Jazz Pianist Donald Brown Creates Music Inspired by Beauford

The Big Ears Festival is the flagship event of the Tennessee nonprofit of the same name. The festival explores the influences that inspire and connect musicians and artists, crossing the boundaries of musical genres as well as artistic disciplines.

This year, one of the artists on the roster for this three-day mega-event performed music inspired by Beauford!

Jazz pianist Donald Brown is a prolific and masterful composer of jazz music. Perhaps best known for his performances with Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers in the early 80s, one of his compositions earned Wynton Marsalis a Grammy nomination for the 29th edition of the awards.

Brown began teaching at Berklee College of Music in 1983.  Though health problems curtailed his ability to perform, he remained active as a composer and left the position in 1985 to resume performing.

He joined the faculty of the University of Tennessee Knoxville (UTK) in 1988, where he continued to compose and perform throughout his tenure.  He retired from his post in 2020.

Brown brought three new compositions to the 2025 Big Ears Festival as a result of having participated in Boundless: Artists in the Archives, a seven-year-old UTK initiative that invites musicians and other artists to visit the UT Libraries' Betsey B. Creekmore Special Collections and University Archives and create original works inspired by the unique primary sources preserved there.

He not only researched the Beauford Delaney Papers at the library, but also interacted with students who consulted the papers as part of an independent study course at the university.

Donald Brown interacting with UTK students
and consulting the Beauford Delaney Papers
Images courtesy of UT Libraries

Martha Rudolph, Editor for Marketing & Communication at UT Libraries shared that Brown had wanted to attend Berklee College of Music but could not afford to do so. She said that Brown taught piano, improvisation, and jazz history at the University of Tennessee College of Music for 32 years. 

Rudolph described Brown as "a gifted educator who could explain the very complex language of jazz in a manner that is easy to understand."

Brown is a native Tennessean (born in Memphis in 1954) who currently resides in Knoxville.  As a prelude to Big Ears, he and a small group of acclaimed jazz musicians performed his Beauford-inspired compositions at the Knoxville Museum of Art (KMA) on Wednesday, March 26.

According to the Knoxville News Sentinal, they are entitled "$5 Blues for Beauford Delaney," "Theme for Beauford's Mom," and "A Letter from James Baldwin."

UT Libraries Modern Papers Archivist Kris Bronstad attended the event and thoroughly enjoyed it:

I attended, it was wonderful. The music was incredible, the musicians were incredible, and everyone was in a good mood. Donald Brown had 3 pieces ....

He talked about Delia Delaney and imagining what she was like (for the first composition), then about Beauford and Baldwin being Black and gay (second composition). The final composition was a boogie-woogie inspired piece ....

I can’t help but imagine that Beauford would have loved it.

For additional details about Brown's career, his participation in Boundless, and the three works he performed at KMA, read the Knox News article entitled Knoxville jazz icon returns to writing, and Beauford Delaney is the focus: See the debut!

To see additional photos of Brown interacting with UTK students at the library, read the Knox News article entitled Jazz pianist to debut new piece based on Beauford Delaney archives.

 

Beauford Is Front and Center at Paris Noir

The groundbreaking Paris Noir exhibition opened at the Centre Pompidou museum on March 19, 2025.

And Beauford's Street Scene, 1968 is the first thing people see when they walk into the show!

Street Scene, 1968 in Room 1 of Paris Noir exhibition
Artwork © Estate of Beauford Delaney
By permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
Photo © Entrée to Black Paris

The full title of the exhibition is Paris Noir: Circulations artistiques et luttes anticoloniales 1950-2000.

Paris Noir catalog cover

The museum describes it as follows:

From the creation of the Présence Africaine review to that of Revue noire, “Black Paris” retraces the presence and influence of Black artists in France from the 1950s to 2000. The exhibition celebrates 150 artists coming from Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean, whose works have often never been displayed in France before.

While Beauford's work has been shown in group shows in Paris many times before, those occasions pale in comparison to this one.

Fourteen (14) of his best oils are on display in multiple sections of Paris Noir, including the dazzling 1965 self-portrait held by the Whitney Museum of American Art.

This painting, which is my favorite work in the entire show, is hung next to one of two portraits of James Baldwin in Room 2.

Beauford Delaney and James Baldwin portraits in Room 2
Artwork © Estate of Beauford Delaney
By permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
Photo © Entrée to Black Paris

One of Beauford's portraits of an older James Baldwin hangs on the wall behind Street Scene, 1968 in Room 2 and seemingly gazes at the two portraits across the room.

