Les Amis de Beauford Delaney is supporting the completion of

BEAUFORD DELANEY: SO SPLENDID A JOURNEY,

the first full-length documentary about Beauford.


Join us in making this video tribute to Beauford a reality!

TO MAKE A TAX DEDUCTIBLE DONATION,

CLICK HERE.



Saturday, August 20, 2016

Beauford and Baldwin in Saint-Paul-de-Vence

From The Guardian:

In the Provençal town of Saint-Paul-de-Vence, the picturesque stone house beneath the medieval ramparts is known as “la maison de Jimmy”. The official records office lists it as the ancienne maison Baldwin. . . . Today campaigners are battling to secure the future of his 17th-century house and its grounds, which have been earmarked for development into 18 luxury €1m flats. Two wings of the property on the 10-acre plot have already been demolished, including one in which he wrote.


Baldwin's property at Saint-Paul-de-Vence (2011)
Photos courtesy of Professor Francine Allen, Morehouse College

Beauford visited Baldwin at this property many times. Often, Baldwin had Bernard Hassell or someone else bring Beauford there when Beauford was in the midst of a psychological crisis. He painted the self-portrait shown below during one of those times of crisis.

Self-portrait
(1972) Gouache on paper
Collection of David A. Leeming
© Estate of Beauford Delaney
by permission of Derek L. Spratley, Esquire,
Court Appointed Administrator

In Amazing Grace, biographer David A. Leeming describes Beauford's 1973 stay at the Baldwin house after his hernia operation at a Saint-Paul-de-Vence clinic as being "perhaps Beauford's last truly happy ones." Les Amis would like to see the property preserved out of respect for Beauford's legacy as much as for that of Baldwin.

To learn more about this project, visit http://hisplaceinprovence.org.

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