Robert Freeman, New Works
November 4 - December 18, 2016
Opening Friday, November 4, 6- 8 PM
Statement by the Artist, Robert Freeman
The
African American community is as complex as any other. It has no single
voice, no single way of seeing the world, and no single way of
producing art, music, literature or theater. My paintings explore and
celebrate the beauty, elegance and grace of the black middle class
through my personal experience.
Commissioned for an exhibition at Adelson Galleries Boston, New Works is
inspired by my childhood spent between two cultures: the Gold Coast,
West Africa (now Ghana) and the East Coast of the United States.
In New Works I revisit the themes of race and culture that I explored in “Black Tie” (1981), part
of a series that comments on the personal conflict I felt as
African-Americans settled into middle-class life following the racial
tensions of the 1960s and 1970s. Although
much has changed in 35 years— including the election of the nation’s
first African American President— questions of identity and inclusion
remain.
New Works includes
eight oil paintings of African Americans at formal social events. The
figures in my latest series are more engaging and the colors more
intense than in my previous work.
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