Charles A. White

1944 White was drafted into the army, where he was assigned to paint camouflage. While he was stationed in Missouri, he developed pleurisy and was hospitalized. He then was discovered to have tuberculosis, was given a medical discharge from the service, and spent the next three years in a Veterans' Administration Hospital.

Upon his release from the hospital, White and his wife settled in New York City. By 1947 White had his first one-man show there, which kindled a worldwide interest in his work. "Charles White's work has force and conviction," a New York Times critic wrote. "Something of the throbbing emotion of Negro spirituals comes through. A restrained stylization of the big forms keeps them from being too overpowering. This is very moving work." In the ensuing years, collectors and museums in the United States and Europe acquired and exhibited many of his pieces.

Time in Mexico Focused Craft

In the late 1930s, White became aware of Mexican artist Diego Rivera, who was painting murals in the United States at the time. Controversial for his politics, Rivera's murals depicting the struggles of the working class are well known. "I found a strong affinity in terms of my goals as an artist and what they represented," White said in the 1971 catalog. "I am concerned about my fellow man ... with the survival of man ... with the progress that man has made in relation to his fellow man, in relation to nature, in trying to find a more beautiful way of life." White traveled to Mexico in the late-1940s to make prints at the renowned graphics workshop Taller de Grafica in Mexico City. He stayed and worked in Mexico for two years, meeting the leading Mexican artists of the time, including Rivera. After a year-long artist-in-residency at Howard University, White returned to New York for a lung operation and spent another year in the hospital. He and his wife then divorced, after which he suffered another physical breakdown and another chest surgery.

After his recuperation White returned to work and became involved with the New York Graphic Workshop, which was similar to Mexico's Taller de Grafica. He also became part of the city's thriving black intellectual community, and lived in the same apartment building as W.E.B. Du Bois, Ralph Bunche, Thurgood Marshall, and Duke Ellington. New York City influenced White's work as an adult as Chicago had in his youth.

At the heart of White's work was his need to explore the universal conflicts that plague all humankind. Human relationships, social or economic struggles, love and hate, justice and injustice were among the themes of his work. "I deal with ideas as an educator or a philosopher," White is quoted as saying in the 1971 exhibition catalog. "This is my life's work, and I treat this responsibility very seriously." Harry Belafonte commented in the foreword to White's 1967 book, Images of Dignity: "There is a powerful, sometimes violent beauty in his artistic interpretation of Negro Americana. There is the poetic beauty of Negro idiom. This is the artist's most profound contribution, and it is significant that his art has never strayed far afield from the roots which gave birth to the artist himself."

Work Received Differently by Varying Audiences

As White's work became more popular and more valuable, White began to notice a trend among his collectors that he had never intended--most of the people who bought his art were upper- or middle-class individuals or museums. "The primary audience that I was addressing myself to was really the masses of black people," White said in the 1971 catalog, "and they were not turning out in hundreds to see my shows, and I had to find some way of reaching them, since my subject matter was related to them and should be made available to them...." To this end, White later published inexpensive portfolios of his work: Portfolio of Six Drawings--The Art of Charles White, Portfolio 10/Charles White, and Portfolio 6/Charles White.

White met and married Frances Barrett, a social worker, in 1950. White was a member of the Committee on the Arts, whose membership included Sidney Poitier and Harry Belafonte. Both entertainers would become serious collectors and champions of his work. Though he was enjoying critical and popular success in New York, White's work could not break all the boundaries of racism in America during the era. His work was included in an exhibition of black artists at the University of Alabama, but the artists were not allowed to attend. The Delgado Museum in New Orleans purchased one of White's paintings, but denied the artist admission.

White found his work very widely known throughout Europe on a 1951 trip there with his wife. He was received as a distinguished guest in France, England, Italy, Germany, Czechoslovakia, Poland, and the former Soviet Union. Throughout Europe, White was amazed not only by how his work was celebrated, but how his skin color was not a concern as he moved freely through the streets. In 1952 the Whitney Museum purchased White's Preacher for its permanent collection.

The Whites moved to California in 1956, and from then on he was known as a Los Angeles artist. White, his wife, and their two adopted children lived at the foot of the San Gabriel Mountains in Altadena, a Los Angeles suburb. They fell in love with the sunshine, nature, and wide open spaces of California. He had several one-man shows in Los Angeles, and was represented by the Heritage Gallery there. In 1965 he began teaching at the Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles, and continued to teach there until his death in 1979. In 1966 the artist was commissioned to do Exodus II by Gemini G.E.L. gallery in Los Angeles. White was not as involved in California arts organizations as he had been in New York, instead focusing on his teaching and his work. He thrived on the energy of his students. He also was given to sitting on gallery floors, talking about art with visiting groups of school children who visited his shows.

White lived passionately, joyfully, and with dignity. His works speak of the aspirations of all people, regardless of race or creed. Still, when asked why he only painted blacks, White responded, "I am a Negro in America," in Images of Dignity. "I relate to images that are meaningful to me, images that are closest to me. I use that as a springboard to deal with the more broad and the more all-encompassing." "Throughout his career, White was a noble voice for his race," critic Clarence V. Reynolds wrote in Black Issues Book Review. "An artist of incredible talent, White's oeuvre testifies to the sentiment that reflects both the strength and suffering that characterize the African-American experience." White died on October 3, 1979.

Awards