For the past four weeks artist Demarcus McGaughey has been working from one of the historic houses on Governors Island’s Colonial Row. One of two artists selected for the inaugural Art Crawl Harlem artist-in-residency program, McGaughey is creating a new series of exuberant mixed media portraits that celebrate the centennial of the Harlem Renaissance.
During this “golden age in African American culture,” Harlem became an epicenter of Black art, literature, music, dance, fashion, and more. McGaughey and Ricky Day, his fellow artist-in-residence, are creating works that focus on the theme Boundaries and Connections: The Other Side of Us, reflecting on the past 100 years of the NYC neighborhood—“from the 1918 pandemic and ‘The Great Migration’ which preceded the Harlem Renaissance when Black people moved to the north seeking opportunity and changing the economic and cultural fabric of America to the Black Lives Movement and COVID-19 pandemic,” according to Art Crawl Harlem.
“This year is celebrating the centennial of Harlem, a hundred years is the other side of us and how do we track and trace that history as it relates to today and where we’re at,” said Ulysses Williams, Executive Director of Art Crawl Harlem. “You have to consider the past as it relates to who we are now.”
Williams says that McGaughey embodies that theme, “being a man from Texas with a dream in New York. He came here with that dream and he’s making it his reality.”
“In the 1920s African Americans moved, they migrated from different states to Harlem and Harlem became this place of refuge, freedom, talent, and culture, a place to be expressive,” McGaughey noted. “For me those individuals created the life that they wanted.”
A metallic canvas with the handwritten message, “Create Your Life,” welcomes visitors as they step through the front door of the artist’s temporary studio. McGaughey, who also works as a life coach, uses this mantra regularly. “I always tell my clients ‘you can create your life,’ and I always say we all have something special and it’s our responsibility to use our gifts to empower the world,” he said during a preview of his works-in-progress on Tuesday. “It’s meant to be like a mirror, a reflection piece,” he said of the work composed of plaster, mirror-effect paint, and resin. “A mirror to look at and be able to see yourself but then think about the life that you want to create.”
The Artist
Originally from Dallas, Texas, McGaughey received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Prairie View A&M University. He moved to NYC 15 years ago and worked in graphic design until his friend, Saundra Heath, co-founder of the Heath Gallery in Harlem, challenged him to take up painting five years ago. He accepted the challenge and has not looked back, creating vibrant pop art pieces and portraits of celebrities and friends.
The series he is currently completing on Governors Island combines pop art and portraiture while merging old Harlem with new Harlem. He started by selecting six models—five transplants to Harlem and one native—interviewing them, photographing them, then painting them on a collage of vintage images of bustling Harlem streets. “I wanted to know their experience…their relationship with Harlem, why they gravitated to Harlem, and what is it that they love about Harlem,” he said.
“The factor everyone was really excited about, really spoke about, was the connections…connections to other people and the culture of Harlem,” he noted. Each of his subjects relayed stories of a neighborhood that exudes a sense of community. “They can walk out their door and they can see someone they know.”
Harlem's New Generation
In his portrait of Steve, an actor and educator who “migrated from Atlanta,” McGaughey painted a confident young man wearing a t-shirt declaring, “I am powerful, passionate, creative.” McGaughey requested that each of his subjects wear clothing that “represents Harlem to them, [is] something they would like to be remembered in,” or something that shows them at their best.
The facade of the legendary Apollo Theater can be seen behind Steve, a reflection of the aspiring actor’s dream. Like many newcomers to the city, Steve did not know where he was going to live when he first arrived, so McGaughey also included a “rooms to let” sign in the background. Steve now resides in the Harlem apartment where his grandmother once lived.
A cool, mysterious figure takes a swig from a plastic cup in McGaughey’s portrait of Jamar. When the Brooklyn-based McGaughey moved to NYC 15 years ago, he spent his first year in Harlem where he constantly encountered Jamar out and about. “To me he’s that guy you see at every Harlem event. He’s like an ambassador of Harlem…everyone knows Jamar.” An entrepreneur and host of the Happy Harlem Hour tour, Jamar is “a person who knows how to make things happen,” according to the artist. “For me he’s a symbol of hope. He symbolizes ‘if you can make it in New York, you can make it anywhere.’”
