Important Fine African American Black Modern Art Woman Sculpture, TINA ALLEN
This is a beautiful and Important Fine African American Black Modern Art Woman Sculpture, comprised of fired clay, by the esteemed African - American female sculptor and public mural artist, Tina Allen 1949 - 2008. This artwork depicts an African American woman in a long gown, seated on a black stone plinth and staring hopefully toward the sky. She wears her hair back in a long ponytail, and rests one hand on her knee, while her other hand is palm upward at her side. 99.9% of Tina Allen sculptures which have ever been available on the market are signed and numbered bronze castings, created from a series of either a dozen or hundreds.
This is an original one-of-one sculpture, completely handmade and sculpted in wet clay by the artist and signed with her name: "Tina Allen" on the verso of this piece. This sculpture is seemingly untitled, but perhaps you recognize this particular work? Approximately 13 3/4 inches tall x 9 inches deep x 15 inches wide including base. Actual sculpture without the base is approximately 12 1/4 inches tall x 9 inches deep x 14 3/4 inches wide.
This artwork likely dates to the 1980's - 1990's. Good condition for age and storage, with some breakages and missing material to the sculpture's right hand, and one small chip on the sculpture's forehead, which has been delicately reattached and repaired at some time in the past please see photos. Acquired from an affluent estate collection in Los Angeles County, California.
If you like what you see, I encourage you to make an Offer. Please check out my other listings for more wonderful and unique artworks! Tina Allen is known for Sculpture. (December 9, 1949 - September 9, 2008) was an American sculptor known for her monuments to prominent African Americans, including Frederick Douglass. Allen was born Tina Powell in Hempstead, New York in 1949 to father Gordon'Specs' Powell, a jazz drummer who played in the Ed Sullivan Show band, and Grenada-born Rosecleer Powell. Her mother was a writer and a nurse, and one of Allen's uncles was a sculptor. Allen began painting at 5 years old; by the time she was 10 she was setting up her easel to paint the seascape of Grenada, West Indies where she lived until her early teens. Allen was an artistic child who began sculpting at the age of 13, when she was assigned to make an ashtray and instead created a bust of Aristotle. She was mentored by the Lithuanian-American sculptor William Zorach who declared her a prodigy. She earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the University of South Alabama. She also studied at the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan and received her Masters at the Pratt Institute. People described her art as a history in bronze because she always focused on important black historical figures and wanted to portray them through sculpture.Allen often focused on the Harlem Renaissance. She also had periods of her work focus specifically on black men and then she turned her interest to black women. After college she volunteered for AmeriCorps VISTA and for several years hosted a local television show on the arts in Mobile, Alabama.
Allen's first major work was a nine-foot bronze statue of A. Philip Randolph, leader of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters. Commissioned in 1986, the piece is displayed in Boston's Back Bay commuter train station and is featured on the Boston Women's Heritage Trail. Over the next two decades Allen continued creating realistic sculptures of black activists for display in public spaces. Her work is also collected by museums, corporations and private collectors.
Explaining her motivation, she said in an interview, My work is not about me, it's about us. Not only does her work serve to emphasize the contributions and aspirations of the African Diaspora but also works to create a "visual landscape that is nurturing and life affirming to people of color" in celebrating the beauty of African Americans. One of her best-known works is a 13-foot bronze likeness of Alex Haley, which was installed in the Haley Heritage Square Park in Knoxville, Tennessee in 1998. Her statue of George Washington Carver. Is the focal point of the George Washington Carver Garden at the Missouri Botanical Gardens. Her 12-foot bronze monument to Sojourner Truth. Is displayed in Memorial Park Battle Creek, Michigan. Is on display at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. It was featured in a scene in the movie Akeelah and the Bee.She is part of the permanent collection at the Schomburg Center. For Black Culture and the African American museum in Long Island, New York. Allen also crafted a bronze medallion for the Women of Essence awards, which annually honor Black women of outstanding accomplishment and achievement. Other subjects include Ralph Bunche. Allen was married twice and had three children, Koryan, Josephine, and Tara.
She died of a heart attack due to complications of pneumonia in Los Angeles on September 9, 2008. Tina Allen is no longer with us, but her sculptures can be seen around the world. Tina Allen was born in 1955 in Hempstead, N.
