William Tolliver
William Tolliver, born in 1951, in Vicksburg, Mississippi, is the second oldest of fourteen children. Truly a rags-to-riches story, William, reared in abject poverty, had none of the advantages most people take for granted. Lacking both education and art supplies, and with little encouragement from his environment, the gifted Tolliver had to make do with what he could teach himself from books at the public library. Now a veritable master of all media, William Tolliver’s successful career bears witness to the fact that talent can and will triumph over the worst odds.
Tolliver is a versatile artist who handles figure studies, portraits, human interest situations, landscapes, and semi-abstracts equally well. His Mastery of color, harmony, and design is unmatched in the art world. He is at home in every painterly medium and uses a diversity of styles, all of which are polished and bear the unmistakeable stamp of his personality.
His works are reminiscent rather than messege oriented, often reflecting experiences from his Mississippi childhood. Recurrent themes in Tolliver’s art are people working and living---stevedors, farmers, cotton pickers, women embracing their children, and people playing musical instruments. He Portrays his subjects with a pride and dignity that heretofore has been uncommon among modern artists.
William Tolliver has been considered by many to be very likely the next great African American artist in the likeness of Romare Bearden and Jacob Lawrence. As a self taught artist, it is amazing the he has been able to master whatever he attempts.
Elizabeth Catlett
The granddaughter of slaves, Elizabeth Catlett was born into a middle-class Washington, D.C. family on April 15, 1915. She attended Howard University, and was the first to earn a Master of Fine Arts degree in sculpture from the University of Iowa. Her sculptures and prints celebrate not only famous African Americans like Harriet Tubman and Malcolm X, but also anonymous workers, as in "Negro Woman," "Sharecropper" and "Survivor." Catlett died on April 2, 2012, at the age of 96, in Cuernavaca, Mexico.
Bob Fitz
Bob FitzGibbons is a passionate photography who loves to travel the world to bring home fine art images of our planet which invokes an emotional response of awe and wonder. His images have appeared on magazine covers, and also hang in many private collections. When Bob is not out pursuing new fine art travel images, he is at home in Atlanta working with his wife Kim, in their life events photography business.