James Baldwin
(1967) Oil on canvas
Artwork © Estate of Beauford Delaney
By permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
Photo © Entrée to Black Paris

The Centre Pompidou is displaying its large Beauford Delaney abstract in the "Le saut dans l'abstraction" section, next to two of Beauford's yellow abstractions.

Untitled (1957) abstract (left center) and yellow abstractions (right center)
(1967) Oil on canvas
Artworks © Estate of Beauford Delaney
By permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
Photo © Entrée to Black Paris

Untitled (1957) Oil on canvas
© Entrée to Black Paris
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator

The last time the museum showed this work was in 2013, when it hung in the Multiple Modernities 1905-1970 exhibition.

Monique and Beauford's Untitled
(1957) Oil on canvas
© Discover Paris!
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator

The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts has loaned its Portrait of Marian Anderson to the show.

Marian Anderson
(1965) Oil and egg tempera emulsion on canvas
Artwork © Estate of Beauford Delaney
By permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator
Photo © Entrée to Black Paris

The remainder of the paintings were loaned by private collectors and the Michael Rosenfeld Gallery. They include Beauford's portrait of Ahmed Bioud, Bernard Hassell, and an unidentified young man.

Beauford shows up in Paris Noir in other ways. The Ina film clip of him being interviewed in his Clamart studio plays on the same wall where paintings by his friends Ed Clark, Herb Gentry, and Larry Potter hang.

Beauford in Ina video and works by
R to L: Ed Clark, Herb Gentry, and Larry Potter
© Entrée to Black Paris

Reproductions of the invitation card for his monographic show at the Galerie Lambert in Paris are on display on the wall in the Paris Dakar Lagos section of the show.

Galerie Lambert display
© Entrée to Black Paris

Galerie Lambert display (detail)
© Entrée to Black Paris

And you can catch a couple of glimpses of him in a video clip from "Meeting the Man: James Baldwin in Paris 1970," during which James Baldwin "holds court" in Beauford's rue Vercingétorix studio.

James Baldwin in Beauford's studio
from the BBC's "Meeting the Man"
© Entrée to Black Paris

Glimpse of Beauford in the BBC's "Meeting the Man"
© Entrée to Black Paris

Outside the exhibition itself, UTK Professor Mary Campbell spoke about the Beauford-Baldwin friendship during the first day of the exhibition colloquium. She spoke passionately about her view of how Baldwin inspired Beauford's art, focusing on the portrait of Baldwin that Beauford named Dark Rapture.

Mary Campbell presenting the Beauford-Baldwin friendship
© Entrée to Black Paris

On Day 2 of the colloquium, I spoke about the two Beauford Delaney walking tours that I created for Entrée to Black Paris during a presentation called "Paris Places and Spaces." I cited the 2016 Resonance of Form and Vibration of Color exhibition in Paris as the catalyst for the first tour and the 2024 UTLibraries visit to Paris in preparation for the exhibition they are preparing for the inauguration of the Beauford Delaney Papers as the catalyst for the second one.

Monique Y. Wells presenting "Paris Places and Spaces"
© Entrée to Black Paris

For many reasons, Paris Noir is an exhibition that should not be missed.

In my book, getting "up close and personal" with several brilliant Beauford Delaney paintings is one of the top three!

Beauford and Loïs Mailou Jones

While performing an Internet search last week, I came across an image of a painting by Loïs Mailou Jones that had been erroneously attributed to Beauford.

Screenshot of Web page displaying The Pink Table Cloth
by Loïs Mailou Jones

The image of The Pink Table Cloth clearly shows Jones' signature at the bottom right corner of the painting, so I presume the error was clerical.

The vivid hues in this work first made me think of Beauford's mastery of the juxtaposition of colors on his canvases.

It then caused me to remember that the two artists knew each other and had several things in common (in addition to being fabulous colorists).

Self-Portrait
Loïs Mailou Jones
(1940) Casein on board
Smithsonian American Art Museum
Fair use claim

They both

- took classes at the Massachusetts Normal Art School in Boston in the 1920s,

- spent considerable time in France,

- created multiple self-portraits,

- represented African art and artifacts in their artwork,

- traveled extensively (Beauford in Western Europe; Jones in Haïti and Subsaharan Africa), and

- produced hundreds of works in their lifetimes.

Both also had their work featured in the Studio Museum in Harlem's Explorations in the City of Light: African-American Artists in Paris 1945-1965 exhibition that was also shown in Chicago, New Orleans, Fort Worth, and Milwaukee in 1996-1997.

