“El Museo del Barrio announces Popular Painters and Other Visionaries, the museum’s first online exhibition that examines the work of 30 artists from the Americas and the Caribbean. Curated by El Museo’s Chief Curator, Rodrigo Moura, and originally planned as an in-person experience, the exhibition was adapted as a virtual presentation. The show departs from the term ‘popular painters’ to identify artists working on the margins of modernism and the mainstream art world between the 1930s and 1970s, and will feature nearly 30 works from El Museo’s Permanent Collection, several of them presented for the first time.
Popular visual sources provide the narrative thread of the exhibition, which is divided into thematic sections around labor and daily life; festivities; black Atlantic religion; vernacular architecture; and bodily representation. In addition to these themes, four artists are presented in monographic sections: Andrés Curruchich, José Bernardo Cardoso Jr., Felipe Jesus Consalvos, and Martín Ramírez. Diasporic experiences are shared by the artists featured in the show – whether as African populations in the New World, Latin American and Caribbean people in the United States, or in reference to the displacement of Amerindian populations within their own territories. This is reflected in the impact of migration, exclusion, marginalization, cultural resistance, indigeneity, self-determination, and autobiography that is present in their works.” — El Museo del Barrio
Micius Stéphane (b. Bainet, Haiti 1912 – d New York 1966). Untitled (The photographer) [Sin título (El fotógrafo)], c.1945-1965. Oil on masonite. 50.8 x 61 cm. El Museo del Barrio Collection, New York. Donation of Drs. Roslyn and Lloyd Siegel.
Heitor dos Prazeres (b. Rio de Janeiro, Brasil 1898 – d. Rio de Janeiro, Brasil 1966). Untitled (Poker Game) [Sin título (Juego de poker)], 1963. Oil on canvas, 48.3 x 49.2 cm. El Museo del Barrio Collection, New York. Donation of Gale Simmons, Craig Duncan and Lynn Tarbox in memory of Barbara Duncan, 2007 © Patrimônio Família Heitor dos Prazeres.
Jacques-Richard Chéry (b. Cap Haitien, Haiti 1928 – d. mediados de 1980). Untitled (Religious ceremony / Voodoo ceremony) [Sin título (Ceremonia religiosa / Ceremonia vudú)], c.1960s. Oil and gouache on panel, 31.8 x 39.4 cm. El Museo del Barrio Collection, New York. Donation of Drs. Roslyn and Lloyd Siegel.
Louisiane Saint Fleurant (b. Petit-Trou-de-Nippes, Haiti 1924 – d. 2005). Untitled (Portrait of woman with two girls) [Sin título (Retrato de mujer con dos muchachas)], Undated. Oil on canvas, 76.2 x 101.6 cm. El Museo del Barrio, New York. Donation of Sanford Rubenstein.
Martín Ramírez (b. Jalisco, México 1895 – d. Estados Unidos 1963). Untitled, (Arches, 5 Panels) [Sin título (Arcos, 5 paneles)], c.1960-1963. Gouache, color pencil and graphite on paper, 72.4 x 185.4 cm © Herado de Martín Ramírez. Courtesy of Ricco/Maresca Gallery.
Eloy Blanco (b. Aguadilla, Puerto Rico 1933 – d. New York, New York 1984). 4000 on Green [4000 sobre verde], 1982. Acrylic and felt tip marker on canvas, 45.7 x 35.6 cm. El Museo del Barrio Collection, New York. Donation of Joanne Blanco.
Felipe Jesús Consalvos (b. La Habana, Cuba 1891 – d. ca. 1960). Chant of the Jungle [Canto de la jungla], c.1920-1950. Mixed media collage, 106 x 71.1 cm. Courtesy of Andrew Edlin Gallery, New York and Doodletown Farm, LLC.