Deep Blues: Bill Traylor, Self-Taught Artist (African-American Artists and Artisans) [Library Binding]

Mary E. Lyons (Author), Bill Traylor (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 8 and up | Series: African-American Artists and Artisans

A portrait of self-taught African-American artist Bill Traylor, an artist whose career began after his eightieth birthday, explores the work of this former slave whose life spanned the Civil War, Reconstruction, and both world wars.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 3-6?Lyons tells the story of this self-taught artist, born in 1856 in slavery and a sharecropper all of his adult life, and of his late-life obsession with creating pictures. Though few facts about him are known, she fills in the gaps with a wealth of details about African American life in the post-Civil War South. Writing with great skill, the author captures the rhythms and rituals of the rural South that influenced Traylor's paintings, such as growing cotton, singing the blues, possum hunting, and church going. In telling the sources of his creativity, she says that "Like mosquitoes in a pond, folktales multiplied on warm summer nights," and that Traylor's life was "...a sweet sorrow...balanced by a spicy humor." Deep Blues, illustrated with numerous black-and-white and full-color reproductions, is a worthy addition for the historical details of Alabama's Black Belt it provides, and for the chance it offers readers to get acquainted with a man of simple dignity and to enjoy his untutored but perceptive art.?Shirley Wilton, Ocean County College, Toms River, NJ
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Gr. 5-7. In this book, written for the same African-American Artists and Artisans series as her Starting Home: The Story of Horace Pippin (1993) was, Lyons tells the amazing story of a folk artist who was born into slavery; he first began to paint and draw at the age of 80, and his work is now acclaimed and exhibited throughout the country. Not much exact information is known about Bill Traylor, and Lyons is scrupulous in saying what is "probably" true, based on slave narratives and other oral documentary sources. But in her discussion of Traylor's pictures, beautifully reproduced here in color, she relates the individual experience and the social conditions of his time to the style, subject matter, and materials of his artistic work. Even older readers interested in art history will be fascinated by the connections she suggests between the untaught artist, the culture of the blues, and some of the traditions of African art. Hazel Rochman

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 8 and up
  
• Library Binding: 42 pages
• Publisher: Atheneum; hbk edition (January 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0684194589
• ISBN-13: 978-0684194585
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 8.1 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,150,677 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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