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When painter Sam Gilliam died last weekend at the age of 88, he left behind seminal works of art, notably his draped, flower-stained canvases, that forever changed the way the world viewed a painting. But he also left a more personal legacy: his influence on fellow artists and friends.
Sculptor Melvin Edwards, 85, was friends with Gilliam for more than 50 years and formed a close trio with painter William T. Williams. Edwards and Gilliam owned each other’s work and would quiz each other endlessly about the process, sometimes chatting three or four times a day.
“We always asked why the other had done something a certain way,” said Edwards, who is perhaps best known for his Lynch Fragments and Barbed Wire series. “But that was the nature of Sam’s work: she always questioned the space.”
Just two days after Gilliam’s death, Edwards and Johnson spoke in a revised and condensed conversation about how they process his life and work, his decision to remain in Washington, DC, and his success in being his own best critic.
Now how do you see Sam’s signature move – taking the canvas off the wall and draping it, which he says was partly inspired by laundry hanging on clotheslines?
MELVIN EDWARDS Sam was a very good painter who was curious and eager to experiment. Thinking about the surfaces on which art was made didn’t start with Sam — but he did take a step most people didn’t realize was possible. Sam took the plunge. He was properly seen by some people who paid attention to such things, and they immediately blessed it.
Oftentimes, fellow artists will see the implications of the style and the potential meaning fairly quickly. One of the earliest things I did was hanging elements made out of steel and chains. When Sam and I exhibited together at the Studio Museum in Harlem [in a landmark 1969 show], I made the first of my pieces of barbed wire, some fixed to the wall, others hung. And we almost took it for granted that we took both steps.
So there were these swirls and echoes between you guys, right?
Edward Look, it’s all visual art, it’s not about labeling. It’s either up or down or left or right. For me and most artists, it’s like having a baby. When you’re having sex, don’t think about what you’re going to name the baby.
Rashid, what were your entry points into Sam’s work?
RASHID JOHNSON There are many, but most important is his relationship with improvisation, his ability to react in real time with gestures, markings and decisions in a way consistent with America’s greatest art form and most ambitious innovation: jazz music. We talked about that. Just watch Sam explore with an honest and radical confidence. This radicalism was related to improvisation and innovation.
Which innovations in particular?
JOHNSON For me, its bevels are just as ambitious an innovation as the detachment of the canvas from the stretcher frame. [Gilliam’s “Beveled-Edge” or “Slice” paintings, a series that began in the late 1960s, were made on beveled-edge stretchers that projected off the wall.] I think there is something really meaningful about this work.
Mel, do you agree?
Edward You didn’t need to know where Sam was going. The plays were supported in many ways. For example in the last show on Pace [featuring Edwards and Williams], the sawhorses he used were a perfect contrast for Sam and spread his work out horizontally. It was human sized, while the other pieces in this exhibition took us straight to the ceiling.
Sam was quite competitive and talked about wanting to win the art game – artists don’t talk that way these days.
JOHNSON Some of this is generational. Older artists are more willing to admit the competitive spirit. It’s different from today. I have great respect for this way of thinking. There’s a beauty in trying to win. Even if there is no direct opponent.
He was a tennis player and maybe that had something to do with the desire to compete.
Edward When we spoke two months ago, I teased Sam that he was a tennis player. Our friend William was a track and field long jumper, and football was my main sport in high school. We were all physical people who understood physical dynamics. I don’t mean that it translates one-to-one to our work, but I do mean the sensitivity to three dimensions.
Rashid, you talked about a black artist’s decision in the 1960s and 1970s to work abstractly and not represent blackness directly in representational or figurative terms – and how that lives on for you.
JOHNSON That was a decision, and it’s a fool to pretend it’s not true. Sam and artists like Sam, who chose abstraction as a vehicle and saw it as a way forward, were also aware that they did not include the Black body and Black thematic concerns. I thank these people. It wasn’t always rewarding in the typical way.
Sam remained in Washington and until late in life did not have a permanent gallery presence in New York, the center of the art world. How has that affected his career?
Edward He had his independence, which was at the core of his personality anyway.
If I interviewed him in 2018 and asked him if being black had inhibited his career, he answered both yes and no, and he was not interested in clearing up the contradiction.
JOHNSON Honestly I love it and I see a lot of truth in both answers. White western history often does a great job of centering itself. For me as a young artist, Sam Gilliam was important. Mel, Ed Clark, William T. Williams, they were heroes to me. And the fact that they were not so ambitiously represented in some cultural institutions was not an obstacle to my view of the world.
Edward People think that stuff written about white people is what we need to strive for as meaningful. The art world has its way of seeing things and educating us, so we often limit our thinking. Ultimately, Sam wasn’t limited by this stuff.
I know it’s so soon after his death, but what is his most important legacy?
JOHNSON I rejoice in the life he lived and the impact he had on so many of us. For me, it’s the cycles in his life and career – the fact that he’s continued to work and create things that have not only complemented his legacy, but expanded it. I know some people will cite his early breakthroughs, but honestly I think over the last three years he’s delivered us with the most ambitious work he’s ever done. This part is important. This guy really moved on.
Edward I’m just glad Sam was Sam and did what he wanted to do. He always maintained this attitude. You could fill the whole New York Times with just Sam and forget the rest. This is my emotional attitude toward my boyfriend. He was glad his work was getting more exposure and more funding coming his way, but it’s been a hell of a fight. He always wanted to do the work, and he did it until he couldn’t anymore.
