DAVID
DRISKELL
Am. 1931 - 2020
In 1953 David Driskell was an artist in residence at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture and began a lifelong relationship with the State of Maine. He and his wife Thelma purchased a home in Falmouth, Maine in the early 1960's. His works of art are in the permanent collections of the Portland Museum of Art, the Farnsworth Art Museum, the Bowdoin College Museum and the Colby College Museum, the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, the National Gallery of Art, among many others.
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For an interesting description of his life and relationship to Maine, see this article in Down East magazine. Carl Little also describes this relationship and pine trees being one of Driskell's major subject matters here.
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In 2001 the David C. Driskell Center for the Study of Visual Arts and Culture of African Americans and the African Diaspora was established at the University of Maryland, College Park. The Driskell Center was the site of the exhibition "David C. Driskell & Friends: Creativity, Collaboration and Friendship" through May 24, 2024. Read the Washington Post review of the exhibition.
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Links to museum collections:
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Take a look at the painting we have for sale by another Maine Black artist, Reggie Burrows Hodges here.