Artists on view: Kevin Cole and Sam Gilliam
By Howard Pousner The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
For more than 15 years, Fairburn artist Kevin Cole considered it his great fortune that Sam Gilliam, an undisputed giant of African-American art, was willing to serve as an informal mentor.
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But with �Prot�g�: Sam Gilliam and Kevin Cole,� an exhibition on view through Jan. 23 at the Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts and Culture in Charlotte, the older artist and his disciple have finally evolved into equals.
�I tell my wife, this is like being on cloud nine,� said the 50-year-old Cole, an art instructor at Fulton County�s Westlake High School. �He�s so well respected. I�ve gotten calls from artists from all over the country wanting to know, �How�d you get Sam to show with you?� It�s so humbling.�
Cole�s wife Karen, in fact, was a central figure in the first bit of advice that Washington artist Gilliam, now 76, gave the younger man when they met in 1994. Gilliam was serving as a juror of an exhibit at Chattanooga�s Hunter Museum of American Art, and included work by the Atlanta artist. With his then-girlfriend Karen, Cole attended the opening so he could meet Gilliam, whose career he had followed since the late �70s when he was studying art at the University of Arkansas-Pine Bluff.
Gilliam �said he liked my work, but I needed to push my materials, work larger. And he told me I needed to marry my girlfriend,� Cole recalled with a deep laugh.
Cole took Gilliam up on both suggestions, which have worked out well. Now a father of two, he�s been married to Karen for 11 years, a period in which his career has prospered. Cole now has more than 1,000 pieces in museum, corporate and private collections, including the Smithsonian�s National Museum of African American History and Culture and those of several former NBA stars including Michael Jordan.
Gilliam, famed as an inventive colorist who in the late �60s tore his canvases off the wall and turned them into draped sculptures, meanwhile has continued to be highly collected, commissioned and exhibited, including a Corcoran Gallery of Art retrospective in 2005 that traveled to four other museums.
After that initial meeting at Chattanooga�s Hunter � documented in the �Prot�g� catalog with a fuzzy black-and-white snapshot of a close-cropped Cole listening intently to his hero � the younger artist stayed in touch.
Then, in 1996, Cole was showing at Washington�s International Visions Gallery, and a newspaper referred to him as �the second coming of Sam Gilliam.�
�That scared me,� Cole said. But it also made him want to know Gilliam on a more personal level. A longtime friend of Cole�s who had collected both artists� work, then-Washington Wizards coach Darrell Walker, set up a weekend visit in 1998 for the Atlanta artist at Gilliam�s Washington home.
�One of the best weekends I ever had in my life,� Cole said. �We talked about art the whole weekend. He showed me books and books and magazines about art. We discussed galleries, museums, who should see my work and why.�
Many Washington visits have followed, and Cole has called his mentor at least twice a month and sent him printed-out images of his works-in-progress for critique. �It�s ?real, real valuable,� Cole said.
Yet in an interview from Washington, Gilliam downplayed the significance of his feedback. �I don�t know,� Gilliam said when asked if he�s had a hand in Cole�s evolution. �I think Kevin is very aggressive on his own. He works hard, shows all over the country. I think he�s following himself while knowing not only me but other artists and sculptors.�
Gilliam�s reticence likely stems from the fact that he�s a strong individualist � �I�d rather be like a tree that just grows silently,� he said � and from his belief that Cole has his own story to tell. Indeed, much of the Atlanta artist�s work is rooted in something his elderly grandfather told Kevin when, as an 18-year-old, he was reluctant to register to vote because he didn�t think it would make a difference.
Sam Cole Sr. knelt down with his cane and drew a map in the Arkansas soil showing his grandson where to go stand by a tree. �I did that and came back and told him that I had a real scary feeling. It was like people were watching me,� Kevin Cole recounted. �He told me that African-Americans had been lynched by their neckties on their way to vote. And it�s been documented in books that not far from there, in a town called Star City, a number of lynchings took place.�
Heavily patterned and richly hued neckties, which curl and entwine, have been a recurring motif of Cole�s wall-mounted sculptural paintings for decades.
But for �Prot�g� the artist took his mentor�s advice and pushed his work. Several of the monumental pieces (the largest, nearly 9 feet) have been liberated from the wall and hang from the Gantt Center�s ceiling.
When he sent Gilliam printouts of those in progress, Cole was surprised by the advice: �Kevin, you can stop now.�
Said Gilliam from Washington: �Some of his work at this point, I�d die for.�
On view
�Prot�g�: Sam Gilliam?and Kevin Cole�
Through Jan. 23 at the Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts and Culture, Charlotte.www.ganttcenter.org .
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