(American, b. 1946) Robert Freeman is celebrated for his monumental oil paintings depicting the jubilant social lives of the Black diaspora middle class. His gestural brush strokes, bold use of color, and layered paint application create vibrant scenes that skirt the line between figurative and abstraction. These dynamic compositions demonstrate the artist’s internal conflicts with the role of race in America and the global Black world, exploring the distinctions of his experience as a child in Ghana and as an adult navigating the complex social dynamics within the African American community. Freeman employs a literary approach to painting, allowing the characters in each work to reveal their personality to him and develop a narrative of their own.
Freeman was born in New York City, and lived on the east coast until 1955, when his father relocated the family to the Gold Coast of West Africa. He spent his childhood between Washington D.C., where he attended high school, and Ghana. He earned a BFA in 1971 and an MFA in 1981 from Boston University, where he had the opportunity to train with renowned artists Phillip Guston and John Wilson. Freeman has taught art at several institutions, including Harvard University, where he lectured from 1986-1992. The work has been exhibited nationally for over 40 years, and has been included in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the National Center of Afro-American Artists, Boston Public Library, Brown University and DeCordova Museum. His paintings have been featured in exhibitions at Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown, MA.
A recent interview of Robert Freeman for "Open Studio with Jared Bowen" on WGBH
