Benny Andrews; painter, printmaker; illustrator
Hyfler/Rosner
http://www.mbergerart.com/neel/andrews.htm
His work:
http://www.artnet.com/Galleries/Artists_detail.asp?gid=14&aid=1521
http://www.welancora.com/consign.html
The New York Times
November 11, 2006 Saturday
Late Edition - Final
Paid Notice: Deaths
ANDREWS, BENNY
ANDREWS--Benny. The Board of Trustees and the Staff of The
Studio Museum in Harlem are deeply saddened by the passing
of artist Benny Andrews. An internationally recognized
painter, printmaker, illustrator, passionate cultural leader
and arts advocate, Benny was a revered member of The SMH
family who will be greatly missed by us all. We send our
heartfelt condolences to his family. Raymond J. McGuire,
Chairman Thelma Golden, Director
Hyfler/Rosner
"Hyfler/Rosner" <rel...@rcn.com> wrote in message
news:08udnSv0H92g-cvY...@rcn.net...
>A portrait of him by Alice Neel
> http://www.mbergerart.com/neel/andrews.htm
>
>
> His work:
> http://www.artnet.com/Galleries/Artists_detail.asp?gid=14&aid=1521
> http://www.welancora.com/consign.html
>
>
November 12, 2006
Benny Andrews, 75, Dies; Painted Life in the South
By BENJAMIN GENOCCHIO NY Times
Benny Andrews, a figural expressionistic painter and teacher
whose paintings, prints, drawings and collages drew on his
African-American roots in Georgia, died on Friday at his
home in Brooklyn. He was 75.
The cause was cancer, said Nene Humphrey, his wife.
Mr. Andrews was a vivid storyteller, using memories of his
childhood in the segregated South to create narrative-based
works that addressed human suffering and injustice. Over his
lifetime, his social concerns ranged from the civil rights
struggle and the antiwar movement to the Holocaust, poverty
and the forced relocation of American Indians.
His paintings and drawings do not fit easily into one art
historical tradition. They sometimes resemble the
anti-Modernist American Scene paintings, though with a
lyrical, almost decorative stylization that draws upon
Surrealism and Southern folk art. Some works border on
caricature, but the formal narrative quality of his images
also suggest his identification with Romare Bearden and
Jacob Lawrence.
Even in an era dominated by abstract art, he continuously
exhibited his work in galleries and was the recipient of
numerous awards and prizes, including a John Hay Whitney
Fellowship in 1965 and a National Endowment for the Arts
Fellowship in 1974. His paintings, prints and collages are
in the collections of more than 30 museums, including those
of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art,
the Studio Museum in Harlem, the High Museum of Art in
Atlanta and the Art Institute of Chicago. The Ogden Museum
of Southern Art in New Orleans holds a major body of his
work, and his archives of material about black artists in
the 1960s and '70s was given to the Studio Museum.
Benny Andrews was born in Plainview, a farming community
three miles from Madison, Ga., on Nov. 13, 1930, the son of
sharecroppers. He was one of 10 children, who all worked in
the cotton fields to help support the family, attending
school only sporadically. In 1948 he became the first member
of his family to graduate from high school.
From 1950 to 1953, he served in the United States Air Force,
and used the G.I. Bill to attend the School of the Art
Institute of Chicago. He was one of very few black students
there. He was trained as an abstract expressionist, but at
night went to jazz clubs to draw. He also earned fees
illustrating Polish polka record covers.
In 1958, Mr. Andrews moved to New York, where his friends
included the artists Red Grooms, Bob Thompson, Lester
Johnson, Mimi Gross and Raphael Soyer. His first New York
solo exhibition, at Forum Gallery in 1962, was reviewed
favorably in The New York Times. It was during this period
that he began to produce collages, which some critics
consider his strongest work.
Mr. Andrews was active in teaching, social causes and arts
administration. From 1968 to 1997, he taught art at Queens
College, a branch of the City University of New York. He
established an art program in the state's prison system,
which later served as a national model, and from 1982 to
1984 was the director of the visual arts program for the
National Endowment for the Arts. Earlier this year he
traveled to the Gulf Coast to work on an art project with
children displaced by Hurricane Katrina.
In addition to his wife, he is survived by three children
from an earlier marriage, Julia, Christopher and Thomas; and
four grandchildren.