Skip to main content
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 7

William "Willie" White
Untitled 2 - Abstract Squares on Red Background

circa 1990

$400
$50020% Off
£305.39
£381.7420% Off
€349.78
€437.2220% Off
CA$560.40
CA$700.5020% Off
A$626.59
A$783.2420% Off
CHF 328.67
CHF 410.8420% Off
MX$7,589.55
MX$9,486.9420% Off
NOK 4,148.87
NOK 5,186.0920% Off
SEK 3,919.68
SEK 4,899.6020% Off
DKK 2,610.74
DKK 3,263.4320% Off

About the Item

Self taught outsider art by African American artist from New Orleans with work in major museum and private collections. White created a bold colorful world of animals, vegetables and other fantastic creations that captured his attention. Bold areas of primary color create a world all his own. Willie White was a nationally recognized self-taught artist who used felt-tip markers to render whimsical organic forms in flat, bold planes of color. Based in New Orleans, White depicted images from his rural Mississippi upbringing, television, and dreams in simplified palettes of green, blue, red, and black. White was born to a farming couple in Natchez, Mississippi. He attended school through third grade and, in 1929, left Natchez to work on “quarter boats” on the Mississippi River, repairing and securing the river levee. White moved to New Orleans and worked as a waiter for approximately twenty years. He later was employed as a janitor and as a sign painter during the 1950s and 1960s. He acquired an interest in painting after observing artists in the French Quarter in the early 1950s. Using house paint, he initially imitated their work but quickly developed his own ideas and techniques. In the early 1960s, he began to work almost exclusively with felt markers and white poster board and used canvas only when it was provided. His early subjects were neighborhood churches and crosses. White later gleaned images from television and his dreams, creating a diverse visual vocabulary. For example, he depicted modern innovations such as skyscrapers and rocket ships as well as organic forms such as fruits, vegetables, and celestial bodies. His whimsical, dynamic, simplified imagery is flat, bold, and textured with large patches of primary color applied to glossy poster board, and created texture and linear pattern with felt-tip marker strokes. His images are beautifully arranged and balanced, filling the entire field with color. White’s felt-tip drawings are in the collections of the New Orleans Museum of Art, the Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans, and Intuit: The Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art in Chicago, Illinois.
  • Creator:
    William "Willie" White (1910 - 2000)
  • Creation Year:
    circa 1990
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 22 in (55.88 cm)Width: 28 in (71.12 cm)
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
  • Gallery Location:
    New Orleans, LA
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU841312995752

More From This Seller

View All
Untitled 6 - Animals in the Light
Located in New Orleans, LA
Self taught outsider art by African American artist from New Orleans with work in major museum and private collections. White created a bold c...
Category

1990s Outsider Art Animal Paintings

Materials

Foam Board, Felt Pen

Untitled 5 - Herd Animals
Located in New Orleans, LA
Self taught outsider art by African American artist from New Orleans with work in major museum and private collections. White created a bold c...
Category

1990s Outsider Art Animal Paintings

Materials

Foam Board, Felt Pen

Truck Traffic (Colorful Gridlock in Manhattan)
By David Kapp
Located in New Orleans, LA
A six block woodcut published in an edition of only 23. It is signed and archivaliity David Kapp is best known for his paintings of the contemporary urban landscape. His paintings ...
Category

1990s Abstract Expressionist Landscape Prints

Materials

Woodcut

Mardi Gras 1980 New Orleans (playful forms cavorting in the carnival fun)
By Robert Gordy
Located in New Orleans, LA
"Mardi Gras 1980, New Orleans", shows playful forms cavorting in the carnival celebration. It is signed in the lower left, and stamped/numbered "671/850" in the lower right corner. ...
Category

20th Century Abstract Geometric Abstract Prints

Materials

Screen

Mizuhiki
By Katsunori Hamanishi
Located in New Orleans, LA
"Mizuhiki" is an exclusive publication by Stone + Press in an edition of 100. Katsunori Hamanishi was born in 1949 on Hokkaido island - Japan's second largest island. In 1973 he fi...
Category

