This week’s various will be back next Friday.
A Theora Hamblett work at the MMA (wish I had just taken the pic better!)
From March 23 through June 22, 2013, the Mississippi Museum of Art in Jackson is exhibiting ‘Symbols of Faith, Home, and Beyond: The Art of Theora Hamblett’ which is a survey of more than 40 of her works.
From the museum:
Hamblett, born in Paris, Mississippi, in 1895, has been described as “the most recognized visionary painter in America.” She began painting at the age of fifty-five, creating hundreds of scenes of early-day remembrances like the childhood games “Drop the Handkerchief” and “Ring Around the Rosie,” as well as many of her own dreams and visions. This exhibition explores different memories of faith, home, and beyond through the eyes of the master Mississippi artist.
She was the first artist from Mississippi to have been exhibited at MoMA. In 1955, they included her in a show of new acquisitions, and again in 1972 for their ‘Masters of Popular Painting: Modern Primitives of Europe and America‘ wherein they mention ‘worlds of fantasy which illuminate inner truths and personal convictions such as those envisioned by…Hamblett’.
Her ‘Cotton Pickers’ (one of my favorites of hers, too) had an auction estimate of $12-18k and sold at auction last year for over $24k.
More of her works viewable here.