Beverly Buchanan

Beverly Buchanan (October 8, 1940 – July 4, 2015) was an African-American artist whose works include painting, sculpture, video, photography, poetry, and land art. Buchanan is noted for her exploration of Southern vernacular architecture through her art.

Early life and education Buchanan was born on October 8, 1940 in Fuquay, North Carolina to Irene Rogers. Marion, a school principal, became Buchanan's primary caregiver after Walter died when she was in the sixth grade.

Buchanan spent a considerable amount of time with her adopted father on his trips where he would work with tenant farmers in the Cotton Belt, advising them in their farming processes.

In 1962, Buchanan graduated from Bennett College, in Greensboro, North Carolina, a historically black women's college, with a Bachelor of Science degree in medical technology. She went on to attend Columbia University, where she received a master's degree in parasitology in 1968, and a master's degree in public health in 1969. In 1971, she enrolled in a painting class taught by Norman Lewis at the Art Students League in New York City. Lewis and artist Romare Bearden, both members of the African-American artist collective Spiral, became friends and mentors to Buchanan. This relationship with Bearden happened after an accidental incident at a concert where Bearden designed a poster for the event. Buchanan bumped into Norman Lewis backstage while trying to get the Bearden poster signed, and Lewis took Buchanan back stage to meet Bearden. Buchanan later wrote a letter to Bearden reminding him of that event and Bearden became her mentor and led her to get involved with the Cinque Gallery. She cited Nellie Mae Rowe as an inspiration for her work, particularly her shacks.

Drawings and paintings Buchanan's early paintings of the 1970s primarily consist of abstract impressionist works on paper, including many still-lifes created while taking classes from by Norman Lewis. During this time, she also created her "Wall" paintings, which "[evoke] the visual erosion of architectural facades." She "wanted to see what the wall looked like on the other side" and put four walls together in three dimensions. Scholar Janet T. Marquardt argues that Buchanan treats shacks not as documentary elements but as "images of endurance and personal history;" often using bright colors and a style of childlike simplicity, the works "evoke the warmth and happiness that can be found even in the meanest dwelling, representing the faith and caring that is not reserved for privileged classes."

Land art Buchanan is noted to have seen viewers sitting on her stone art piece Unity Stones, but let the men remain seated because she did not mind people sitting on her pieces as they contemplated the work and it represented. "The piece serves as a communal place to sit and talk, and do the other things that we do."

In 1980, Buchanan's piece, Wall Column, made of four cement sections, was featured in "Dialectics of Isolation: An Exhibition of Third World Women Artists of the United States," a major feminist exhibition organized by Ana Mendieta at A.I.R. Gallery. In 2021, Amelia Groom published a book devoted to the work.

In an interview with Angela Son, Son asked Buchanan what her concept of home was and Buchanan responded with, "[Home] means what I've stablished and where I am, wherever that is. And it means South Carolina, where I grew up... I consider home as where I grew up."

Buchanan's last official outdoor sculpture was "Blue Station Stones," a public art project designed for the Earlington Heights Station of Miami-Dade Transit in 1986.

Death and representation On July 4, 2015, Buchanan died in Ann Arbor, Michigan at the age of seventy-four.

Buchanan has been represented by the Andrew Edlin Gallery since 2014, and her work was featured at their booth in the 2017 Independent Art Fair. Buchanan has remarked, "A lot of my pieces have the word 'ruins' in their titles because I think that tells you this object has been through a lot and survived — that's the idea behind the sculptures ... it's like, 'Here I am; I'm still here!'"

Buchanan's work featured among that of twenty African-American artists in an exhibition at the Turner Contemporary, Margate, Kent, UK in February 2020, entitled 'We Will Walk-Art and Resistance in the American South'. She was also featured in a 2021 exhibition at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and a 2023 show at the Nasher Sculpture Center. and the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, Georgia.

Awards 1980: Guggenheim Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship 1990: National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in sculpture 1994: Pollock-Krasner Foundation Award 1997: Georgia Visual Arts honoree 2002: Anonymous Was a Woman Award 2005: College Art Association Committee for Women in the Arts distinguished honoree 2011: Women's Caucus for Art lifetime achievement award

Selected solo exhibitions List from exhibition catalogue "9 Women in Georgia" Traveling retrospective exhibition organized by the Montclair Art Museum to nine museums and college galleries, 1994–96 Steinbaum Krauss Gallery, New York, 1993 Schering-Plough Headquarters Gallery, Madison, NJ, 1992 Three Rivers Art Festival, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 1992 Chrysler Museum, Norfolk, VA, 1992 Jacksonville Art Museum, Florida, 1992 Bernie Steinbaum Gallery, New York, 1991, 1990 Oregon School of Arts and Crafts, Portland, 1991 Greenville County Museum, South Carolina, 1991 Fairleigh Dickenson University, Rutherford, NJ, 1990 Museum of Arts and Sciences, Macon, GA 1990 Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, Winston-Salem, NC, 1989 Heath Gallery, Atlanta, GA 1987, 1986, 1981 University of Alabama, 1982 Kornblee Gallery, New York, 1981 Truman Gallery, New York, 1978 Mercer University, Macon, GA, 1977 Upsala College, East Orange, NJ, 1974 Cinque Gallery, New York, 1972