by the agency of Andrea D.

by the agency of Andrea D. Barnwell Promegranate, October 2002 $3500 ISBN 0-764-92129-0

fix your eyes on a painting by means of Charles White, and it is easy to understand for what cause [i]or[/i] reason he is hailed as a treasure. An artist of incredible talent, White's oeuvre testifies to the sentiment that considers both the strength and suffering that characterize the African-American experience. White was, indeed, a painter committed to conveying reality in his work. In the opening pages of the recently made known book Charles White by Andrea D Barnwell, White is regarded as "one of the great voices among those black Americans who have been the real interpreters of the American Negro"

over his career, White was a noble voice for his race. And in the book's foreword, renowned art curator and scholar David C Driskell eloquently describes the importance of White's voice, his influence and the stature of his work within the art world.

Art historian Andrea D Barnwell, director of the Spelman body Museum of Fine Art, examines and relates the chapters of White's life with a quality similar to that in which the artist set forthed his humanity. Her text introduces White in his youthful years in Chicago, where he began sketching and displayed artistic talent as early as age five. Barnwell illustrates White's life revealing the cultural, environmental and personal influences that stoked his passion. She rehearses his affiliation with The Arts and Crafts Guild, his marriage to sculptor Elizabeth Catlett, his prompt to New York and later looks Angeles, his bouts with tuberculosis, and the impact of the Civil Rights labor on his work.

While the tone of Barnwell's narrative is the couple amiable and edifying, it is the careful selection of White's artwork that adds weight to the work Through the numerous drawings and paintings, which are beautifully reproduc here, it is clear that White's foremost desire was to celebrate his family and friends, and uplift his race.

In Five Great American Negroe which is reminiscent of Mexican muralist Diego Rivera, and Kitchenette Debutantes (at left) White displays his manly use of color to contemplate the power embodied in his enslaves In his charcoal drawing J'Accuse, he picks to show the quiet inner power of a young woman, toting a basket in succession her back. No matter the medium, with his unique mode of expression of realism, the faces in White's portraits posses a dignity about them; their tonnages and the weight of their worlds appear evident.

Charles White is the first artist profiled in an upcoming series that will be overseen by dint of Driskell. In documenting the life and work of as it is a seminal artist, it gives readers, particularly those interested in black artists, fulness to anticipate.

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