1990s Contemporary Abstract Prints

Materials

Mezzotint

North End ( Reference to Chicago's gay sports bar in Boystown near Wrigley)
By Nicholas Krushenick
Located in New Orleans, LA
Nicholas Krushenick 's "North End" is a color silkscreen pencil signed, dated, and editioned; proof from the published edition of 200, . Nicholas Krushenick (American, 1929 – 1999) ...
Category

1970s Pop Art Abstract Prints

Materials

Silk, Screen

You May Also Like

Blocks of Color on a Red Field in Acrylic on Textured Paper
Located in Soquel, CA
Blocks of Color on a Red Field in Acrylic on Textured Paper Abstract color field composition by California-based artist, Ricardo de Silva (American/Brazil, 20th C). This piece is co...
Category

1980s Abstract Impressionist Abstract Paintings

Materials

Paper, Acrylic

Abstract Grid Composition on Red
By Frank Shifreen
Located in New York, NY
These new works start from polar opposite impulses which juxtapose the purity and beauty of platonic forms opposed to impulsive muscular instantaneous painting. Shifreen internalizes...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Abstract Abstract Paintings

Materials

Oil, Acrylic

French 20th Century Abstract Bold Red Diamond Amidst a Complex Grid
Located in Cirencester, Gloucestershire
Abstract Expressionist Composition by Gilbert Pelissier (French born 1924) signed, inscribed verso dated 78' oil painting on canvas, unframed canvas size: 16 x 31.5 inches condition:...
Category

Late 20th Century Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil

"It Is The Closest You Can Get", Contemporary Red Abstract
By Michael Pauker
Located in Soquel, CA
Beautiful red and white abstract expressionist painting with different hues of white and beige by Bay Area artist Michael Pauker (American, b. 1957). Titled "It Is The Closest You Ca...
Category

2010s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil

"Red Harmony" Abstract, Geometric, Colors, Bright Red, Green
By William Antonow
Located in Detroit, MI
SALE ONE WEEK ONLY "Red Harmony" is an abstract painting that does have a sculptural presence in the shapes of the red areas. The lush greens blend various shades into a background that while it does contrast sharply with the reds, it is not in conflict. The overall effect of this work is dynamic in its energy while at the same time harmonious. One of the original Cass Corridor artists from the 1960s William Antonow studied at the School of the Detroit Society of Arts and Crafts (now the College for Creative Studies) and at Wayne State University, where he received his BFA (1967) and MA (1970.) Antonow’s first one-person show at the Willis Gallery in 1971, represented a radical departure from his early work – abstract bronzes shown at the Michigan Artists exhibitions at the Detroit Institute of Arts in 1969 and 1970. A founding member of the Willis, Antonow publicized his exhibition with a cryptic invitation stating, “art isn’t anything.” Echoing the challenge implicit in the exhibition announcement, the works in the show consisted of precariously balanced piles of such non-art materials as wood crates and barrels, corrugated paper or cardboard, cellophane and beer cans. These brash, paint-slathered juxtapositions of salvaged objects were perhaps the first example of the nascent “tough art” aesthetic of the Cass Corridor. (Both Gordon Newton’s wood constructions and Bob Sestok’s crude “radio wheels” first appeared in 1972.) In 1975, in the inaugural group exhibition of the Willis at its new location in the Fisher Building...
Category

1980s Abstract Expressionist Abstract Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Abstract with Red Forms, Large Painting by Dan Teis
By Dan Teis
Located in Long Island City, NY
Artist: Dan Teis Title: Abstract with Red Forms Year: 1980 Medium: Acrylic on Canvas, Signed l.r. Size: 54 x 60 in. (137.16 x 152.4 cm) Frame Size: 55.5 x 61.75 inches
Category

1980s Abstract Abstract Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Acrylic