Charles Humes Jr.
March 2024
Visual Arts
Miami, FL
Miami-born, Charles Humes Jr., comes from a rich family heritage of the Grand Turks, Exuma, and Eleuthera Islands of the Bahamas. A nationally acclaimed painter, printmaker, draftsman, and educator. Humes's early expressions found a voice championing the plight of the homeless, urban conditions, and stereotypes predicated on socio-political, educational, economic prejudices, and bigotry.
Humes Jr. has received many national and regional awards for his signature depictions of the African-American condition. His studies include Florida State University, Florida International University, and Miami-Dade Community College, earning arts degrees in painting, printmaking, and arts education. A recipient of the State of Florida Individual Arts Grant in painting, A Smithsonian Southern Arts Fellowship Printmaking Fellow, a Bakehouse Residency Award, a Visual Arts Scholar and Residency at The University of Miami’s Center for Global Black Studies, and most recently an Ellies Creator Award Recipient and a Oolite Home And Away Mass MoCa Residency.
Humes Jr.'s paintings and drawings have been exhibited in galleries, universities, and museums throughout the United States and most recently completed a solo exhibition entitled MOTIC an acronym for ‘Matters of the Inner-city’ at the Miami International Airport Concourse D, March through September 2023.
BIO
“I create expressions that reflect and interpret flora, fauna, urban, rural, and human elements that I live in. My work explores the psyche and state of the Black experience, I explore the use of collage-forming, drawing, mixed-media, and painting using realist-minimalist methods of depicting or captioning a myriad of conditions, ie…. homelessness, depression, gun violence, old age, rites of passage and loss. Figurative natural & mechanical forms are my favorite icons in my work that reflect my efforts to document and examine the many nuances of African-American experiences.
My artistic palette is dominated by green “the color of life’ and black the “color of death”. Elements of structure, balance, and perspectives are juxtaposed in exaggerated figurative forms employing elongated stylized angles, spaces, and shapes. I am concerned with telling a visual story of people of color.
My intent as an artist is to open a visual window to view dramatic genres depicting intensive messages that create an impactful dialogue for my audience. Icons and symbols of past, present, and contemporary issues are featured in my work. My expressions paint an aesthetic of thoughtful and memorable tableau of life and time and genre of the African-American Diaspora.”
STATEMENT
How Do You Define Innovative Storytelling? How Can This Innovation Be Used As A Tool To Educate, Preserve, And Celebrate The Natural Environment?
“My impression of innovative storytelling is to create a narrative that expresses and queries the environment whether it's social, political, or personal. My concentration and practice have always been an honest yet extremely keen observation of my surroundings and how it affects daily occurrences, actions, and perceptions. My art centers around focusing on the given genre of life and using my art to reflect what I see, interpret, and feel. I am an African-Caribbean-American painter and am dedicated to showcasing the living plight of people of color wherever I am and I do this by using my visuals as a writer would use the word. I have taught the visual arts of drawing, painting, two and three design as well as preparing students for Advanced Placement through the COLLEGE Board nationally and through practice, I have given my life's work in the realm of education and preservation.
My portfolio and practice document the history and culture of a people as well as depicting the environment of man in concrete jungles along with the beauty of nature. I have been a resident of Florida for many years and presently I have had a shared existence in South Florida where I maintain a studio and in North Florida and Georgia areas of the Osceola National Forest and the Opakanokee Swamps, which is the home of my spouse and in-laws where I have a fond appreciation of nature, enjoying the pursuits of site-seeing, hiking and fishing in its lush environments, along with using my plein-air techniques to capture the beauty and serenity of these magnificent landscapes via my watercolors, drawings and sketches.
I use my craft as a tool to express and interpret my surroundings using the realms of realism, impressionism, and classical perspective to initiate a visual conversation about the environment and how I have been affected in that environment. It has always been a plan or goal of mine to create a series of works such as diptychs and triptychs on canvas and paper after observing and admiring the beautiful photographic essays of Clyde Butcher and as a student at FIU under the tutelage of the great landscape painter Jim Couper.
To be afforded the opportunity to document and express the wonders of the Everglades and to depict its beautiful flora and fauna which is unique to our South Florida environment would be an amazing chapter and hallmark of my arts career. I can fondly remember my Father and Uncles taking me as a child to areas of the Everglades as a sportsman participating in the activities of hunting and fishing and recalling the sounds and sights of wildlife that are so different from the sounds and sights of urban life that I was raised in. So for me, It is always special and amazing to be out in space, appreciating the wonders of nature and I hope to use my residency to appreciate, value and illustrate the environmental aesthetics, movements, and wonders of this place for future generations to come.”