From his earliest paintings to his final collages, music was a recurring theme in Romare Bearden’s art. This selection of more than a dozen examples of Bearden’s work, drawn entirely from The Mint Museum’s rich holdings, highlights some of the many ways that the artist explored musical subjects in drawings, prints, and collages.
Music was a foundational part of Bearden’s life. His father, Howard, was a pianist and organist, and other members of his extended family had musical talents as well. A grand piano enlivened their apartment in Harlem, which was visited by a variety of musicians who were close friends of the family, including Fats Waller and Duke Ellington. One of Bearden’s memories of visiting relatives in Maryland as a teenager involved delivering cakes made by a family friend accompanied by her husband, a blind folk artist, who strummed a guitar as they made their rounds.
Bearden also enjoyed listening to music while he worked and likened the process of making art to that of playing jazz: “You do something, then you improvise,” he would say. In this installation, many types of musical performances are featured, ranging from impromptu porch jam sessions to the immersive world of clubs and lounges. Sometimes the instruments and performers are easy to identify; in others the visual equivalent of the sounds and experiences they are creating is more prominent, abstracting the scene. The seductive power of music is suggested in a scene from “The Odyssey,” Siren’s Song, and there is even an example of Beaden’s own talent as a composer in the sheet music and record for the hit he composed with Larry Douglas and Fred Norman, “Seabreeze” (1954). Visitors can even scan a QR code and listen to the tune!