“Amber has been a dancer, actress, singer her entire life,” McGaughey said of the Dallas native who relocated to Harlem to study dance at Juilliard. “I’ve known Amber since she was a baby. I went to church with her.” Dressed in a flowing regal purple dress with white flowers in her hair, Amber strikes a seductive pose on McGaughey’s canvas. “When I thought of Amber I thought of the Cotton Club,” the artist said. An image of the famous venue’s marquee and a poster of Duke Ellington and his orchestra appear in the backdrop of Amber’s portrait. “She just embodies the Harlem Renaissance to me,” McGaughey said of the performer, “creating your life. Coming here to use your gifts and your talents.”
Standing proudly with long blond braids cascading over her left shoulder, Hollis stares intensely at the viewer. The only portrait-sitter born and raised in Harlem, Hollis is a playwright and the daughter of Heath Gallery owners Thomas and Saundra Heath—the same Saundra whom McGaughey credits for his art career. In the portrait, Hollis wears a chambray shirt adorned with streaks of red, pink, and white painted by her father. “She wanted to be remembered in her dad’s art,” McGaughey noted. “I feel like I’m painting two portraits in one, because it’s her dad’s art and her dad’s creation, his daughter.”
Hollis also wears a pair of oversized gold hoop earrings. “As a child her mom would not let her wear those door-knocker earrings,” he added, “so to see her as this grown, powerful, Black woman, she now gets to wear the earrings…. To me she’s just a beautiful Amazon goddess, very confident, very strong.”
McGaughey has two more portraits to paint, one of Ashley, a celebrity makeup artist, and another of Reginald, an assistant pastor of The Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem. Once all six of the 36 x 48 inch portraits are complete and displayed side-by-side, a heartbeat running through the center of each background—an ECG-like line within the collaged images—will connect the Harlemites.
Art Crawl Harlem
An educational arts non-profit, Art Crawl Harlem was founded in 2008 by gallery-owner Averlyn Archer and event organizer Jacqueline Orange. The pair produced a guided trolley tour of Harlem introducing neighbors and visitors to Harlem artists, galleries, and cultural institutions, according to Williams, who joined the organization in January 2019.
Originally from Jersey City, Williams fell under the spell of Harlem himself years ago. He recalls sitting in the backseat of his uncle’s car as a child. “My Uncle Abraham drove down 125th Street… Something just pulled me to Harlem, so to live here so many years later it was a dream come true. It’s where I’ve always wanted to be.”
After being accepted for the Governors Island residency program, Williams had just a few weeks this summer to organize and find artists for Art Crawl Harlem’s inaugural event on the island. Before McGaughey arrived, photographer Ricky Day worked in the space and Lisa DuBois, a curator at Harlem's X Gallery, exhibited a public installation on the back porch of the house in September.
“This has been a wonderful opportunity,” McGaughey said of his experience on Governors Island. “There are so many different beautiful pockets and so much history here. McGaughey first visited the island last year. Wandering around, wondering what to do on the bucolic former military base, he discovered the historic houses surrounding Nolan Park, many filled with artists and exhibits. “Wow, they have artists here!” he recalled. Recently back from his first-ever residency in Barcelona, McGaughey was trying to figure out what he wanted to do next. “I remember standing in front of one of the homes saying, ‘I will be an artist-in-residence on Governors Island one day.’ And I walked away. Then a year later, I’m actually here.”
“It was that intention as well as his work,” Williams said of his decision to select McGaughey for the residency program. “I love the fact that he’s an African American Pop Artist and his Black muses are really superheroes to me. He allows them to come alive. There’s a back story, there’s a movement. I think this residency gave him an opportunity to work on a series of comprehensive works that the audience can harken back to.”
Williams notes that McGaughey’s artwork is reminiscent of Harlem Renaissance portrait photographer James VanDerZee. “It’s inspirational as well,” he adds. “He’s picked dynamic figures, diverse figures…an entrepreneur, a dancer, someone in faith,” members of a new generation of talented Black Americans who, like their predecessors a hundred years ago, moved to the iconic neighborhood to realize their dreams and create their lives.
Visit Demarcus McGaughey on Governors Island until October 31 or tune in to a virtual studio tour with him on Saturday, October 31 at noon. Go to artcrawlharlem.com to learn more.
The final works by both artists-in-residence, Demarcus McGaughey and Ricky Day, will be exhibited at the Kente Royal Gallery in May 2021.
And the celebration of the Harlem Renaissance Centennial will continue in December when Art Crawl Harlem presents Fire and Soul: Harlem 100, featuring visual art, poetry, and spoken word performances. Click here to learn more or to submit a proposal.
This need to be spread from state to state so that all artists can be inspired by what Harlem has ventured off into for a bigger and better spot light for all artists.
Posted by: Bryce Henry | 10/30/2020 at 09:16 AM