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Hubert Massey
"Mexicantown: Bagley Bridge" Proposal Drawing for Tile Mosaic, Watercolor

2016

$11,000
£8,314.64
€9,555
CA$15,317.43
A$17,040.02
CHF 8,932.59
MX$208,224.83
NOK 113,745.39
SEK 107,075.55
DKK 71,324.42
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About the Item

"Mexicantown: Bagley Bridge" is a proposal drawing for a mural completed by Hubert Massey in 2016. It is colorfully rendered on paper with color pencil and watercolor. Mexicantown is a significant area in the city of Detroit and the Bagley Bridge is a major entry route into the colorful street scenes and restaurants. This proposal captures iconic aspects of Mexicantown. The work is signed and dated by the artist in the lower right corner. Hubert Massey is a Michigan artist who works in a variety of media to create large public art installations. Massey is noted for collaborating with communities to create art that tell their stories. His bold vibrant images are installed in Detroit at the Museum of African American History, at the Detroit Athletic club, TCF Bank Convention Center (formerly Cobo Hall), Paradise Valley Park and Campus Martius. Chances are if you’ve visited Mexican town, Greek town, the Cultural Center, or any number of other landmark community attractions, you’ve encountered the remarkable work of master muralist-artist Hubert Massey. Massey is a graduate of Grand Valley State University and has studied at the University of London, Slade Institute of Fine Arts. He studied with Stephen Dimitroff and Lucienne Bloch, apprentices to muralist Diego Rivera, and is one of few African American artists painting in the true Buon Fresco style and the only known, African American commissioned fresco artist in America. An award-winning Kresge Fine Arts Fellow, his distinctive fresco murals grace the halls of such visible Michigan destinations as the Flint Institute of the Arts, Detroit Athletic Club, and his alma mater, Grand Valley State University, where he earned an honorary doctorate of fine arts in 2012. In 2014 the Detroit Regional Convention Facility Authority commissioned Hubert to create the first large-scale mural completed for Cobo Center since 1987. A fresco painting, the mural features images and tell stories of Detroit community pride. It is titled: “Detroit: Crossroad of Innovation” and measures 30’ x 30’. He said he learned the “lost technique” of producing frescoes two decades ago from the assistants to the creator of the most famous fresco mural in Detroit, Diego Rivera. Two of Rivera’s assistants were in Detroit for maintenance work on the 1932 Detroit industry murals. It created a special opportunity to learn the craft himself, Massey has said. “Back in the early '90s, the Art Foundation of Michigan chose 12 artists to study under Diego Rivera’s assistants,” Massey said, and he was one of them. “They came in, and after they did a restoration, they did a workshop, and the workshop was on the process of how to do a fresco. Out of the 12, I was the only one to pursue it. River sand, lime, marble dust and oxidized pigment. That’s all it is. Everything’s from the Earth.” “Public art begins with the community it will serve. In fact, after nearly 20 years of creating large-scale public works of art for various cities, communities and neighborhoods throughout the Midwest, it is my belief that public art should be, first and foremost, meaningful to those who surround it.” – Dr. Hubert Massey Unframed the piece measures 7 x 32 inches.

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