Bill Traylor at the American Folk Art Museum

This exuberant, moving and vivid exhibition of the art of Bill Traylor consisting of about 63 remarkable drawings should be seen by every artist in the city and anyone interested in great art. I have always loved his simplistic yet sophisticated works that he made on cheap paper and cardboard that tell his story and what passed in front of his hard life.  Born into slavery in 1854 on the Traylor Plantation where he continued to live until 1938 raising some say over 20 children, and moving to Montgomery at the age of 84 where he picked up a pencil and started to draw.  Oh Bill I would hug you if I could I would buy you a drink or a coke and pencils and paints If I could. I would scrounge the dirty streets  of  racist Montgomery looking for discarded pieces of paper and cardboard for you to do your magnificent drawings on. These stunning images can be seen as autobiographical or relics of his memory caught in a frozen moment in paint and pencil on his ragged pieces of paper. What is amazing is that he didn’t start drawing until he was 85 and worked for 10 years before his death at 95, that  eye of his taking in the passing parade of African American life moving, running, and jostling in front of him as he did those drawings sitting  outside on a chair on Monroe Street. Your use of color and line is so subtle Bill I’m in awe with joy and envy when I look at them and love how you draw people moving, jumping fighting twisted with joy and sorrow their feet and hands stretched out and up reaching for no doubt what we all reach for. His palette was limited and consisted mainly of a sharp and strong acidy blue poster paint but there are also reds, and yellows here and there in the drawings and those deep deep blacks and those abstract shapes that morph into people, animals and objects many   filled in with loose colors and sometimes complex textures.  And then there are your animals Bill. I swear to God I had tears in my eyes looking at your pigs, dogs, cows and horses stylized. Big and little with dogs as big as cows and some of them looking like they could be on the walls of Chauvet Cave, outlined, colored, textured and washed. Did you ever do a bad drawing in your short art career and very long life?  I doubt it. Some 1,200 brilliant drawings are with us now, thanks to your great friend and fellow artist Charles Shannon, (The Museum Of Modern Art in the 40’s wanted to buy 16 of them for $1.00 and $2.00 each, Mr. Shannon turned them down) who discovered you late in your life, encouraged your work and saved your great accomplishment so that I can now bathe in their beauty. One of the great exhibitions of the year.