Ashley Bryan
Ashley Bryan spent his career bringing African culture to life through folktales, spirituals, visual art, and performance. A brilliant colorist, he brings to the page a magical sense of rhythm and movement. Whether he’s illuminating the pranks of a rascally trickster character, or celebrating the richness of African traditions, he communicates a sense of pride and wonder in the themes and textures of his ancestors’ stories. His passionate style, both on the page and with an audience, reveals the universal themes found in particular experiences through charming, rhythmic verses and a language that dances into the hearts of audiences.
A dedicated craftsman and teacher, he cannot remember a time when he was not an artist. He attended Cooper Union art school in New York City and Columbia University where he received degrees in art and philosophy. He taught drawing and painting at Queens College, Lafayette College, the Dalton School, and the Brooklyn Museum. For a many years he taught painting and visual design at Dartmouth College, where he is currently emeritus professor. He has exhibited his paintings in many one-man shows and has lectured and written extensively on his own work and on African American poets. In 1990, he was invited by the American Library Association to deliver the May Hill Arbuthnot Lecture.
Ashley Bryan has been richly honored for his works. Beat the Story Drum, Pum-Pum was a Parents’ Choice Award and received the Coretta Scott King Award for illustration. He received Coretta Scott King honor book citations, for his illustrations in 1983 for I’m going to Sing: Black American Spirituals; for his writing in 1986 for Lion and the Ostrich Chicks and Other African American Folktales; for his illustrations in 1988 for What a Morning! The Christmas Stories in Black Spirituals; and for his illustrations in 1992 for All Night, All Day: A Child’s First Book of African American Spirituals. His book of spirituals, Let it Shine has been selected for the Coretta Scott King Best Picture Book of 2007.
The gallery will be exhibiting a collection of Ashley’s large floral paintings during the month of July.