Romare Bearden

Happy Birthday Romare Bearden!! This American artist was born in Charlotte, North Carolina in 1911, He worked in cartoon, oils, and collage. He also was a writer, co-writing the jazz classic Sea Breeze. He originally began painting Southern scenes with an influence by famed muralist Diego Rivera. Bearden served in World War II and then using his GI bill, studied in Sorbonne, France. His outlook changed and he began to create abstractions of the human form, social issues and religious commentary, relying heavily on collage. In fact he has been deemed one of the nation’s foremost collagists. He and his wife established the Bearden Foundation to assist young artists. The collage example below is titled Falling Star.