Facing a mirror naked reveals what Albert Sangiamo devoted the 1970s to. His interest in portraits, nude from above the waist, began when he started his lengthy career at Maryland Institute College of Art, said Sangiamo, whose friends call him Abby.
“At first, I just did faces. That?s when I noticed, unlike most art books? claims, no face is symmetrical. That got me wondering: Are bodies asymmetrical too?”
Before teaching at Morgan State University and MICA, Sangiamo, 79, graduated from Yale University, where he studied with the accomplished Joseph Albers, he said.
An 86-piece retrospective on his charcoal, acrylic, pastel and oil drawings examines, among many aspects, the artist?s attention to the body?s forms.
From 1972 to the early 1980s, Sangiamo composed several hundred portraits while teaching at MICA.
The Brooklyn native revisited the works in 2004 to “give them a new life,” applying tattoos to the existing subjects, he said. “I was teaching a course on body art when I ran across a book on Russian prisoner tattoos that really focused my mind. Unlike the tattoos that kids get ? little hearts or the conventional ?scary? tattoos ? Russian tattoos were narratives that would tell why a prisoner was jailed, how many people he killed and the number of years he was sentenced to.”
In addition to portraits, the retrospective at Howard Community College presents Sangiamo?s depictions of enthralling trees, animals and infants floating in water, inspired by women birthing children in pools and tubs.
His engrossing paintings reveal the artist?s ability to investigate, said curator and former student Peter Collier. “He is a legend. He instills in you to look again and again at a subject from different angles and to always ask how can I make it better.”
Sangiamo taught waves of future well-known artists and art professors, subsequently shaping past and present art scenes, Collier said. “He not only taught conceptual aspects but the techniques as well like how to bring a line alive.”
IF YOU GO
Albert Sangiamo: A Retrospective, 1960 to Present
» Reception: Saturday, 6 to 8 p.m.
Artist Gallery Talk, 7 p.m.
» Venue: The Rouse Co. Foundation Gallery
Howard Community College
10901 Little Patuxent Parkway, Columbia
» Show: Through Oct. 7; Monday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