Allen began painting at the age of five and was discovered at the age of 10 by William Zorach, who was considered one of the greatest living sculptors in the world. Allen was the daughter of Gordon "Specs" Powell, a studio percussionist for CBS Records. Allen, who was considered a social activist as well as an artist, created her first three-dimensional work when she sculpted a bust of Aristotle in high school.
She soon began winning competitions and awards, but Allen revealed that though she had originally intended to paint, sculpture was more natural for me than painting. Allen studied art at the University of South Alabama where she received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1978. She was a VISTA volunteer, and for nearly a decade, hosted a local television show on the arts. She eventually moved to New York City, where she attended the Pratt Institute and the New York School of Visual Arts. In 1986, she entered a competition in Boston for a commission to create a memorial statue of African American labor activist A. Philip Randolph, who founded a union for train porters in 1925. In a profile of Allen on the University of Texas at Austin Web site, Allen describes her body of work as "writing our history in bronze" and her creations as "totems that tell the children this kind of behavior, this kind of person is worthy of attention". In 1988, Allen moved to Los Angeles where she produced many sculptures and paintings that reflected the Harlem Renaissance.She also focused on the black male, which is shown in her creations entitled "Proud Father and Son" and The Banjo Lesson. " Allen has promoted the contributions of African American women through her work entitled "Ethiopia. Los Angeles County Supervisor Yvonne B. Burke, a longtime friend of Allen, reflected, I think all of us know that Tina was an exceptionally talented woman as a sculptress. Tina always did excellent work.
Burke recalls that Allen also possessed a great sense of humor. "She was the funniest woman I ever knew, " said Burke. She would keep you in stitches for hours. She had an ability to lift you up and make you smile and to bring you out of whatever depths you're in. Laura Hendrix, owner of Gallery Plus in Leimert Park, met Allen when she first moved to Los Angeles from New York in the early'80s.
I was devastated after hearing of Allen's death. I was very fond of Tina and her work. She was an accomplished, world-renowned artist and one of our cultural warriors. Through her artwork, Allen wanted to leave a legacy for African American children. "Our children must be able to say greatness comes out of people who look like me, " she once said.
Locally, Allen had been commissioned to create sculptures of community activists Lillian Mobley and Celes King Jr. She was also commissioned to create sculptings of Sammy Davis Jr. Ralph Bunch, Marcus Garvey, Dr. Charles Drew, George Washington Carver, Sojourner Truth, Betty Shabazz, and Tupac Shakur. As her acclaim grew, Allen's prodigious talent kept her traveling extensively to such faraway places as Africa, Europe, and Asia, South Africa.
Tina Allen's work has appeared in the permanent collections of some of the most important institutions in the country including the Schomberg Center and the Pratt Institute in New York, the Museum of Afro-American Art in Los Angeles and the King Center in Atlanta. She makes much smaller abstract sculptures as well, and collectors of her art include Hilary Rodham Clinton, Muhammad Ali, Denzel Washington, and Robert DeNiro. Tina Allen's work includes Sojourner Truth, a 12' bronze sculpture, Memorial Park, Battle Creek, Michigan, Alex Haley, a 19' bronze monument, located at Haley Heritage Square, Knoxville, Tennessee, Martin Luther King Jr. A 12' bronze statue on a 8' high fountain base, Las Vegas, Nevada, and A. Philip Randolph, a 9 1/2' seated bronze monument, Boston, Mass to name a few.
Tina Allen passed away on Tuesday, Sept. 2008 of a massive heart attack due to complications of pneumonia.Allen created monumental bronze statues of distinguished Africans and Black Americans. She won commissions to sculpt the likenesses of figures such as Malcolm X, Nelson Mandela, and Sojourner Truth and her works are displayed in settings throughout the United States and abroad. Her works celebrate African concepts of beauty regarding both physical appearance and character.
As Allen herself noted in an interview with Contemporary Black Biography in 1999, I'm a conduit to express the unseen and to bring back and reposition the emphasis on the good and the great. A 12-foot-high bronze sculpture of Sojourner Truth, was installed in Battle Creek, Michigan in 1999. Truth is depicted at a lectern because she used her gift for public speaking to fight for abolition and suffrage.