Self-portrait
Beauford Delaney
(1944) Oil on canvas
Art Institute of Chicago
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
By permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator

In the biography Amazing Grace: A Life of Beauford Delaney, author David Leeming mentions Jones twice in the chapter called "Boston and Harlem" but does not state outright that the two artists were friends or even communicated directly with each other.

A note found in the Beauford Delaney Papers at the University of Tennessee Knoxville provides evidence that they did have a social connection. It is written on a card that Jones used when she was a professor at Howard University.

Handwritten note on Professor Loïs Mailou Jones' calling card,
Beauford Delaney Papers, MS.3967.
University of Tennessee Libraries, Knoxville,
Betsey B. Creekmore Special Collections and University Archives.*
Image by Wells International Foundation

Jones wrote the month in French (15 août is August 15) and used the salutation Cher (Dear) in addressing Beauford. She says she is "so sorry" to have missed seeing him.

The closing salutation is also in French (A bientôt - See you soon).

Because she joined the faculty at Howard in 1930 and worked there until 1977, and because no envelope (and therefore no postmark) was associated with the card, we don't know when this encounter was to have taken place.

*Conditions Governing Use
Estate of Beauford Delaney,
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator.
Held in the Beauford Delaney Papers, MS.3967,
Betsey B. Creekmore Special Collections and University Archives,
University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

Beauford's Art on View - Current Exhibitions

Beauford's work is currently on display in exhibitions across the U.S. through June 1, 2025.

Art Institute of Chicago - Chicago, IL
Project a Black Planet: The Art and Culture of Panafrica (December 15, 2024 - March 30, 2025)

Co-organized by the Art Institute of Chicago and MACBA Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona in collaboration with KANAL-Centre Pompidou Bruxelles, Project a Black Planet is the first major exhibition to survey Pan-Africanism’s cultural manifestations. 

Beauford's Self-Portrait in a Paris Bath House 1971, in which he depicts himself in African dress, is on display in the Interiors room of the exhibition. 

Listen to Professor Adom Getachew of the University of Chicago describe this work in the YouTube video below (description begins at 6:47).

Read about the exhibition HERE.

National Portrait Gallery - Washington, D.C.
This Morning, This Evening, So Soon: James Baldwin and the Voices of Queer Resistance (July 12, 2024 – April 20, 2025)

This exhibition is a celebration of the "queer voices" of James Baldwin and a circle of friends who maintained various degrees of silence about their sexuality at the same time that they were outspoken about racial injustice during the Civil Rights Movement. It features the Art Institute of Chicago's 1944 self-portrait of Beauford and the National Portrait Gallery's 1963 portrait of James Baldwin by Beauford.

James Baldwin
(1963) Pastel on Paper
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institute
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator

Read about the exhibition HERE.

Oglethorpe University Museum of Art - Brookhaven, GA
Fragile Genius: Catherine Wiley and Beauford Delaney (January 30 - May 4, 2025)

According to Curator John Daniel Tilford, this exhibition presents a number of major Beauford Delaney works, including a rather rare early still life that has not been publicly exhibited in several decades and two late masterpieces loaned by Clark Atlanta University.

Untitled: Self Portrait by Beauford Delaney
(1964) Oil on canvas
Tennessee State Museum Collection 2001.46
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator

Read about the show HERE.

Spelman College Museum - Atlanta, GA
We Say What Black This Is (February 7 - May 24, 2025)

We Say What Black This Is features mixed media and watercolor paintings by MacArthur award-winning artist Amanda Williams. The exhibition showcases Williams’ abstract paintings alongside works by prominent artists from Atlanta collections,including Spelman College, Clark Atlanta University, and private collectors. 

The Spelman College Museum Website indicates that the show "includes works by Betty Blayton, Sheila Pree Bright, Beverly Buchanan, Beauford Delaney, Sam Gilliam, Maren Hassinger, Jacob Lawrence, Deborah Roberts, Thomas Sills, Alma Thomas, and Ming Washington to offer multifaceted perspectives on Black identity. Delaney’s expressive abstract paintings explore spirituality..."

Read more about We Say What Black This Is HERE.

Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art - Las Vegas, NV
American Duet: Jazz and Abstract Art (November 15, 2024 - June 1, 2025)

As reported in our blog post dated December 7, 2024, two of Beauford's abstracts are on display at the Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art in Las Vegas.

The 1956 blue and rose gouache on illustration board that was selected for this show is one of my favorites!

Untitled
(1956) Gouache on illustration board
Signed and dated in ink, lower right
© Estate of Beauford Delaney,
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator