Joy Taylor on Romare Bearden

Romare Bearden, Conjur Woman, 1975, photostats, magazine pictures, colored paper, ink, 46 x 36 inches

Soon after I moved to New York City in 1975, I saw that Romare Bearden had an exhibition of collages entitled The Prevalence of Ritual at Cordier and Ekstrom Gallery on Madison Avenue. The work was based on his recollections and appreciation for his childhood days in rural Mecklenberg County in North Carolina during the Great Migration. I was trying to make collages myself, so I went to the show—over and over again.

The work was so free, but so constrained at the same time, and made of so many disparate parts, each drawn from a different source, but all together making perfect visual sense. It was incredibly messy-looking up close but, when I stepped back, everything clicked into place. He created utterly flat but paradoxically deep space, too, inhabited by dignified characters of mythical stature from scraps of colored paper, torn and ink-stained prints, bits of fabric, and parts of magazine imagery.

During the following year, I was able to contact the artist — he was in the phone book… and he answered the phone himself. He had a studio in Long Island City where he was willing to look at my work if I made the trek over the East River from Manhattan. I did!

There, as he critiqued my work, he explained his method of composition, essential to making each collage a unified whole: linking colors together across the entire picture, taking small pieces and guiding the viewer’s gaze from one spot of color to the next, weaving each unique bit into a larger whole. I also absorbed his appreciation of Dutch paintings from the Golden Age, especially Vermeer, and the drawings and prints of Hokusai — all, to his eye, examples of elegant and restrained composition.

Composition is still the lynchpin of each piece I make. My gratitude for his generosity and his kindness continues to guide me in my relationships with fellow artists. Thank you, Romare!

Joy Taylor, Gotcha, 2024, Acrylic on canvas, 60 x 52 inches

Joy Taylor: I moved out of the city in 1987, settling in northern Dutchess county, where I live in a small old house among woods and fields. Immersed as I am in Nature, my art is inspired by her superb, ever-changing compositions to this day.