Sculptor whose subject was African Americans (9/12/08). Tina Allen, whose monumental sculptures of prominent African Americans through history -- including abolitionist Sojourner Truth and author Alex Haley -- fill public spaces across the United States, has died. Allen died Tuesday at Northridge Hospital Medical Center of complications from a heart attack, her former husband, Roger Allen, said. She had been a resident of North Hills. Her first major commission, in 1986, set the course for her future. She made a 9-foot bronze sculpture of labor leader A. Philip Randolph, who helped organize a union for sleeping car porters in the 1920s, for a train station in Boston.Over the next 22 years Allen created more than a dozen other sculptures of black activists to be displayed in public spaces. Whether her subjects were famous or not, her works were her way of "writing our history in bronze, " Allen said. For every nationally known figure -- agricultural scientist George Washington Carver for the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis or Sojourner Truth for Memorial Park in Battle Creek, Mich.
- Allen created one of her remarkable likenesses of a prominent local leader. "Tina felt an obligation to get the word out about people who make important contributions but aren't household names, " said Eric Hanks, an art dealer who represented Allen at the M. Hanks Gallery in Santa Monica in the 1990s. Several of her works were created for sites in Los Angeles. Her bust of Celes King III, a founder of the California Congress of Racial Equality, was unveiled at the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza in 2004. A bas-relief of the Rev. Drew was installed at King Drew Magnet High School of Medicine and Science in 1998. She also made smaller abstract sculptures and bronzes of Hollywood celebrities. A number of her works are now in museums and corporate and private collections. She had a special rapport with her realistic sculptures, each one capturing a strong personality. "I'm trying to infuse a soul into these objects, " Allen said of them in a 1992 interview with the Los Angeles Sentinel. To begin a new work, she studied photographs and other likenesses of her subjects, interviewing their friends if possible, and talked to experts about them. Then she made a clay model."Tina said that once she got her hands into the clay, her subjects started talking to her, " her agent, Quentin Moses, said this week. As she sculpted a likeness of Frederick Douglass, who was born a slave and helped to abolish slavery, "he told me he's not happy, " Allen said. It shows in his face, which closely resembles a famous photograph.
The finished piece was featured in a scene from "Akeelah and the Bee, " a 2006 movie about a girl in South Los Angeles who overcomes the odds and becomes a spelling bee champion. "I'm looking at myself as speaking about the heart and soul of a people, and making sure they're not forgotten, making sure they don't feel ignored, " Allen said in a 2003 interview with National Public Radio.I like to think it's useful pieces of art as opposed to just decorative. One of her most highly publicized works was a 13-foot bronze of author Alex Haley, whose 1976 book "Roots" inspired people around the world to trace their family history. Allen portrayed Haley sitting with a book in one hand, reaching out with the other hand, as he did when he told stories, she discovered in her research. She chose a seated pose for Haley because it brought him closer to people. "I want to see kids climb onto his lap and play hide-and-go-seek around his legs, " she said in a 1998 interview with the Knoxville News-Sentinel in Tennessee, where the work was installed in Haley Heritage Park in 1998.
Allen, who was born Tina Powell in Hempstead, N. 9, 1949, made her first breakthrough as a sculptor at 13 when she crafted a bust of Aristotle instead of the ashtray that was her art class assignment.
"I just knew instinctively how to make faces, " Allen said in a 2002 interview with Essence magazine. She had already tried her hand at musical instruments.
Her father, Gordon "Specs" Powell, was a studio musician for CBS Records who played in "The Ed Sullivan Show" band. "I had one trump card, so I've been playing it, " she said of her choice to make art. Her parents divorced when she was young, and she lived with her mother in Grenada for four years. While she was there, she met the New York City-based sculptor William Zorach, who was on vacation. A few years later, when she moved to New York City with her mother, she met Zorach again. Allen graduated from the University of South Alabama with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1978. She also studied art at the New York School of Visual Arts, the Pratt Institute and the University of Venice in Italy. Both of her marriages ended in divorce. She is survived by three children, Koryan, Josephine and Tara Allen. Tina Allen was an artist who produced more than a dozen bronze sculptures of nationally known African American activists as well as smaller abstract sculptures and bronzes. Her monumental sculptures fill numerous public spaces in the United States. Allen lived in Grenada, West Indies until her early teens. From the University of South Alabama in 1978. She studied at the School of Visual Arts in New York and received her M. Her first major commission was a 9-foot bronze sculpture of labor leader A. Philip Randolph, who organized a union for sleeping car porters in the 1920s.Her early realistic sculptures were of prominent African American men. Later she sculpted likeness of African American women. Her sculptures included likenesses of George Washington Carver, Sojourner Truth, and the Rev. According to her, her works were her way of writing our history in bronze.
