Find out more about exceptional artists an d their work\, this month is about Clementine Hunter (1886-1988)
\nH unter lived and worked most of her life on the Melrose cotton plantation n ear Natchitoches\, Louisiana. She did not start painting until the 1940s w hen she was already a grandmother. Her first painting\, executed on a wind ow shade using paints left behind by a plantation visitor\, depicts a bapt ism in Cane River.
\nHunter painted at night\, after working all day in the plantation house. She used whatever surfaces she could find\, draw ing and painting on canvas\, wood\, gourds\, paper\, snuff boxes\, wine bo ttles\, iron pots\, cutting boards\, and plastic milk jugs.
\nWorkin g from memory\, Hunter recorded everyday life in and around the plantation \, from work in the cotton fields to baptisms and funerals. She rendered h er figures\, usually Black\, in expressionless profile and disregarded for mal perspective and scale.
\nThough she first exhibited in 1949\, Hu nter did not garner public attention until the 1970s when both the Museum of American Folk Art in New York and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art exhibited her paintings.
\nEven with such success\, Hunter chose to stay in Louisiana\, working at Melrose Plantation until 1970 when she move d to a small trailer a few miles away on an unmarked road.
\nhttps://oc ls.libnet.info/event/17260013 URL;VALUE=URI:https://ocls.libnet.info/event/17260013 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR