When the painter Sam Gilliam died last weekend at the age of 88, he left behind pioneering works of art, especially his draped canvas dyed with flowers of colors that changed the way the world thinks of painting forever. I did. But he also left a more personal legacy: his influence on his fellow artists and friends.
The sculptor Melvin Edwards, 85, has formed a close trio with the painter William T. Williams, a friend of Gilliam for over 50 years. Edwards and Gilliam own each other’s work, question endlessly about the process, and sometimes talk three to four times a day.
“We were always asking why The other did something in a particular way. ” “Lynch Fragment” When Barbed wire series.. “But that was the essence of Sam’s work. It always questioned space.”
Only two days after Gilliam’s death, Edwards and Johnson, in an edited and condensed conversation, decided to stay in Washington, DC, how they handle his life and work, and he. He talked about his success in being his best critic.
How do you see Sam’s characteristic movements now? Remove the canvas from the wall and drape. He said this was partly inspired by the laundry hanging on the clothesline.
Mel Edwards Sam was a very good painter who was curious and experimental. Thinking about the surface on which art is made didn’t start with Sam — but he took a step that most people didn’t understand. Sam has taken a step. He was seen in the right way by some people paying attention to such things, and they immediately blessed it.
Often, fellow artists quickly recognize the meaning and potential importance of style. One of the first things I did was about the suspended elements of steel and chains.When Sam and I showed them together Harlem Studio Museum [in a landmark 1969 show], I was doing my first barbed wire, some of which were wall-mounted and some of which were suspended. And we both took it for granted that we were taking a step forward.
So there were these vortices and echoes between you??
Edward You see, it’s all visual arts, not labeling. Either top or bottom, left or right. For me and most artists, it’s like having a baby. When you have sex, you aren’t thinking about what you name your baby.
What was the entrance to Rashid and Sam’s work?
Rashid Johnson There are many, but most important are improvisational relationships, the ability to respond in real time with gestures, mark making, and decision-making in a way that is in line with America’s greatest form of art and the most ambitious innovation, jazz. music. We talked about it. I’m just watching Sam explore with an honest and radical sense of self. Its radicality was linked to improvisation and innovation.
What kind of innovations are there in particular?
Johnson His bevel for me is as ambitious as the liberation of the canvas from the stretcher. [Gilliam’s “Beveled-Edge” or “Slice” paintings, a series that began in the late 1960s, were made on beveled-edge stretchers that projected off the wall.] I think there is something really important in that job.
Mel, do you agree?
Edward You didn’t need to know how it was going to go with Sam. The work was supported in various ways.For example, these days Show at a pace [featuring Edwards and Williams], The sawhorse he used was the perfect foil for Sam and spread his work horizontally. It had a human scale, but the other works in the exhibition took us straight to the ceiling.
Sam was very competitive and said he wanted to win the game of art. The artist isn’t talking that way right now.
Johnson Some of them are beyond generations. Older artists are willing to admit their competitiveness. It’s different from today. I have great respect for that idea. There is beauty in trying to win. Even if you don’t have a direct opponent.
He was a tennis player, and maybe it was related to his willingness to compete.
Edward When I spoke two months ago, I made fun of Sam as a tennis player. Our friend William was a track athlete, a wide range of jumpers, and soccer was my main sport in high school. We were all physical people who understood the physical dynamics. It doesn’t mean that it was translated one-on-one to our work, but I do mean sensitivity to 3D.
Rashid, you talked about the black artist’s decision in the 1960s and 1970s to work abstractly, rather than portraying blacks directly in representational or figurative language.
Johnson It was a decision, and it’s a fool’s errand to pretend it’s not true. Sam and artists like Sam, who chose abstraction as a means and saw it as a way forward, were aware of the fact that they did not include blackbody and thematic blackbody concerns. .. I thank those people. It wasn’t always rewarding in the usual way.
Sam stayed in Washington and did not have a consistent gallery representation in New York, the center of the art world, until later in his life. How did it affect his career?
Edward He had his independence, which was at the heart of his character anyway.
I Interviewed him in 2018 And he asked him if being black hindered his career, he answered both yes and no, and he wasn’t interested in clearing up the contradictions.
Johnson To be honest, I love it and there is a lot of truth in both answers. White Western history often does a great job of putting itself at the center. As a young artist, Sam Gilliam was important to me. Mel, Ed Clark, William T. Williams, these were heroes to me. And the fact that they weren’t ambitiously represented in some cultural institutions did not prevent me from seeing the world.
Edward People think that what is written about whites is what we must aim for. We often limit our thinking because there are ways to see things in the world of art and to educate us. In the end, Sam wasn’t limited to anything like that.
I know he’s just died, but what’s his important legacy?
Johnson He was delighted with the life he lived in and was excited about the impact he had on many of us. For me, it’s a cycle of his life and career — the fact that he continued to work, complementing his legacy, as well as creating something to add to it. I know some people quote his early breakthroughs, but over the last three years he has honestly provided me with a series of tasks that are as ambitious as I’ve ever created. I think it was. That part is important. This guy really continued.
Edward I’m glad Sam is Sam and does what he wants to do. He always kept that attitude. You can fill the entire New York Times with Sam alone and forget about the rest. It’s my emotional view of my friends. He was pleased that his work got more attention and more finances came his way, but it was a painful hell. He always wanted to do the job, and he did it until he couldn’t.
