Born in Durham, North Carolina, Ernie Barnes (1938-2009) is known for his paintings of Southern life in which he animates the lyricism of the human body at sport, work, and play depicting Black Joy as a space of beauty and resistance. Barnes’s characters—stylized and sinuous—are expressive of the soul and spirit the Artist described as the “spiritual currency of the ghetto.” By instilling his canvases with positivity, celebration and pride, Barnes imparts a principled defiant message accessible to all. His neo-mannerist style was influenced by Italian masters and 20th century American artists including Thomas Hart Benton, Andrew Wyeth and Charles White.

Barnes studied art while attending Carolina College on a football scholarship before being drafted by the National Football League where he played for six years before retiring to concentrate on his art. Barnes’ work became well known in popular culture, featured on the cover of Marvin Gaye’s 1976 album I Want You, and in the credits of the groundbreaking television series Good Times.

No Time for Church was completed at the time his series The Beauty of the Ghetto embarked on a seven-year tour of major American cities hosted by dignitaries, athletes and celebrities. The series, made in response to the Black is Beautiful movement of the 1960s, focused on the beauty and joy of mid-century Black Southern life at a time when work by Black artists was often dismissed by institutions and underrepresented in public collections.

A self-portrait of the Artist with his eyes closed, Barnes described the symbolism of this expression: “I began to see, observe, how blind we are to one another’s humanity. Blinded by a lot of things that have, perhaps, initiated feelings in that light. We don’t see into the depths of our interconnection. The gifts, the strength and potential within other human beings. We stop at color quite often. So one of the things we have to be aware of is who we are in order to have the capacity to like others. But when you cannot visualize the offerings of another human being you’re obviously not looking at the human being with open eyes.”

No Time for Church was originally in the collection of the actor Burt Lancaster (1913-1994), who gave it to the screenwriter and co-producer, Roland Kibbee (1914-1984), a frequent collaborator and close friend, as a gift. Both Lancaster and Kibbee had social progressive, backgrounds, and Kibbee was named as a Communist by several witnesses before the House Unamerican Activities Committee in the early 1950’s. Forced to testify (or lose his livelihood), Kibbee reluctantly appeared, and later said he named only those that had named him. He retained his friendship and association with Lancaster, who was a vocal critic of the Committee and its effect on the business of Hollywood.

Shortly after his final football game, Barnes crashed the 1965 American Football League owners’ meeting in Houston to make a pitch to become the first official painter of a professional sports franchise. New York Jets owner Sonny Werblin was impressed with Barnes as an artist and person and offered to pay him a player’s salary to become the team’s official painter. Soon after, Werblin financed the transportation of Barnes’ paintings to New York and brought three art critics to view them, who agreed that Barnes was “the most expressive painter of sports since George Bellows.” In November 1966, Grand Central Art Galleries in New York debuted Barnes’ first solo exhibition, which was critically acclaimed and rapidly sold out.

In 1996, the National Basketball Association commissioned Barnes to create a work for its 50th Anniversary on the theme “Where we were, where we are, and where we are going.” Barnes’ answer to the challenge was The Dream Unfolds which hangs in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Massachusetts.

The graphite and acrylic work, Study for The Dream Unfolds, was created in preparation for the commission, and features the last names of notable NBA players, such as Elgin Baylor, Julius Erving, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson and Michael Jordan.  It is signed lower right and inscribed “Study: For NBA”.

Twentieth Century Stories also presents paintings, works on paper, photography and sculpture by Davis Cone, Philip Evergood, César Galicia, Gregory Gillespie, William Gropper, Chaim Gross, George Grosz, Käthe Kollwitz, Jack Levine, Louis Lozowick, Reginald Marsh, Anthony Mitri, Bernard Perlin, Winfred Rembert, Ben Shahn, Raphael Soyer and Alfred Stieglitz. Each work is a compelling, humanist expression of subjects that include civil rights, the human toll of war, and the century’s industrial progress, public works, and entertainment that challenged the world and changed modern life.

For more information about the works in Twentieth Century Stories, you are invited to view our catalogue and visit our Online Viewing Room.

Dates: November 14, 2024 – February 1, 2025

Hours: Monday through Saturday, 10am to 5:30pm.

Location:

Forum Gallery

475 Park Avenue at 57th Street

New York, NY 10022

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