I’ve always liked the movement and vibrant colors of the works of Charles Searles but had not loved them. That’s probably because I had not come face to face with a piece of his abstracts that spoke to me.
I’ve seen his crescent and odd-shaped forms of beautifully painted wood sculptures at exhibits and in books. An art friend of mine even has one of his small sculptures on her wall.
I was still waiting for that special piece of mine when I learned of an exhibition of Searles works at the Woodmere Art Museum in Philadelphia. What I saw in the ads for the exhibition were not the typical Searles that I was used to. These were figurative pieces – drawings and paintings of members of his family, city people and nudes.
A boxer just plain worn out from blows and age. A pool player ready to make that almighty straight-in-the-pocket shot. A nude painted the color of chartreuse. A sick daughter in a hospital bed.
This is Charles Searles? His abstracts are so distinctive that I can easily recognize them, but these were a revelation to me. Finally, I had found that which spoke to me. Click on the photo above for a full view of the drawing.
Titled “Focus on the Figure,” this showing features his early works created primarily in the 1960s. The exhibit, which ends June 15, consists of nine watercolors, oil-on-canvas and ink drawings lining a small hallway gallery at the museum in Northwest Philadelphia. It is just one of four exhibitions celebrating this African American artist and his works, a follow-up to local university seminar courses held in the fall.
The Art Museum at LaSalle University in the city is sponsoring an exhibit called “Charles Searles: The Mask of Abstraction” that ends May 31. A large-scale sculpture that he made after moving from Philadelphia to New York in 1978 is on display at his alma mater, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA).
Born in Philadelphia, Searles got his first watercolor set at 4 years old, according to the website of his wife Kathleen Spicer. In grade school, he was the eclectic boy who could not only draw but design and sew clothes and build scooters. (As an adult, Searles made clothes for his first wife and their children, as noted on one display board at the exhibition).
He helped his father in carpentry and construction work, and became a skilled house painter and craftsman, according to the Spicer website, using what he learned later to renovate his own homes and studios.
As a child, Searles attended Saturday morning art school, his youthful interest encouraged by his mother. He took liberal arts classes at the University of Pennsylvania and art classes at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in the late 1950s after leaving the military.
He flourished at the academy, painting his own family and his surroundings. Ten years later, his light was dimmed when his youngest daughter developed a rare form of cancer and died. His works reflected that melancholy period, according to the Spicer website.
Searles received two scholarships while at PAFA in the 1970s, traveling first to Europe and then to Africa. He was so taken with the colors and rhythms of Africa that elements of the culture would find their way into his works for the rest of his life. He later developed an interest in percussion instruments – he played the congas and other instruments – and they inspired his “Dancer” series of paintings, according to the Spicer website.
He moved to New York in 1978 and while there, he strayed from painting on canvas and paper to abstract sculptures. “My work is abstract, painted wood or aluminum sculptures that have a strong sense of life: faces, figures or animals,” he is quoted as saying on the Spicer website. “My sculptures are very animated and have a feeling of music and dance.”
Searles’ works are in several museums around the world, including the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and his commissioned works are on display in various locations. His 1971 acrylic on canvas painting “Indoctrination” sold for $22,000 at Swann Auction Galleries in 2010. The artist died from complications of a stroke in New York in 2004.
At the Woodmere exhibit, a 1974 oil on canvas called “Relaxed Traders” along with “Masked Nude #1 (1982)” were demonstrative of his move from a figurative to an abstract sensibility, and the influence of Africa and its colors. Looking at the traders, even in stillness there is a sense of movement.
Now, all I need to do is stumble onto one of these works at auction.
