Today’s painting from this period is titled, “Colored People.” It’s a 52” x 38” acrylic and oil on canvas that I created in 2016, and which will be on exhibit in LEROI: Living in Color opening Nov. 11th at Burchfield Penney Art Center.
As I noted in my previous Colored People post, the focus of this series is the universality among us. No matter our skin tone, we are all people of color. In this particular painting I also wanted to convey the regality of people, in the way we can dress and present ourselves to the world.
Colored People is my favorite of all six art periods in the LEROI: Living in Color Collection. There are many reasons why. One of the most significant is that during this series I evolved my signature to the one I use today.
An artist’s signature is obviously very personal. When I first began painting, I signed my Initials---LCJ. At the time I was trying to stay out of the way of my artwork, since the scale of my paintings left little room for anything more. Then I started signing my name in script, again on a small scale.
The leap to the current block version of my artist’s signature was a bit of a struggle. I first printed it as I write it, with a capital “L” and a capital “R” (LeRoi,) but the presentation looked awkward---hard to read.
After a few paintings, I decided to line up the five letters in a block formation of all capitals. Since then, I have “signed” LEROI in a variety of places on my paintings, deciding to incorporate it into the artwork rather than treat it as an intrusion.
And while I know some assess it as oversized, it has become celebrated in the artworld as a unique trademark of my artist’s personality.
LEROI: Living in Color Exhibition includes the work of students from Buffalo Center for Arts and Technology (BCAT,) Buffalo Public Schools (BPS,) Just Buffalo Literary Center (JBLC,) and Squeaky Wheel Film & Media Art Center. The exhibition will be on view at the Burchfield Penney Art Center through March 26, 2023, presented by M&T Bank, with additional support from organizations and individuals throughout the Western New York community.