“Black Bird” by Benny Andrews

30 x 22 inches, hand pulled color lithograph on paper, limited edition of 275, (1980) —unframed

Benny Andrews (1930-2006) Benny Andrews, nationally recognized as an artist, teacher, author, activist, and advocate of the arts, grew up in rural Morgan County. Benny Andrews, a native of Plainview, began experimenting with collage as a student at the Art Institute of Chicago during the 1950s. His 1994 work Preacher, oil and collage on canvas (48” x 28”), is housed at the Morris Museum of Art in Augusta.Preacher Although he moved to New York in 1958, his formative years in Georgia continued to inform his work. Andrews explored American life in his collages, prints, paintings, and drawings by fusing memory and imagination. Andrews was born on November 13, 1930, in Plainview, a small farming community three miles from Madison. His mother, Viola, instilled in her ten children the importance of education, religion, and freedom of expression; his father, George, a self-taught artist, fueled their creativity with his drawings and illustrations. Although the entire family worked in the cotton fields as sharecroppers, Viola Andrews was adamant that her children attend school. Andrews’s attendance was sporadic because he went only when he wasn’t needed in the fields or when it rained.