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PROFESSIONAL
QUOTES ABOUT FONSECA AND HIS ART:
Gary Snyder, winner of the 1975 Pulitzer
Prize for Poetry (Turtle Island), wrote the following
about Harry Fonseca's Coyote
paintings:
"Harry Fonseca's flower-like,
bird-like bright dancing images of Coyote and Rose
-- often placed
on the streets of our hard-edged urban world -- are
a promise like a knife: of sharp truths to come, of
new ways to be. I love the wit and play of his art,
and the depths of the myth it is founded on."
GS |
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Carey
Caldwell,
Chief Curator of History for Oakland Museum of California,
stated about Fonseca's "Discovery
of Gold in California" series:
"This exhibit doesn't preach
at anyone. The works are universal. They
reach out to everyone."
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In
her Master's thesis, " Coyote-A Myth in the
Making," Margaret
Archuleta wrote that Fonseca's works: ".....have had an impact on contemporary American
Indian art. No
longer is it necessary to have obvious icons (feathers,
beads, tipis,
buffaloes, etc.) to be real Indian art. The "real" comes
from cultural
connections, not depictions of what the viewer superficially
considers
to be "Indian."
"Through his works, Fonseca
allows us to use tradition to explain and
understand the present; often it is the continuity of
the past in the
present. His images endure and with them Indian identity
endures."
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Santa Fe freelance writer, Judy Allison,
stated about Fonseca's "
Rock Art Imagery":
"In his sketchbook series, flute
players, birds, animals and symbolic
designs vibrate against the textures and earthen hues
of
volcanic rock, punctuated by vivid splashes of chartreuse
and orange lichen. The larger paintings let us listen
to the music and their flutes, as cavorting and dancing,
they leap
from those
scratched, rough surfaces right into our hearts."
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For
his recent exhibition in the "Continuum" series
at the
Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian
in New York City, Jo Ortel wrote:
"Fonseca presented new works
which were both rich and intriguing, in
part because they entered into a dialogue with a number
of modern and
historic visual traditions - and yet they could be appreciated
on many
other levels."
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In
her comments, quoted by Ortel, in the "Continuum" series, Annie Ross said
about "The (Four) Seasons" pieces (2003):
"These paintings are full of
power, the energy of creation, and the
phenomena of constant change."
" His series stands as a knowing inversion of modernism
- and a pointed
jab at modern art's indebtedness to indigenous traditions."
" Like the Coyote that scampers through his paintings at
regular
intervals, this work carries the mischievous mark of
the trickster."
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Floyd Solomon wrote
in his article "Journeys to
Transcendence" in the
catalogue for Fonseca's one man exhibit at the Wheelwright
Museum of
the American Indian "EARTH, WIND AND FIRE" (1996):
"Fonseca's artistic presentation
of information through the use of
symbols reflecting two cultures and two philosophies
serves to educate
rather then merely entertain. His work presents an opportunity
to
initiate much-needed dialogue surrounding both history
and its
relationships to contemporary issues."
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Aleta Ringlero,
PhD., in writing for "The
National Museum of the
American Indian" magazine, Spring, 2005, stated:
"With the onset of a new millennium,
Fonseca's new work reflects a
mature style that defies simple classification. Fonseca's
vision is
influenced by a range of sources from the ultraradical
to the dynamic
tribal arts of non - Western cultures including African
masks,
Indonesian carving, and batik. However, it is abstraction
and the
nonrepresentational techniques pioneered by the New York
School of
abstraction expressionism that articulate the intensity
of Fonseca's
approach."
"While the contested arena of
Native art remains politicized over
issues of authorship and representation, Fonseca is not
content to let
others dictate what is Indian, what is authentic and
what defines the
traditional in his work. Do not expect the status quo
from the painter
for whom art is a profession, not a lifestyle. 'The task
of the painter
is honesty,' Fonseca remarks. The quest for self-exploration
is one
he is yet to exhaust."
