Originating - Roland Ayers (NEW)
Originating, Roland Ayers

Originating

Artist

Roland Ayers

Nationality

American

Heritage

African American

Medium

Offset Lithograph

Date

1987

Dimensions

30 x 22 inches

Edition Size

100 prints in this edition

Printer

Robert "Bob" Franklin

Provenance

Brandywine Workshop and Archives

Location

Philadelphia, PA

About the Work

From the Artist

[My work] oftentimes reveals my fragmented consciousness: full of dream states and visions concerning one-world-togetherness: bits and pieces of primal religiosity that point to Europe as much as it does Africa; Afro-American cultural imagery, all presented up-front with an optimistic facade.

However, there is another side: part of the dream as nightmare, simmering terrors underneath or just around the corner, ominous dark skies, lonely figures, fragmentary, confused thoughts on being black in the dark, cavernous belly of America, curses and cries in the night. I cannot always decide which story the finished product illuminates: an upbeat optimist or a frustrated, lonely pessimist. Or both at once: Gemini-like, each facing his own way, one foot planted in the West, the other in the East. 
—Adapted from https://www.terenchin.com/2019/10/12/roland-ayers-1932-2017/, accessed 6/1/2021

About the Artist

Roland Ayers

Artist and art educator Roland Ayers was born on July 2, 1932, the only child of Alice and Lorenzo Ayers, and grew up in the Germantown district of Philadelphia. Ayers served in the U.S. Army (stationed in Germany) before studying at the Philadelp...

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