Artist Birthday: Alma W. Thomas (1891-1978 US)

Alma Woodsey Thomas was a pioneering African American abstract painter and art educator. Any art historian who is a nut about color as I am certainly knows her work!

Artist Birthday for 22 September: Alma W. Thomas (1891-1978 US)

Starting in the 1970s, Thomas initiated her Earth series of paintings. These involved concentric circles of parallel layers of broken color. They are reminiscent of tesserae used in mosaic, although much more brilliant in color. The radial balance of these Earth works belie the fact that they were influenced by the azaleas and cherry blossoms Thomas saw in her hometown of Washington, DC. The concentric circles are also reminiscent of the Color Field paintings of Kenneth Noland (1924-2010), although Thomas' technique of short, square brush work creates a much richer and lively surface movement, and a prismatic quality to the brilliant colors.

Background 

The Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s led to the formation of the African American artists’ Spiral Group in New York in 1963. These two factors galvanized Black artists to push for a revival in the exhibition and study of African American art that had stagnated since the Harlem Renaissance (ca. 1918-1930s).
 
As during the Harlem Renaissance, some black artists continued to work on images of the African American community, with scenes of everyday life and elements of their African ancestry. Others believed that style was a means to an end, and that any style, regardless of its “Blackness” could represent modern African American art as a significant contribution to contemporary American art.

A series of shows in the 1970s and 1980s brought further attention to African American artists like never before. By the 2000s, the presence of African Americans in the American art world has progressed to strong representation in almost every gallery and museum in the country, including some museums dedicated to black artists, and in many abroad.

Alma Thomas was born in Columbus, Georgia.  In 1924, Thomas was the first graduate of Howard University’s newly formed art department. Howard, founded in 1867, was the first historically black university in the US. After graduation, Thomas taught art to children for thirty-five years in Washington, DC. While teaching, her personal paintings were realistic in style. She exhibited in shows for black artists. Her works were respected but not acclaimed.

In the 1950s she studied painting at American University and became interested in color and abstract art. At the time, Abstract Expressionism, with its emphasis on pure color and dynamic brushwork as well as fields of unmodulated pure color, held sway in the art world. Thomas’s interest in color led her to choose Color Field painting, rather than works that represented her African American heritage.

In 1966, when she was seventy-four, Thomas was offered a one-person show at Howard University. Instead of exhibiting her color field paintings with large, flat areas of color, she decided to exhibit paintings that were in a totally new style. She was fascinated by the leaves outside of her window and the way that sunlight coming through them created endless varieties of pattern and color. Her style of mosaic-like color fields was born. Having started showing in her seventies, Thomas became one of the most exhibited African American artists.

Correlations to Davis programs: Explorations in Art Kindergarten 2E, Lesson 8; Discovering Art History 4E, lesson 2.2; Exploring Visual Design 4E, Chapter 7 Studio Experience; Davis Collections -- Women Artists 1900s