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Elizabeth Woody,
winner of the American Book Award for Poetry (1990),
who dedicated a poem to the artist entitled "Deer
Dancer" (Luminaries of the Humble, 1994) wrote the following
poem for his "
EARTH WIND AND FIRE", a one man exhibit at the Wheelwright
Museum of
Indian Art in Santa Fe:
GOLD
oppressed
split the story
senseless in half
with abominable swords
ingots are conformity
cast in its depths
SLAVERY |
SUN
in heaped confusion
the embrace of light
is shadow to challenge
impulses with reverence
relatives and ancestors speak
generous serenity
FERTILITY
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In
her book of poetry "Indian Singing in 20th Century
America," (1990), Gail Tremblay wrote a poem for Harry Fonseca:
COYOTE, HANGING IN A MUSEUM,
COMES OFF THE WALL |
After days of blue haired ladies
commenting
on the odd slant of your eyes, asking
if real men wear earrings, or, "darling,
perhaps he's supposed to be a pirate";
after hearing, "my, what big teeth
you have," as if all people's stories
are the same, Coyote gets lonely
for brown women whose grandfathers
told them tales, whose memories
collect adventures that run deep in time
when everything was changeable.
Coyote waits 'til no one is looking,
comes off the wall to check out other
rooms. Hoping he's found the girl
of his dreams, ripe and ready,
he laps the ass of a Maillol bronze
and sniffs the air. The hard, cold surface
caresses no one's tongue, makes him
wish for desert girls who sing
while they grind corn, who know they own
the world and shyly catch the image
of a stare in the corners of their eyes.
How was it that he ever let that bright-eyed
brown man with the wild hair talk him
into posing, tell him fame would make them
both rich; one has to laugh, mangy gambler;
one has to laugh at where vanity and wealth
will take one. An Indian understands
you're just a horny devil playing tricks
on yourself and making the whole world
rich with ironies while people try to figure
out what the image you're creating means.
GT |
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Richard Tobin, writer for THE MAGAZINE, (1996), Santa
Fe:
"Perhaps Fonseca's artistry,
like the visual allure of medieval
painting, is a human testament to an ultimate, redeeming
beauty
in a painful truth."
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VISITORS COMMENTS:
1998: " THE DISCOVERY OF GOLD IN CALIFORNIA":
AN EXHIBITION OF PAINTINGS BY HARRY FONSECA,
OAKLAND MUSEUM OF CALIFORNIA
"Beautiful-powerful-moving,
Harry, Pure gold."
Nicole and Daren, 18 April 98
" What an extraordinary exhibit-the
way an artist's work should be
shown-such a beautiful installation and such a world
of
information-one could spend a few weeks here."
Cecile Moocneck
" ....And the land bleeds,
for it is full of gold, full of labor, and
full of greed. The land of opportunity indeed."
Unsigned
"
I have come to sit "on the riverbank" with
you about three or four
times so far in the few days since you opened. Each day
your work
works a bit more magic in me. It's not all calm-or peaceful-but
it is
deeply real. I expect I'll be in here several more times-no,
many more
times-before this show closes."
Claudett " Written
in blood and gold, American literature in the raw.
Thank you,
Harry, for this deep California Text."
David Roche
"Wonderful, powerful, honest.
A true representation that is felt."
E. Herron, 5/2/98
" Incredibly powerful images
taking you through the calm, peaceful,
beautiful landscape of Native land to the shattered,
scattered,
horrific patterns of the discovery of native land by
outsiders!
Extremely important pieces-the most impressive of the
entire gold rush
exhibit! Thank you for your energy! Congratulations."
Oakland Resident, 1998
I was very moved-by the land, sky,
and then blood and gold. So lovely,
yet so tragic. So mysterious."
Tom Mosmiller.
" 7/3/98. I had to return,
long after your opening, to look again at
these paintings. In an empty, quiet gallery, far from
the throngs at
the 'Gold' exhibit, these works are wonderfully expressive.
The
environment, nature, splattered and besmirched by sand,
blood, and
gold-far from seeming monotonous, instead, a exhibit,
emphasizes the
repeated changes, subtly different, wrought upon this
and every land by
forces often irresistible. Harry, I found it deeply moving."
Rudolf J.
"1/2/99 Harry-loved your idea-both
aesthetically and the motivation.
Makes me proud to be Indian. We need to expand awareness." Maya
Martinez, Mexican/American Indian,
Los Angeles, CA |
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