David Driskell: Spirit Watching
Spirit Watching
July 25 - September 21, 2024
About the Show
Featured Artist
Cove Street Arts is honored to present a solo exhibition of work from the estate of iconic African-American artist, curator, scholar, Skowhegan alumni and 50+ year Maine summer resident, David C. Driskell (1931-2020). The featured paintings and prints span the breadth of Driskell's long career. The earliest piece was begun in 1958, and the most recent works were made in 2019. All of the artist's signature imagery and motifs are represented, including his rare overtly political paintings. Driskell's style fits loosely into the Modernist canon, but is marked by his personal identity and life experience. As art critic John Yau noted, “Driskell never tried to fit in or accommodate his work to prevailing, white, avant-garde styles...Rather, he absorbed aspects of various styles and, in the cauldron of his art practice, welded them to his personal and cultural history.”
At Howard University, Driskell was mentored by important African-American artist and scholar, James A. Porter, and studied with artist Lois Mailou Jones. In his own long and distinguished career of making, teaching and curating, in addition to mentoring and championing art of the African Diaspora, Driskell advocated strongly against segregating African American art from the broader American canon, stressing that "African American art is American art." David was prominently featured on the HBO documentary Black Art: In the Absence of Light which was aired in 2021, one year after his death.
Driskell earned a BA in Fine Art from Howard University (1955) and an MFA from Catholic University (1962). He attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in 1953, after which he maintained a lifelong relationship with the program, serving as visiting faculty, lecturer, and board member. In 1976, Driskell curated the groundbreaking exhibition, Two Centuries of Black American Art, which opened at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) and traveled to institutions throughout the US. The catalogue Driskell penned in support of the exhibition was seminal in establishing the canon.
His works can be found in collections throughout the country, including the National Museum of African American History and Culture, Washington, D.C.; National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; High Museum of Art, GA; Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, PA; the Baltimore Museum of Art, MD; the Portland Museum of Art, ME; The Studio Museum in Harlem, NY; the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, VA;.the Birmingham Museum of Art, AL; Colby College Museum of Art, ME; Bowdoin College Museum of Art, ME; and the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, AR, among others.
Preview the Exhibition
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