Highwaymen feel more timely, and necessary, than ever at Orlando Museum of Art

Viewing an exhibition at Orlando Museum of Art is a little different these days. But any tinge of inconvenience you might feel about wearing a face mask will dissipate if you take a moment to reflect on the much more significant challenges endured by Florida’s Highwaymen.

Florida’s celebrated collective of Black painters is being celebrated at the museum with an astounding 100 works by core members of the group.

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The Highwaymen received their nickname because the racism of the 1950s, when they began their unique endeavor, meant that traditional avenues to success in the art world were closed to them. So they went door to door and through pluck, perseverance — not to mention talent — sold their painted scenes of Florida’s beauty.

“They succeeded because they were spirited entrepreneurs,” writes guest curator Gary Monroe in the beautiful catalog Orlando Museum of Art has produced to accompany the exhibition. “During a shameful and trying time in U.S. history, they rose above a system designed to hold them in check.”

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Shameful and trying time? Does that sound familiar?

More on the shame in a moment, but obviously part of the trying circumstances of the present day is the COVID-19 pandemic.

Harold Newton painted this image of stormy weather, known as "Crashing waves along the shore." It's on view in Orlando Museum of Art's "Living Color: The Art of the Highwaymen" exhibition.

For safety, the museum is limiting the number of visitors, and tickets must be purchased in advance for a specific day and time so attendance can be monitored. During my visit, I saw at most 15 other visitors spread out through the multiple galleries.

Masks are required, and all complied during my trip — except for one boy, whose mother quickly informed him why it was important to cover his nose and mouth.

Signage keeps visitors all moving in the same direction, and for those who need a rest or desire a moment of contemplation, socially distanced chairs are available.

One quirk: The one-way travel requires that those seeking the main exhibition, titled “Living Color: The Art of the Highwaymen,” access its galleries from the side instead of through the main entryway; it’s fitting for the down-home feel of the works, like coming in through the back porch instead of the formal front door.

This painting by Mary Ann Carroll, known as "Backcountry twilight," was painted on Masonite board. It's part of Orlando Museum of Art's "Living Color: The Art of the Highwaymen" exhibition.

Beyond the health precautions, of course, looms the quest for racial equality, something that looms even larger when admiring the work of a significant school of Black artists.

The turmoil of the outside world can make these inside-the-gallery scenes look particularly candy-coated and simplistic — criticism that always has been leveled at the Highwaymen.

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“Sentimentality is central to these paintings and along with their beauty-pageantlike appeal has kept scholars at bay,” Monroe writes. “But romanticism is not their sustaining feature.”

As with much in the real world, there is more to the Highwaymen’s art than at first meets the eye: An appreciation of their unique quick-painting style, their eye for a natural Florida that is quickly disappearing.

Although the Highwaymen are renowned for their landscapes, people do turn up in their work from time to time. This image, by Harold Newton, is known as "Man relaxing on beached rowboat under coconut palms."

And every once in a while, a human figure appears among the bucolic beauty.

That does change things. Many of the roughly sketched human figures are “bordering on stereotype,” Monroe writes.

But those simplistic stereotypes mean something, too.

Why do the people seem to be simple fishermen or washerwomen? The poor, resting on the porches of their ramshackle cabins?

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The answer, of course, is that’s what these Black painters saw. That’s what their white customers of the 1950s would have found “acceptable” depictions of African Americans. And those facts give an added, deeper emotion to these works — a tinge of sadness among the scarlet plumage of the royal poinciana trees.

James Gibson painted this work on Upson board. Known as "Moonlit palms," the painting is on view in Orlando Museum of Art's "Living Color: The Art of the Highwaymen" exhibition.

The museum’s marked path will lead you through its other exhibits, as well, but don’t miss another small grouping of Highwaymen pieces in the alcove adjacent to gift shop before you exit.

Speaking of the gift shop, you’re going to want to pick up the catalog, with page after page of the gorgeous paintings, which usually hang in the private homes of collectors Allan Asselstine, Tim Jacobs, Roger Lightle, Scott Schlesinger and Lance Walker.

I can see why; this is art worth taking home and treasuring.

Because even the paintings’ simplicity has a higher purpose now, as both a reminder of why what’s happening in America’s streets is important and at the same time, providing a respite from the heightened emotional level of current public discourse — if the frequent toxicity of social media can even be considered discourse.

“In Highwaymen paintings, the social temper never boils over, and the perceived temperature is always comfortable,” Monroe writes. “Perhaps these paintings serve to check reality, to keep us on course as we move forward in a chaotic world.”

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The royal poinciana tree is a recurring image in the work of the Highwaymen, such as this painting by Harold Newton. It's part of Orlando Museum of Art's "Living Color: The Art of the Highwaymen" exhibition.
  • Where: Orlando Museum of Art, 2416 N. Mills Ave., Orlando
  • When: 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesdays-Fridays, noon-4 p.m. Saturdays-Sundays; through Aug. 16
  • Register: Book your ticket in advance at omart.org
  • Cost: $15; $8 seniors; $5 children and college students; active-duty military, veterans and children younger than 3 are free
  • Info: omart.org or 407-896-4231

Find me on Twitter @matt_on_arts or email me at mpalm@orlandosentinel.com. Want more news of theater and other arts? Go to orlandosentinel.com/arts

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