Some of her works are in the permanent collections of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture and the African-American Museum in Long Island, New York. We want to encourage and inspire people through this art': Lawrence and Gay Square share African American art in new West Baton Rouge Museum exhibit (2/10/19). Were it not for Lawrence and Gay Square, a lot of people might never see the work of some of the country's most notable African-American artists. Take the late Tina Allen, known worldwide for her bronze sculptures and public monuments to prominent African-Americans, including Frederick Douglass, Malcolm X, Sojourner Truth and George Washington Carver. The Squares own the largest collection of her works.And they are willing to share. In February, which is Black History Month, and running through March 24, the West Baton Rouge Museum in Port Allen is showcasing "The Square Collection, " dozens of art pieces by Allen and other African-American artists the couple has amassed over the past four decades. The museum's sampling of Allen's sculptures shows the diversity of her subjects.
There are lovers, parents and children. There are women, strong, regal women. But it's her dancers, especially the exhibit centerpiece "Eclipse, " that steal the show. "Lawrence says Tina told him that the sculptures talked to her, " museum curator Kathe Hambrick said.
The sculptures would emerge into what they were going to be. No doubt the artist did tell that to Lawrence Square because the two were friends. And that's true of many of the artists in the show.
"I miss having the art in my house because it's a big part of our lives, " said Lawrence Square of the now mostly empty walls in the couple's Zachary home. But I want to expose as many people as I can to the work by these artists.
Art was not a part of Lawrence Square's childhood. He's a graduate of Chaneyville High School, now called Northeast High School, in Zachary.
The school had no art program, and there was no art in his family's home. After both he and his wife graduated from Grambling State University, they moved to Los Angeles to teach. For him, it was high school physical education, math and science, along with coaching basketball and teaching at Compton Junior College. Gay Square, a Keithville native, taught elementary school. Their connection with the art world didn't begin until Lawrence Square left education to open an awards and recognition trophy business.
He attended a reception for artists showing their work. Now the work of many of those same artists is in the couple's collection. "It gave me a chance to get an idea of their work in one area, " Lawrence Square said. Then I ended up meeting my friend, the artist Tina Allen.
The couple gave Hambrick carte blanche in choosing the pieces for the West Baton Rouge show. "But I'm always nervous when the art leaves our house, " he said. It's been shown in museums in St. Louis, Atlanta and Los Angeles.
This is the first time it's been shown in Baton Rouge, and this is important for the community to see it. Hambrick whittled her choices down to some 50 pieces by such important artists as Allen, Samella Lewis, Manuelita Brown, Sam Gilliam, Charles Dickson, Ed Dwight and John Biggers. There's also the work of John T. Scott, who was born in New Orleans' Gentilly section and grew up in the Lower Ninth Ward. His commissioned public sculptures are found throughout New Orleans, most notably Spirit House, a collaboration with Martin Payton that celebrates the contributions of African-Americans to the building and culture of New Orleans.And Jacob Lawrence and Elizabeth Catlett, who produced art for the Works Progress Administration. Catlett, who died in Mexico in 2015, is also known for her sculptures. Her public bronzes of Louis Armstrong and Mahalia Jackson are centerpieces of New Orleans' Armstrong Park. She also is considered one of the leading artists of the Harlem Renaissance, and her sculptures have been described as politically intensive.
Her piece in this show isn't a sculpture but a linocut print titled "Dancers, " showing a group of African-American men and women dancing in a line. At the bottom is a thumbprint belonging to legendary musician Stevie Wonder. "This print was part of The Stevie Wonder Foundation, " Hambrick said. Stevie Wonder also collected art.He can't see it, but he stands in front of it while people describe the art to him. Rose native Margaret Burroughs comes three paintings for the show.
In addition to her art, she is known for her poetry and political activism. Burroughs also was the founder of the Dusable Museum of African American History in Chicago. But it's Allen's 20 sculptures, spread throughout the gallery, that make the connections.
She died in 2008 at the age of 58 from a heart attack, but the Squares are making sure she continues to live on through her art. "She had a lot of energy and she was a hard worker, " Lawrence Square said. She wanted to put a public bronze in every state to let kids know that they could be great, too. While the new show means some empty walls in the Squares' home, it's what the couple wants to do."We want to encourage and inspire people through this art, " Lawrence Square said. An exhibit of African American art from the collection of Lawrence and Gay Square.
Tuesday through Saturday, 2 p. WHERE: West Baton Rouge Museum, 845 N. Free for West Baton Rouge Parish residents.