Robert Powell talks about his portfolio gallery and the kind of artistic collaboration he wants to model for the nation
As told to Lynnda Greene
Sculptor Robert Powell not only talks a good line—“Positive Motivation Through Art”—but lives it in his Portfolio Gallery and Education Center, arguably one of Grand Center’s most delectable (and authentic) gems. Over the last 16 years, the Kansas City native has slowly transformed the stately 115-year-old Victorian mansion at Delmar and Grand into a singular venue (and invaluable urban resource) for showcasing high-caliber art, mainly the work of outstanding African-American artists from around the country. Here, Powell, also a gifted wood sculptor, talks about the role played by African-American visual art in its own community—and about the American cultural conversation.
It’s hard to explain what I do. Though I earned a degree in physical education and industrial arts and taught in Oakland, Calif., I spent most of my life in sales. When the last job ended, I decided I would do what I’d always promised myself I’d do if I got the chance: work with art, especially sculpture. I never thought of myself as an artist until, one day, out of sheer boredom, I started to fool with a piece of wood. One thing led to another, and soon I was carving faces, then more abstract shapes, and then I found myself deeply involved with the wood itself. Now I can look at a good piece of oak or walnut, even a piece of driftwood, and enter a dialogue. I let it speak to me for a while before I begin; with wood, you have to listen. In general I like to follow the natural grain and shape, like following a river’s natural course—but, like a river, it can change and reinvent itself. Some pieces take a long time to become themselves; I rarely end up with what I thought I was starting. But, always, it’s a relationship.
I started this gallery 15 years ago because I wanted to promote black artists, who still have little presence in the American consciousness. It’s all about positioning. You see, no one really speaks for us. Who is writing about African-American art? I’m showing what you might call mainstream art by important black artists—art like the work you see in most galleries around this city—but no one comes here to write about it for the general public.
I find that critics, if they review African-American art at all, tend to compare it to standard white European art. The black artists they’re discussing often don’t even know the artists they’re being compared to. Most, I’d wager, have no professional training and not much education in the disciplines; I don’t think many go to art schools. But that’s our heritage: Lacking education, we have always expressed ourselves, what we live and feel, by whatever castoff and leftover things we can find.
Very little is being written about African-American art anywhere in this country, so our story remains largely our own—and untold; even we don’t know it. Black kids don’t know about black art because their parents don’t know it. Why is that? The stories, the great black artists, their work—people don’t learn about all that. That’s why I wanted to do this gallery and education center. I want to do more education but lack the funds, which troubles me because I know black kids are not taught about their heritage, even in schools.
Think about it: The African-American institutions in this town tend to be personality-driven. The founders of our major institutions—the Black Rep, Portfolio, the various choruses—are all still alive. Could they survive the death of their founders? I wonder.
Black cultural institutions are all young here. The Black Rep is 28 years old; Portfolio is 16 years old—and in the black community, that’s old. Consider that the symphony, the history and art museums are over 100 years old—imagine that! And they’ll go on, because they get the kind of support that will ensure their perpetuity. We’re still struggling to build our institutions so they can continue even into the next generation.
That said, St. Louis does a lot to support its arts communities. The Regional Arts Commission, the A&E Council, corporate and private donors here are very generous and have certainly helped me a lot. I wouldn’t be here without their support.
But in the end, it’s up to the community to nurture our own, which is difficult here because most local black artists are just too busy to teach on call. Most artists have to work day jobs, but I’ve found that white artists around town have more time to teach for me. It says something that African-American artists have to struggle to a degree that they don’t have time to pass their art on to their own community.
Black art lags far behind black music, dance and film, which have achieved a place in the national consciousness. But dancers, musicians and actors collaborate naturally, while artists, who tend to work alone, don’t. My goal is to set Portfolio up as a model of black artistic collaboration, a franchise of galleries and studios that would work in cities across the country, where African-American artists could work but also teach others, too, especially the youngsters. They’re our future.
