Artist to Know: Alma Thomas and a Life Filled with 1sts
Alma Thomas (1891-1978) was an African American artist and educator who accomplised a series of remarkable firsts in her art career continuing even after retiring from teaching in the 1960s at the age of 69. Still more proof that there it is indeed NEVER too late.
Thomas developed a distinctive painting style with dabs of color interspersed with the white background and a technique called radial symmetry technique. Alma Thomas developed her art career later in her life creating her early representational artwork such as The Stormy Sea (1958) at the age of 67, and she only began to develop her signature painting styles after she retired from teaching in 1960 at the age 69.
Images: Alma Thomas’ work on display at the Michael Rosenfeld Gallery (2015); Red Rose Cantata (1973); Red Azaleas Singing and Dancing Rock and Roll Music (1976), acrylic on canvas, 73 3⁄4 × 158 1⁄2 × 2 1⁄2 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Bequest of the artist, 1980.36.2A-C; Alma Thomas and Resurrection (1966); Untitled (1974), acrylic and watercolor on paper, 5 1/4 x 7 3/8 inches / 13.3 x 18.7 cm; The Eclipse (1972) acrylic on canvas, 62 in. × 49 3⁄4 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the artist, 1978.40.3; Autumn Leaves Fluttering in the Breeze (1973), On loan from the Smithsonian American Art Museum; Abstraction in Blue, Green, Yellow and Orange (1974), watercolor on paper, 15 x 23 in.
Motivated to show her work at an upcoming exhibition at Howard University in 1966, Thomas began experimenting with applying small dabs of paint in a rhythmic pattern which resulted in work such as Light Blue Nursery (1968) and Aquatic Gardens (1973).
Images: Aquatic Gardens, 1973, acrylic on canvas, 72 x 52 in. (182.8x 132.1 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Bequest of the artist, 1980.36.7; Light Blue Nursery, 1966, acrylic on canvas, 49 x 47 7⁄8 in. (124.4x 121.5 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the artist, 1970.324.
Thomas was born in Georgia but her family moved to Washington, DC in the 1907 to escape the growing racial violence of the South and to gain access to better education opportunities. Her household growing up was filled with art, culture and learning. In 1924, Thomas became the very first arts graduate from Howard University and she taught for 35 years at Shaw Junior High School.
Thomas was a pivotal member of the Washington Color School, an important visual art movement of abstract expressionist artists who created from the 1950s to the 1970s. Artists in the Washington Color School focused on methods of art making that explored non-representational compositions made from blocks of color. For example, one pioneering technique that was developed during the Washinton Color School was "staining" or "soak staining" where a thinned color medium was poured on to a canvas and allowed to sit over time which created a composition with no visible traces of application such as brush strokes.
In addition to being a member of the Washington Color School, Thomas was also a part of the Little Paris Group of artists and Howard University’s Gallery of Art. In addition, she was involved in the establishment of the Barnet Aden Gallery in 1943, one of the first successful Black-owned private galleries to open in the United States.
Images: Vase with Flowers and Bibelot (Peonies) (1960), watercolor on paper, 13x10 in.; The Stormy Sea (1958), oil on canvas, 48 1⁄8 x 41 7⁄8 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the artist, 1977.125; March on Washington (1964), oil on canvas, 30x39 inches, National Gallery of Art.
Thomas evolved her work during a time when many African American artists were capturing social justice themes and rather than making art that explicitly represented symbols and events of the civil rights movement as many of her contemporaries were doing, Thomas chose to represent her experience through the abstraction of colors and shapes.
Untitled, acrylic on vellum, 16 x 20 in.
“I’ve never bothered painting the ugly things in life. People struggling, having difficulty. You meet that when you go out, and then you have to come back and see the same thing hanging on the wall. No. I wanted something beautiful that you could sit down and look at. And then, the paintings change you.”
Thomas accomplished many firsts in her career. In 1972 at the age of 81, Thomas became the first African American woman to have a solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Alma Thomas at the opening of her solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum of Art, 1972.
Image credit: http://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/images/detail/thomas-opening-whitney-museum-7395, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=32329296
In 2019, her work A Fantastic Sunset (1970) was auctioned at Christie's for $2.655M. In 2021, a new record was set for her work when Alma's Flower Garden (1970) was sold for $2.8M by the Greenville Museum of Art in South Carolina to a private collector. I bet she would have been very happy to hear about that milestone if she were still alive.
Alma Thomas accomplished many remarkable firsts during an art career that reached full swing only later in her long life. It is a remarkable legacy for an African American woman who devoted her life to creating and teaching.