A Gallery Talk -- "The Family of Man - Breaking Stereotypes" -- will be on Thursday, August 12 at 6:30 at the Discover Portsmouth Center. RSVP suggested but not required, 603-436-8433. This exhibition is in celebration of the Portsmouth Black Heritage Trail's 15th anniversary year.
Richard Haynes, Jr. can best described by this quotation from the artists' web site: "Like Walt Whitman, he celebrates what it means to be an American in an era of great National transformation. Like Whitman, he tells our stories, not with words, but using shapes and hues, in a style that is both instantly familiar and surprisingly new".
ABOUT RICHARD HAYNES
Richard Haynes, Jr. painter, photographer, southerner, yankee, father, veteran.
Richard Haynes is truly an American Artist. He knows this country from every perspective. Born to the south in 1949, Richard hails from James Island in Charleston, South Carolina where he spent his boy hood.
In 1958 he made the enormous cultural leap to New York City, and attended the High School of Art & Design. After four years in the U.S. Air Force at the height of the Viet Nam era, he majored in Fine Arts as a painter/ printmaker at Lehman College, a New York City University, graduating in 1976.
Richard received his MFA in 1979 from the distinguished Pratt Institute. CBS hired him as an Art buyer for their publishing company Holt Rinehart and Winston. In 1984 he held the position of Staff Photographer there and two years later established Haynes Images.
Richard's colorful and diverse life is directly reflected in his art. Whether celebrating the harsh lives of migrant workers, or wandering the ancient halls of a colonial New England mansion, Richard sees scenes through his own deeply-held vision of America.
"Art does not reproduce the visible, rather it makes the invisible visible." Richard says. His works of art are part memory of his subject, part nostalgia, part hope-- one man's reprocessing of a topic, shape, and color, into something else all together.
His work hangs in the permanent collection of the Currier Museum of Art where he also served as artist-in-residence. His evocative paintings regularly win regional awards and press attention. He divides his time among freelance commissions, book illustrations, and thematic work on topics close to his heart.
Richard begins, simply, with the scenes and citizens that capture his eye. Like Walt Whitman, he celebrates what it means to be an American in an era of great National transformation. Like Whitman, he tells our stories, not with words, but using shapes and hues, in a style that is both instantly familiar and surprisingly new. -- JDR
