Curated by Peter Selz

September 20 - October 20, 2007

Meridian Gallery announces its upcoming exhibition, Troubled Goods: Robert Colescott, A Ten Year Survey (1997-2007), curated by renowned art historian, Peter Selz. The exhibition, originated by Meridian, will travel to the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa for exhibit from November 8 through December 7, 2007.

Colescott, born in Oakland in 1925, was the first African American artist to represent the United States in a solo exhibition at the Venice Biennale in 1997. His mother a pianist and his father a jazz musician and railroad porter, were friends with Sergeant Johnson. Johnson and Diego Rivera became the first major influences in the artist's life. Robert, himself a musician, played drums and performed with local groups but after serving in the army in France during World War II, he returned to the San Francisco Bay Area where he received a BA and MA in art at UC Berkeley. After his time in Paris studying with Fernand Leger and a significant period in Egypt, Colescott returned to San Francisco and taught during the 1970s at the San Francisco Art Institute. He is currently Emeritus Professor of Art at the University of Arizona.

A selection of Colescott's painting, drawing, and collage will survey his work of the last ten years. There has never been a substantial catalogue of his work. With the assistance of Zellerbach, Grants for the Arts funding, the Harold & Arlene Schnitzer CARE Foundation, and the University of Alabama, we hope partially, to redress this lack in a catalogue with texts by Peter Selz, De Young Museum curator, Daniell Cornell, and critic and art historian Albert Stewart..

Peter Selz writes, "Colescott painted figurative paintings at a time when figuration was out of the mainstream. Colescott's art, moreover was, and is, concerned with political issues as well as race and sex. His paint is luscious, his brushstroke is vigorous, his subjects are controversial, and there is an internal structure to his paintings with a jazz-like rhythm. Back in 1988 Peter Schjeldahl, now the art critic for The New Yorker began his review of the Venice show by saying: "The most interesting thing about Robert Colescott is that he paints beautifully." The present exhibition, "Troubled Goods" is a survey of the last ten years which exhibits mostly works not seen heretofore. These new paintings show the admirable vitality of this octogenarian artist, who continues to paint with Dionysian abandon."

Events for the Colescott show will include the reenactment of "Dulacrow's Masterwork - A Mockumentary," a 1976 performance piece by the artist and performed at the San Francisco Art Institute. Colescott originally created this 45 minute slide lecture (on Delacroix's "Liberty Leading the People") as a tribute to academic boredom - hence its "class period" length. The piece's extemporaneous commentary - set to the music of Edgard Varèse - developed as Colescott painted his "Homage to Delacroix: Liberty Leading the People," 1976, while listening to recordings of "Integrales," "Density 21.5," "Ionization," "and "Octandre."

This is a museum caliber show by an American Living Treasure which will occupy all three floors of Meridian's new site in an historic 1911 mansion.

Dulacrow's Masterwork - A Mockumentary

2 screening dates:

Friday September 21, 2007
7:00 PM
at the San Francisco Art Institute Lecture Hall (800 Chestnut Street, San Francisco, CA)

Wednesday October 10, 2007
SPECIAL BENEFIT SCREENING
7:00 PM Dessert reception
8:00 PM Screening
at Meridian Gallery

PRESS:

Kenneth Baker's review in the SF Chronicle

Peter Selz's article in the Berkeley Daily Planet

CATALOGUE:

Order the Troubled Goods catalogue!

With essays by Peter Selz, Daniell Cornell, and an interview by Albert Stewart