocturne. | The exhibition’s 16 canvases from Ms. Thomas’s mature period give a general sense of how much she could do with her basic color-block method. “Cherry Blossom Symphony” (1973), pearlescent pink, wide-brush strokes covering a dark blue-green underlayer, is like a Monet landscape translated into a grid by Mondrian, and it’s gorgeous. In “Stars and Their Display” (1972), one of the exhibition’s most beautiful pieces, blocky strokes of dark blue layered over lighter areas of red, blue and yellow produce a beguiling nocturne. |
| Paintings from 1976 are rendered in small blocks fitted together in mosaic compositions, as in the intricate, red-on-white “Scarlet Sage Dancing a Whirling Dervish” (1976) and in “White Roses Sing and Sing” (1976), which resembles a shattered windowpane of melting ice. | Paintings from 1976 are rendered in small blocks fitted together in mosaic compositions, as in the intricate, red-on-white “Scarlet Sage Dancing a Whirling Dervish” (1976) and in “White Roses Sing and Sing” (1976), which resembles a shattered windowpane of melting ice. |
| For all their virtues, however, the 16 late paintings here are not enough to fully represent Ms. Thomas’s adventurous range and her way of improvising variations on certain themes. None of her mandalalike concentric circle paintings are included, and they are among her most compelling works. To get the bigger picture, you need the exhibition catalog, which reproduces nearly 40 paintings not in the show, as well as the ones in the show. Of particular note is “Red Azaleas Singing and Dancing Rock and Roll Music” (1976), a red-on-white, mosaic-style picture over 6 feet high and 13 feet wide, showing Ms. Thomas tackling big scale with terrific aplomb. Many works only in the catalog evidently involve more exquisite subtleties of color and tone than anything in the present exhibition. | For all their virtues, however, the 16 late paintings here are not enough to fully represent Ms. Thomas’s adventurous range and her way of improvising variations on certain themes. None of her mandalalike concentric circle paintings are included, and they are among her most compelling works. To get the bigger picture, you need the exhibition catalog, which reproduces nearly 40 paintings not in the show, as well as the ones in the show. Of particular note is “Red Azaleas Singing and Dancing Rock and Roll Music” (1976), a red-on-white, mosaic-style picture over 6 feet high and 13 feet wide, showing Ms. Thomas tackling big scale with terrific aplomb. Many works only in the catalog evidently involve more exquisite subtleties of color and tone than anything in the present exhibition. |
| Asked why there are so few of the later canvases, Ms. Haynes said via email that neither the Studio Museum nor the Tang had enough exhibition space to accommodate more. A full-scale New York retrospective of Ms. Thomas’s oeuvre is long overdue. Someone with the space and resources should get on it. | Asked why there are so few of the later canvases, Ms. Haynes said via email that neither the Studio Museum nor the Tang had enough exhibition space to accommodate more. A full-scale New York retrospective of Ms. Thomas’s oeuvre is long overdue. Someone with the space and resources should get on it. |
| The current exhibition also includes about three dozen small, vibrant works on paper from the ’60s and ’70s. These afford much insight into Ms. Thomas’s creative mind as they show her freely experimenting with watercolor while soaking up and deftly manipulating her influences, which include Matisse, the Abstract Expressionists Clyfford Still and Barnett Newman, and members of the Washington Color School, like Morris Lewis and Sam Gilliam. | The current exhibition also includes about three dozen small, vibrant works on paper from the ’60s and ’70s. These afford much insight into Ms. Thomas’s creative mind as they show her freely experimenting with watercolor while soaking up and deftly manipulating her influences, which include Matisse, the Abstract Expressionists Clyfford Still and Barnett Newman, and members of the Washington Color School, like Morris Lewis and Sam Gilliam. |
| Unlike the many artists who have viewed modernity through jaded eyes, Ms. Thomas was excited by humanity’s efforts to constantly outdo itself. She wrote: : “Today not only can our great scientists send astronauts to and from the moon to photograph its surface and bring back samples of rocks and other materials, but through the medium of color television all can actually see and experience the thrill of these adventures. These phenomena set my creativity in motion.” | Unlike the many artists who have viewed modernity through jaded eyes, Ms. Thomas was excited by humanity’s efforts to constantly outdo itself. She wrote: : “Today not only can our great scientists send astronauts to and from the moon to photograph its surface and bring back samples of rocks and other materials, but through the medium of color television all can actually see and experience the thrill of these adventures. These phenomena set my creativity in motion.” |
| This explains why some paintings in the exhibition have titles like “Apollo 12 ‘Splash Down’” (1970). In “Starry Night and the Astronauts” (1972), a field of rich, dark-blue paint strokes is punctuated near the top by a small fragment of red, orange and yellow dots suggesting a rocket ship burning through space. Ms. Thomas was a metaphorical explorer of deep mental space, a fellow traveler of the Afrofuturists, as Ms. Haynes observes in her catalog essay. | This explains why some paintings in the exhibition have titles like “Apollo 12 ‘Splash Down’” (1970). In “Starry Night and the Astronauts” (1972), a field of rich, dark-blue paint strokes is punctuated near the top by a small fragment of red, orange and yellow dots suggesting a rocket ship burning through space. Ms. Thomas was a metaphorical explorer of deep mental space, a fellow traveler of the Afrofuturists, as Ms. Haynes observes in her catalog essay. |
| She didn’t dwell on the dark side. “I’ve never bothered painting the ugly things in life… no,” she once said. “I wanted something beautiful that you could sit down and look at.” She was being unduly modest. In her paintings, she reached wide to embrace the physical and the transcendental, the terrestrial and the cosmic. Her kind of unfettered optimism and generosity of spirit is an invigorating antidote to the anxious negativity pervading the world of art today. | She didn’t dwell on the dark side. “I’ve never bothered painting the ugly things in life… no,” she once said. “I wanted something beautiful that you could sit down and look at.” She was being unduly modest. In her paintings, she reached wide to embrace the physical and the transcendental, the terrestrial and the cosmic. Her kind of unfettered optimism and generosity of spirit is an invigorating antidote to the anxious negativity pervading the world of art today. |