Crystal Bridges acquires an early Sam Gilliam drape painting
Sam Gilliam (b. 1933, Tupelo, Mississippi), Mazda, 1970, acrylic on canvas, installed: 135 × 90 in. (342.9 × 228.6 cm), Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, 2020.12.
BENTONVILLE, ARK
.-Crystal Bridges announced the acquisition of Mazda (1970), an early drape painting by the renowned artist Sam Gilliam. For more than 60 years, Gilliam has pushed the limits of traditional painting. In the 1960s, he received international acclaim for his drape paintings as he continued to explore abstraction through works that jumped off the wall, an exploration that would continue throughout his career. His mixed media work, Black and Golden Door (1996), was a gift to the Crystal Bridges collection in 2016, and Gilliam was featured in Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power, which was on view at Crystal Bridges in 2018.