CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS.- The Sert Gallery presents today "Beauford Delaney: The Color Yellow," on view through May 4, 2003. Of the handful of black painters associated with Abstract Expressionism, Beauford Delaney (1901-1979) is probably the least known or understood. This retrospective presents the full range of Delaney’s art, from the portraits and cityscapes he did in New York’s Greenwich Village in the 1940s to the abstract work that followed his 1953 move to Paris, where he lived for the next 25 years.
Much like Van Gogh, Delaney believed that the color yellow held spiritual significance as the hue of light and healing. The color plays a unifying role in his work, from his early views of Washington Square to the shimmering fields of thick color he painted in the 1960s and 70s. Jazz and literature were sources of inspiration too, as evidenced by his portraits of Ella Fitzgerald and James Baldwin.
The Color Yellow is traveling from the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, where it was organized by Richard J. Powell, chairman of Duke University’s art history department. A fully illustrated catalogue will be available.