Ralph Fasanella: Lest We Forget
Ralph Fasanella was a self-taught painter
who celebrated the common man and fought for the working class through artworks
that tackled complex issues of postwar America. “Ralph Fasanella: Lest We
Forget” positions Fasanella within a lineage of American painters who believed
that art can come from everyday life and that it can generate important social
change.
“Ralph Fasanella: Lest We Forget” brings together 19
of the artist’s most significant large paintings and eight sketches in
celebration of the 100th anniversary of his birth. It is on view from May 2
through Aug. 3 before traveling to New York City and is organized by Leslie
Umberger, curator for folk and self-taught art.
“The Smithsonian American Art Museum was an early
champion of collecting and exhibiting work by self-taught artists, so it is
fitting that we are presenting
powerful paintings on the 100th anniversary of his
birth,” said Elizabeth Broun, the Margaret and Terry Stent Director of the
Smithsonian American Art Museum. “Fasanella’s message of community and family
unity sends a potent reminder that the power to effect change lies in the heart
of every person.”
The son of Italian immigrants, Fasanella was born in
the Bronx and grew up in the working- class neighborhoods of New York City. He
labored with his father on his ice-delivery route, later working in the garment
industry, as a truck driver, gas station owner and union organizer. His parents
ingrained in him empathy and respect for the common man and taught him the
value of hard work and of fighting for one’s rights, lessons that would later
resonate in his works. Fasanella took up painting in 1945 and was able to
devote himself to it full-time in the 1970s, a period when his art became more
widely recognized.
A tireless advocate for workers’ rights, Fasanella viewed
painting as an extension of his union activity and created artworks as memorial
documents, teaching tools and rallying cries for his SI-130-2014B
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community. These paintings, often large in scale and laden with symbolic
imagery, deal with themes of struggle, endurance, social justice, family and
community. He felt strongly about the need to remember the sacrifices of
previous generations, inscribing the phrase “Lest We Forget” on several of his
paintings.
“The artworks on view chart a painting career that
spanned five tumultuous decades,” said Umberger. “As Fasanella grew as an
artist he developed an astute and accessible style that reflected his deep
commitment to the working class. He ardently believed that art didn’t have to
be elitist or unapproachable; it was a tool to be wielded like a hammer.”
As early as 1947, Fasanella was exhibited alongside
the top social realist painters of the day, including Philip Evergood and Ben
Shahn. His works hung in both galleries and union halls and effectively bridged
a divide between socially aware, self-taught artists and their trained
counterparts.
Among the 27 artworks on display are two major
paintings from the museum’s permanent collection. “Iceman Crucified #4” (1958)
is a tribute to Fasanella’s father and a recent gift to the museum from the
artist’s estate. In “Modern Times” (1966), the artist champions humanistic
values in an increasingly technological modern world. The display marks the
first time both paintings will be on public view at the museum.
The American Folk Art
Museum in New York City, which holds a significant collection of Fasanella’s
artworks and archives donated by the Fasanella family, has loaned six paintings
to the exhibition as well as the drawings and archival materials presented. (Text:
Smithonian Amercan Art Museum)